October 28, 2020

Machine-generated transcript — may contain errors.

All right, we should be good. Okay, welcome everybody. Adequate notice has been given, and as always, we're going to start with the pledge to that famous flag in Sean's background there. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Okay. All right. So, as always, we're going to start with recognizing our own, and it's Red Ribbon Week, so it's the all-in Clayton Coalition, and I'm going to hand it over to Sean. Thank you, Joe.

Good evening, everyone. And I'm actually going to hand it over to Robin Wiens, who is our superintendent of student services, and she's going to talk a little bit about that and introduce a few people that we want to recognize. Thanks, Sean. So good evening, everybody.

I wanted to recognize All in Clayton Coalition this evening at our board meeting because this week is Red Ribbon Week. And in just a moment, a few special guests are going to tell you a little bit more about what Red Ribbon Week is. But just a little bit of background information. The All in Clayton Coalition was founded by several parents, including Bruce Butler and Beth Deutsch several years ago.

And in February of 2020, the All in Clayton Coalition was able to hire a full-time project coordinator. And in February, we welcomed Kim Sharone as our project coordinator. And she started with us earlier in the year. In about three weeks after she started, we went into emergency school closure.

So I just wanted to take a moment to recognize Kim for the incredible amount of creativity she has shown with the organization to pivot so quickly and to take the coalition's action plan and bring it to life under completely different circumstances than when it was written. We have been able to work with her to bring the coalition into such an incredible place from where it was just a year ago. And so I'm going to hand it over to Kim and her special student representative who's with her this evening to tell you more about Red Ribbon Week. Great.

Thank you so much, Dr. Weins. And yeah, it's definitely been a very eventful year, you know, as I think it's been for all of us. I just feel so grateful to have landed in the position that I'm in.

It was a great place to land, you know, a few weeks before a pandemic broke out and the support of you and the school district has just been phenomenal. We couldn't do the work that we do without the support of the school district. So thank you all so much for having us here tonight. Again, my name is Kim Ciarone with the All in Clayton Coalition.

And I just want to take a quick moment to share with you all a little bit more, like Dr. Wien said, about Red Ribbon Week. So this is a week, October 23rd through the 31st, and it's the same set of dates every year. And this week is really about promoting safe, healthy, drug-free living amongst youth.

And it's also a week where communities and schools can raise awareness around substance use and can really ratchet up their substance use prevention. Prevention is a year-long effort. It doesn't just happen during Red Ribbon Week, but Red Ribbon Week is a great way to bring schools together and to have a unified effort when it comes to substance use prevention. So just a little bit of history about Red Ribbon Week.

This week started with a man named Kiki Camarena. And Kiki was his nickname. His real name was Enrique Camarena. And Enrique was an intelligence officer for the DEA back in the 1980s.

And he got assigned on a mission in Mexico. And his job was basically to get more intelligence on drug traffickers who were bringing in large amounts of drugs into the United States. Superroportion O levy agenda motion carried Traffickers who he was there to actually stop So it had a very tragic ending to his life but his friends his family wanted to continue his legacy of you know really wanting people to be safe to stay drug free And so they did that by wearing red ribbons. That very small gesture has really turned into a national movement over the last few decades.

And it's something that schools and communities participate in all over the country. So it's really cool to see, especially on social media, all of the different things that people are doing. So just a few things that All In is doing this year to celebrate Red Ribbon Week. Again, as Dr.

Ween said, it's definitely been challenging to try to do the in-person activities that we had planned on when we were doing our action plan last year. Little did we know that this is how the year would look. But we have been able to participate in several different events. The first is the DEA National Drug Take Back event that was actually this past Saturday.

It was outside of the center of Clayton and the Clayton Police Department was gracious enough to allow us to have a presence there. And we had several volunteers, all social distancing, wearing masks, but we were able to pass out information on the coalition and about 100 of these things. So these are called Deterra bags. They're at-home drug disposal bags.

So if somebody isn't able to take their prescription meds to a drug take-back box, or I'm sorry, a drop box or a drug take-back event, they can use one of these bags to safely deactivate and dispose of their medication at home. This is really important right now more than ever because so many kids are still at home, family members are still at home, and so we just want to make sure that people are disposing of their medication when they're done using it. Another really exciting activity that we're able to present to parents is a film called Don't Wait. This film was produced by our partners at Addiction is Real, and it's a wonderful resource for parents of really kids of all ages.

And this film is about an hour and it discusses the importance of parents having conversations with their kids. And it's not just a one time conversation, but it's early and often conversations about drugs because that can actually significantly reduce kids risks of using drugs in the future. So we were able to give free access to parents at Y down and CHS to that film through the month of November. And we've gotten really good feedback and we're thinking about opening up to elementary school parents as well.

Because, again, we know the younger prevention can start, the better off our kids will be, the more we can reduce their risk. And then last but not least, we've been able to do some things at the middle school and high school and elementary school this year. Superintendent, Board of Education, Proposition O, levy, agenda, motion carried. Superintendent, Board of Education, Proposition O, levy, agenda, motion carried.

Thank you. We like wear sweatpants and sweatshirts and stuff and so on and so forth. And we have people take pictures and email them to Miss Sharoni. And every time that they take a picture and email it to her, their name gets put in a raffle once to go into a big raffle that we will pick four top people.

Then we will pick two top people and then one winner. Superintendent Board of Education Proposition O levy agenda motion carried Card to either Starbucks Barnes Noble or Amazon And the runner up will get a gift card to those places too So our other student reps that help with this are Rafael Rodriguez, Sydney Hallway, Camille Matlock and Gabriel Talsky. So we had a lot of fun doing this. We put together a really fun iMovie.

So, yeah, that's really it. Thank you for your time. Thank you so much, Kira. And Kira, she's not going to tell you all this, but she spent a lot of time putting the video together.

She did all of that. And this was really a student led effort, which for us as a coalition, that's what we want to see is youth really leading the way. So we look forward to expanding our efforts next year when we're hopefully able to do more in-person events. But that's really it in a nutshell.

So I appreciate you all taking the time to hear a little bit about our Red Ribbon Week activities. Thank you so much. Thank you both. That was great.

We appreciate it. So we are, Sean, going to move on to your superintendent report. Okay. All right.

Well, good evening, everyone. It's good to see all of you. And so tonight, as part of my superintendent report, I'm going to give another update around our return to learn plan. And I'm also just going to give a brief update about our strategic plan because I want to make sure that the board is in the know about some of the work that we've been doing around that.

And so to get us started, I want to just take a few moments to say thank you. And I think that one of the things that I always encourage people to do is practice gratitude. So I want to say thank you to the Board of Education for your support over the last seven months. I want to say thank you to the teachers who have been working so incredibly hard in the classrooms and have pivoted so many different times throughout this year.

Superintendent, Board of Education, Proposition O, levy, agenda, motion carried. We've had to make some difficult decisions and we've had to take next steps, even when it was difficult. And I know that this situation is emotionally draining and I know that it's emotionally charged and it's a situation that's new to everyone. And so I want to just, I just want to put it out there that I'm a firm believer in that collective, when you have collective efficacy, when a group comes together and feeling very capable of doing something, you can get through it.

And in this situation, there's nothing that's perfect. And there's not going to be any decisions that I'm going to make that everyone's going to be 100% supportive of. And I know that students and parents and teachers and board members even, administrators will maybe not agree with every decision. But I feel like we always have to come together and move forward collectively so that way we can do what's best for our students.

That's what we're going to do. So as part of our return to learn plan, I want to just kind of give you a brief update of our current reality. So on October 12th, we started welcoming our Family Center students back in and added, we still are continuing to add classes. So we started with a few classes and have gradually added some more, and that's been working well.

All of our K-5 students are back in school, those students who are in responsive learning. Superroportion O, levy, agenda, motion carried. Superroportionate, Proposition O, levy, agenda, motion carried. Superintendent Board of Education Proposition O levy agenda motion carried Thank you And then you can see that there are quarantines that happen.

And the reality is that quarantine is part of this, part of all of this. And it's something that is, it's not necessarily a bad thing. It's something that's part of this process. And so it's keeping people safe.

We had to quarantine two classes this over the last couple weeks. And that's why you see a spike in that. What we've been able to do is pivot those classes into remote learning. And we've had some individual cases of students quarantining.

So we are working with the ever-changing guidance of St. Louis County Health and I will say that we've tried to make sure that we've been consistent, but we also have to go by what the guidance is by St. Louis County Health and these quarantines aren't something that we say, this is what we're doing. We get that guidance from St.

Louis Public Health. I also want to just emphasize is that since we've had those quarantines, we haven't found out that there was a transmission that happened within our schools. And so those situations where we've had presumptive cases or cases of COVID, they're not being transmitted within our schools, which is also good to know because we've put a lot of risk mitigation measures in place. And that's a good sign that these transmissions that we do have in our community are not happening within our schools after we do the contact tracing.

As I shared with you last week, I think it was last week, we are continuing to monitor different data points. And those data points, we're not going to just use one to make these decisions. We're going to look at positivity rate within the community. And we're also going to look at cases per 100,000 for school age groups.

Superintendent, Board of Education, Proposition O, levy, agenda, motion carried. When we're talking about school age, 100,000 school age by group, by school age group. And what we've seen, and this area right here, I don't know if you can see my cursor, when we're looking at our 15 to 19 year olds, we're continuing to see an increase there. And it's right at that 20.

So we're at that cusp right now. And that's in between that lowest and moderate risk. And so, but we also have that coupled with our positivity rate, which is falling near that is in that highest risk. So the other thing that's really important to remember about this is that the CDC says that you lower the risk when you have the right risk mitigation tools in place.

And so they say that if you use the consistent and correct use of mask, social distance, social distancing to the largest extent, hand hygiene, respiratory etiquette, cleaning and disinfection and contact tracing in collaboration with the local health department, that helps mitigate the risk. And so I'm going to continue to monitor that. And I am going to have to make a decision based off of this data and also based off the risk mitigation measures we've put in place. And so I will have that decision by November 2nd and let people know.

I'm glad to see that we're kind of still falling within the lowest risk for our middle school age students. And I find that to be encouraging. And so I will let the board know what my decision is and make sure that you know before we send that out to the public. I think the other thing that's important to remember is that there are lots of news stories out there and we're seeing lots of things in media right now.

And we are aware of that and we know that our public sees that. And so we have to continue to think about how are we educating our parents about those things that are keeping our kids safe within the school. So that's why we're producing videos, putting information out there so everyone feels informed. And then the other thing too is when we're looking at that school age group, the 15 and 19 year olds, we think it's important to note that when we look at disaggregate that a little bit more, we tried to see if we can get some additional information about where are they falling because that range falls between 15 and 19.

And so, Chris, can you talk a little bit about this slide that you produced for us so we can... Have a better understanding of this? Yeah, absolutely. So through a partnership with Mercy Health Systems and actually the St.

Louis Metro Area COVID Task Force, school districts back at the beginning of October were given access to a few specific data points that they can actually disaggregate by the boundaries of their district. And one of the things that we can look at is total number of cases that we've seen within that. And just to understand how that's tracked back to our district is that's based on the paperwork that's filled out. That is the zip code associated with the positive test is how that was explained to me.

So we don't have data that takes this back to a specific address, but we do have it by zip code. And we know that we have both WashU and Fontbonne University have student housing within our zip code. So we've been trying to look at this data and really understand what it means, because if you look at those first four student age groups, 0 to 4, 5, 9, and 10 to 14, you know, those numbers look a heck of a lot different than that 15 to 19-year-old age band. So while we haven't been able to narrow down, kind of geocode those specific positive cases, the people in charge of this dashboard at Mercy have been super helpful.

They were able to break that 63 positive tests out by specific age groups. So you can kind of see that the majority of those, 42 of those actually by my count here are in the 18 to 19 year old range. Based on where we are in the school year, you know, we can reasonably assume that there's very few of those 18 year olds that are probably seniors in high school right now that have already turned 18. So this tells us that a lot of those 18 and 19-year-old cases are more than likely associated with positive tests at Wash U and Fontbonne.

The challenge with any of this data is that there's a lag in it. I mean, the data that we're getting today, even though it's dated October 28th, is really from October 20th, October 21st. Part of that is just due to the confirmation process they go through with making sure that all those numbers and those totals are correct and nothing is double counted or anything like that. So one of the things that you can take away from that, though, is you can see since we've been able to look at this, you can see that there's been reasonably small numbers of increases in positive cases in those school-aged age groups as we look at this.

Thank you, Chris. I also wanted to inform the board that we did give the families an opportunity to switch either into responsive learning or learning at home. And we did have some students that the increase, we did have an increase in the number of families that wanted to do learning at home at the secondary level. And so out of our Clayton High School and White Island Middle School, there's about 23% of the students that are going to do learning at home.

And then there's about 20% at YDOWN that they're going to do learning at home. So I wanted you to have those stats as well. The other thing is that last time we met, the board asked if we could put some additional guidance out there for families because, you know, people don't know what it means when we have to quarantine or what is my situation, what is my family situation. And so we took that feedback from the board and decided that we wanted to try to come up something from our communications department that would give some additional information, but not set information, because we can't say this is exactly what will happen because every situation is unique.

So if you go to our website now, you can see these proposed questions. And then this is for self and scenario two is for family. And so I wanted you to see we appreciated the feedback from the board and we did follow up with that and put that information out onto our website. So I'm going to stop right there before I just move into a brief overview of the strategic plan and see if you had any questions.

I just have a quick question. Yes. So I'm wondering if families are able to, so you're going to make your decision on the second, but then some families I think might want to make their decisions kind of based on what your decision is going to be So I wondering if there will be an opportunity after you make your decision for families to then maybe modify what their decision is Does that make sense Yeah, so my decision on November 2nd would be probably whether or not I would have the middle school and high school start on November 9th. And we already gave them a window of time.

If we did have families that said after I make the decision, if they reached out to us, we will try to accommodate that. But we've tried to give them a window of time to switch. But we'll take that into consideration. Yeah, and so there's so many variables that change day to day.

So I just want to make sure that we're flexible. Okay. Okay. I have a question.

Will teachers like students have the opportunity to choose if they want to stay at home. So teachers will be expected to come in. We did have opportunities for teachers if there was if it was necessary for teachers to stay home during due to specific reasons could be medical reasons. We did give teachers those opportunities to do that as well.

And they had a window of time to sign up for that as well. See whether or not they qualify for that. Other questions for Sean? Go ahead.

So I may have just missed this or misunderstood when Chris was talking about it, but the, I don't know if we can go back to the slide that had the district specific numbers. But it sounded like that was driven by zip code information. Is that right? This one?

Right. So if if cases in the district, is that is that information that we're getting based on if it's a zip code that is part of our district? Correct. So the the the dashboard that we have access to through Mercy allows you to filter the St.

Superroportionate, Proprietary, and Proprietary. We're using St. Louis County data as well because we have families and teachers that live throughout St. Louis.

But this was just the specific data that was attached to Clayton. Okay. Yeah, that was actually going to be my next question. Yeah.

So thank you for clarifying that. Other questions? Yeah, just one more for me. Do we know, do we have data that indicates what kind of what an originating source is, you know, on some of our major, you know, like taking down a whole classroom.

Do we have an idea how much of the league sports is playing on it? You know, just speaking as somebody who's just getting a kid out of quarantine from league sports, and we don't even play. So I'm kind of curious, you know, and kind of the basis of my thing is, you know, there's a lot of focus from a community perspective of get the kids back to school. But if the community isn't making the right decisions that help get kids back into school, all the planning that you and your team do becomes moot, right?

So I get nervous that, you know, it's all for naught if we end up just kind of turning into a giant hotspot no matter what. So if it's something that we're tracking, it may be a good data point for the league organizers to be aware of what the impact that, you know, those games are having. And if there's no impact, that's good, too. It's just it's a data point that would be interesting to understand.

So, Heather Christman, who is the head of our nurses, who is incredible, by the way, with the job that she is doing. I should have thanked her at the beginning because she is running ragged. But yeah, she is doing all the contact tracing. And so we do have data in terms of looking at the sources.

I'd have to look and see what that data looks like. But again, when we have had cases, we're noticing that the transmissions are not happening within the school environments. And so it is happening usually outside of the school. So I'd have to look at what it is.

I'd have to look at the data to see where it is coming from in terms of its sports league or family or something like that. I can clarify a little bit So David we have a spreadsheet tracking every positive case and every quarantine that we aware of throughout the district And then that ties back to what the positive cases another pretty elaborate contact tracing document that completed by our staff that has been trained as contact tracers So what I can't say without getting too specific is all the positive cases that we've had, and Sean, pardon me, Sean said this earlier as well, are either tied to family transmission. So there's been somebody in the household that has, you know, and generally it's been a parent that has become positive and then brought that into their household. And that's how specifically the two classrooms that we have have been impacted.

We are tracking as many cases as we can of students who are not currently enrolled or not currently attending, you know, in-person class. And we are aware that with some of those, there is some that there are a few cases that are related to the league sports. But, you know, I don't know that it's enough at this point to call it a trend, but it's a, it's a, to your, to your point, it's a data point of interest. Yeah, so I know I appreciate it, Chris and Sean.

And by the way, I will say, you know, as a family that had to go through a quarantine decision, I think I think your team's handled it remarkably well. So, you know, we get I know we're we're building the ship a little bit while we're floating on it. But I think the communication that we've had from all levels of the administration, from teachers to nurses to principals, has been pretty stellar. Thank you, David.

I appreciate it. I have a couple questions. Go ahead, Stacey. The numbers that we have of Clayton students that currently, like the current cases are kids in quarantine, are those, do those come from the health department or are you expecting families to self-report those?

And I think you were just talking about this, but do those include like our middle school and high school kids that maybe don't feel like they need to report it now because they're not physically at school yet? So the data on the dashboard does not include, it does include students who are in sports right now. Isn't that right, Chris? But not students that are, so.

Yeah, that is correct. So the data that we're representing on the dashboard is students and staff who are in our buildings right now. That said, each of our school nurses are actively tracking other cases that they are made aware of. So in other words, so let's say, for example, you have a sophomore at the high school that has COVID but is not in school, not involved in any school-related activities that that might impact.

We are still tracking those and keeping aware of those. But, I mean, because of HIPAA requirements, we do not get name-specific information reported back to us from the county health department. Are you depending on people to self-report, I guess is what I'm asking? By and large, yes.

And I think that, you know, up to this point with, you know, especially with all of our staff and all of our students that are in schools, you know, our parents and families have been really excellent partners with us in helping manage that aspect of that and keeping either their principal or their school nurse or their teacher kind of in the loop as to what's going on. And we do have actually an extra layer that we've set up even within PowerSchool for tracking absences so that when there is a student that's out sick, there's an additional layer of follow-up from that school nurse to track down why that student is out to make sure that if that's somebody that we need to be paying attention to and monitoring moving forward, we capture that individual and keep an eye on them. Thanks. I have one more question, and I think you probably talked about this a while ago, but since we are talking about now getting middle school and high school back, could one of you talk a little bit about the mitigating measures we're using in those buildings?

Things like, obviously all the middle school and high school students will be masked, but what kind of PPE are you providing teachers with? Are they having plexiglass on their desks like the elementary is? I'm just curious what we're doing there. And like I said, I know we've talked about it a lot, but it's been a while.

So there's several different ways that you can look at risk mitigation. One is purchasing a PPE and equipment, our facial coverings. We have face coverings for everyone which includes teachers and students and staff We did provide we are providing teachers with the face guards too if they want those in addition The other thing is that the way that we structured the schedule is also another risk mitigation measure. So we have half days so that way we have fewer students in the building who are going to be in the building at one time, which we then can provide social distancing.

The other thing is that we're looking at pathways. So if you go through our buildings, you'll see that there is state of the right, only use this stairwell. We have videos that we put out for health promotion. We have orientations that are giving students information about what they need to do.

The other thing is that we are looking at our cleaning procedures. And so cleaning, we've shifted more custodians to the day shift. So that way we have more people in the buildings during the day to help with cleaning. We're also making sure that our students are involved with the cleaning.

So when a class is moving to a different class, the teacher is squirting down the desk. And then when students are coming in, they're wiping off the desk before they sit down. Superroportionate, Proposition O, levy, agenda, motion carried. Thank you.

I have one last question. What will online learning look like now that some students are in school and some students are still learning from home? So we want to try to make sure that we're maintaining consistency for our students. So at the secondary level, we've had some students who have been in mixed classes.

So some of them have been learning at home classes and responsive learning. And so we have bought kits for our secondary levels that allow our teachers to live stream from the classrooms. Excuse me about the sneeze. I apologize.

And so it's we the students are going to stay with or try to keep our students in the same sections as much as possible. And our teachers are going to be live streaming from the classrooms. And so, again, that's another pivot for our teachers. And, you know, we've gone from Zoom and then now we're going to be doing live stream, which is still going to be using Zoom.

But the classes are going to be in the live stream from the classrooms. Kim or Jason, any questions? I don't have any questions. Thanks.

Thank you. And Sean, I don't have any questions, so you can, I think they're already answered. My questions were answered, so you can continue with your strategic plan. So I just wanted to briefly just, and this is going to be very quick because I know we want to look at monitor time, but I wanted to just let the board know that we are continuing to, the work that we're doing right now on the strategic plan is not about mainly the content.

It's around finessing the words. The work we are starting and we're really excited about the work that we're doing. I have shared this plan with the board, got feedback from you. I've worked, I've met with teacher groups, met with students.

Superintendent, Board of Education, Proposition O, levy, agenda, motion carried. Superroportionate, Proposition O, levy, agenda, motion carried. And then goal three is around that personal growth in the social, emotional, and physical well-being. So our tagline is in head and heart.

So if you look at putting all those together, if anyone asks about our strategic plan, it's a place for, Clayton is a place for everyone to grow as learners in head and heart. And that'll be a quick way for us to remember what we're doing. And then I just wanted to kind of give you an overview that, you know, we are going to, when we present this back to the board, it's going to be looking very different than what it looked like previously. And that it is our communications team that put it together and has made it look very professional.

And it's going to be a great outward facing document for our community and also a tool for all of our decision making. So I just wanted to make sure that the board knew where we were with that. We're continuing to work on that and we'll have that for the November meeting. The only other thing I wanted to share was that we're continuing to work with our work around equity and becoming an anti-bias, anti-racist culture.

We have Cameron Poole has been working to build capacity of all of us and has been building capacity with our building leaders and our teachers. He's also working. We just have recently finished the board conversations and now looking at next steps for that and what that's going to look like. He led some professional development for our classified staff in terms of some of the work that he has been doing with other teachers in terms of humanizing.

We also have the data that is collected from our equity audit and Cameron's going to be working with our building principals and bringing that data back to him saying, so this is our data. What is this telling us and then what action does it mean that we have to do and connecting that to their school improvement plans. And then I also think that we're even looking at how we're revamping our current structure for professional development and looking at how we're looking at equity as being beyond a book study, but something about really looking at the dignity of our students and taking action. So I just wanted to give that quick equity update.

And then I was going to shift to Caitlin to see if she had an update as the student board representative. Yes, so I'll start off with a couple of first quarter wrap-up thoughts. So the quarter ended last Friday and a common theme that was noticed throughout the quarter by students is that many teachers are now providing the opportunity for revisions of assignments and tests and also being more flexible about deadlines. This is very appreciated by the students that I've heard from during this stressful time, and it also contributes to an environment of learning and growing from mistakes.

Students are also liking when teachers are giving a small break during the period and also the shorter school day with a block schedule. In addition, I'll be moving on to student opinions on back to school. So there are a range of opinions from nervousness to cautious optimism. While some students are excited to have a more normal school experience and in-person learning in a classroom setting, there are a lot of students who show concern about the safety of going back to school.

A couple of these concerns include going back to school while cases are rising and while flu season is coming, and also how the learning experience of those who choose to learn at home will be affected in this online environment. And some events that are coming up are that on November 6th, the orchestra, the theater department and the choir are having a production in Shaw Park called Poe in the Park, where small groups will be led through Shaw Park and experience performances that are inspired by Edgar Allan Poe. Thank you. Thanks, Caitlin, and thanks, Sean.

So we're going to move on to our study items, and we have four study items, all of which Robin has the pleasure of talking about. So the first one is the first reading of Policy JFG, which is Searches of Students. So Robin, your show. Thank you, Joe.

Yeah, so policy JFG, this is just a revision to policy. It is not required by law, but it does provide more specific language related to student searches. And it takes out some of the previous language around student interviews, because that's covered in the next policy that I will be talking about with you. But it does also include some new language related to testing students for drugs and alcohol, as well as the use of drug detection dogs.

So just a little bit of background information. You know the way the new policy or the revisions in this policy really don change all that much to what we are already doing You know, the administrators in our buildings are the primary people when we conduct a student search and our, you know, law enforcement has very minimal involvement with our searches. In fact, they're usually not involved at all unless the contraband that is found is something that is illegal and needs to be turned in. So the way this updated policy is written, you know, really isn't too much of a departure from current practice.

Great. Thank you, Robin. So I'm just going to go around the horn here. David, any questions?

No, I do have a couple, but I have a feeling that they're going to be cleared, so I'm going to defer to some of our other folks. Okay. Stacy, any questions? Yeah, just a quick one.

In the very first paragraph, that last sentence says that the superintendent or designee is directed to provide staff with appropriate training. Superintendent, Board of Education, Proposition O, levy, agenda, motion carried. There is information that would lead to reasonable suspicion that a search might be warranted. Okay.

And my next question is, when it talks about the student vehicles parked on district property, is the Center of Clayton considered district property? Because kids park in those lots. Yeah, I would say that, yes. I mean, I think.

We own half. I mean, since we own half of it. Well, legally, it's our land. We actually own the land.

So I don't know if that matters. I don't know if it does either. That's why I was asking. I think it's a good question, though.

OK. And then I'm sure this is obvious, but when it talks about searching student property, I assume that also means like backpacks, purses. I mean, anything, right? Okay.

Thanks. That's all. Thanks, Stacey. Amy, any questions?

Just a few. So, Robin, in the first paragraph, the sentence starts with all searches. Sorry, I didn't redline this, but I just wanted to say all searches will be conducted equitably, professionally, and in accordance with law. So pop in that word equitably in front of professionally.

Got it. And then the term reasonable suspicion, you start talking about it under searches of student property. I wanted to tie it to like the way that Missouri law kind of tracks what the Pace law uses is this term called totality of the circumstances. So I wanted to pop that term in the policy.

So the policy is kind of tracking the language that Missouri law uses. And where would you like that dropped in? So it's under searches of property in the third line. It starts with reasonable suspicion.

Must be based on the totality of the circumstances, including, I guess, facts known to the admin, credible information, blah, blah, blah. Okay, got it. I think that was it. Thank you.

Thanks. Thanks, Amy. Kim, any questions? Okay, thank you.

Jason, any questions? Not really. Just in this item, I just, the more reasonable suspicion, I wasn't sure if I understood what that really meant. Superintendent Board of Education Proposition O levy agenda motion carried I don understand what it means reasonable suspicion What does that mean exactly What a reasonable suspicion Oh, do you want me to?

Yeah, Amy, you can go ahead. I can, and then I'll just pipe in if there's anything additional. So under Missouri law, it's pretty broad under Missouri law, and that's why I wanted them to, so Missouri law says, I think it's like this case, I'm going back to law school, Gary, but it's like U.S. versus Cortez or something.

Is that right? The totality of the circumstances. But it's vague. And so it's meant to, reasonable suspicion can mean a lot of different things.

There isn't just one definition of what reasonable suspicion is. So like it can mean, like, I mean, unfortunately, I totally hear what you're saying, but there isn't just one definition. It's the totality of the circumstances. And that's what constant, so which would mean the, you know, every situation is different.

So based on the totality of the circumstances, does the person conducting this search have, you know, reasonable suspicion, grounds for reasonable suspicion to be conducting the search? Does that make sense? Yeah, no, I mean, from a legal standpoint, I get why it's vague, because it gives a lot of latitude to the person making their decision. Right.

Which to me also can be a way to, you know, since it's not a uniform applicable thought process on how we're going to deal with the issue or the person, it could be subjective. Subjective, and then that's when it starts getting kind of weird on who you're going to and how someone might dress, how someone might look. You're right. It's a little subjective.

It is. Like, and that's, it is. I think in general terms. I'm sorry, Robert, one more thing.

Oh, okay. One more thing. Just reading this in general, these four different, well, really, probably just really three of them, three different items, it was kind of hard to read because what's happening now in our world, like what's legal now and what's happening in our community on what people are doing when it comes to business now. Spervantage, Propriety, and Equality.

The policy currently references credible information and oftentimes where the rubber meets the road, that might be student reports of, you know, seeing some type of prohibited items such as drug paraphernalia, cross-referenced with students in question, perhaps smelling like they were using some type of substance, in addition to, you know, just in general visual or behavioral information. Spervantage of Education, Proposition O, levy, agenda, motion carried. Got it. Thank you.

Caitlin, any questions? No questions. Okay, thanks. Gary, any questions?

So, I will say, I don't remember the cases as well as Amy, I think, does. But when I was reading through this set of policies and the suggested changes, one, I was kind of having, like, not particularly pleasant flashbacks to first year law school, trying to remember some of the standards of Thank you Superintendent Board of Education Proposition O levy agenda motion carried Spervantage, Permanent, and Permanent. That expends resources and that's important too. So that's the first question.

The second thing that I would just offer is that we, that doesn't get us off the hook in terms of making some of these hard decisions just because it's legal or it's appropriately justified under the law to have policies like this. I think in our community, we do have to make decisions based on what our community expects and wants. And that may not be the same as every other community in Missouri that, you know, MSBA may be suggesting this for. So I think we're eventually going to have to make some hard decisions about some of these things as well.

So those are my kind of parallel, slightly uncomfortable feelings about this, So, this is that we, one, needed to get more specific, or I would be more comfortable if we had more specific legal advice pertaining to our situation, and also that we should consider this in the context of our own specific community and what they expect us to do in terms of articulating these kinds of standards. So, that's my input, and I'll leave it at that. Thank you, Gary. And I don't, I think my, anything that I would have said has already been addressed.

So I'm going to move us on to 5.02, which is the first reading of policy JFGA, which is new, and it's the interviews with or removal of students. Okay, so policy JFGA, interviews with or removal of students. This is a new policy for the district to consider related to law enforcement interviewing students on campus. Adoption of this new policy is not required by law, and it outlines clear procedures for when law enforcement can access students.

Some of the background information, some of you may have already read this on the cover page from MSBA's suggested policy, was that basically with another school district, the school district actually did not follow their own policy related to law enforcement's access to a student and essentially allowed law enforcement to interview a student without a principal. Spervantage, Propriety, and Equality. Again, it's not a policy that's required by law, but does provide clear guidance around how school districts would permit access to students by law enforcement. Thanks, Robin.

Gary, any questions? I think I said it all applies here. So all the same, same thoughts. So thanks, Robin.

Great, thanks. Caitlin, any questions? Thanks. Jason, any questions?

Yeah, not really. I mean, I don't have any questions. This policy is just rough to read. And, you know, getting the police involved in a kid's life who might be, I don't know, man.

Who could be a Depression issues, looking for a way out. I don't know. I'm just thinking, I don't know. I'm just not a fan of this policy.

And the good thing is we don't have to approve it. Right, Robin? Correct. This one is not required by law.

Also, one piece of information that might help provide a little bit more context, too, is that in St. Louis County, when law enforcement need to interview a minor related to an investigation, they actually have to do it at family court. So a DJO is involved. And so, you know, if law enforcement were to show up at, you know, Clayton High School, they would not be interviewing them as part of an investigation on campus.

You know, they'd be reaching out to the parents and working with us to get parental consent. And that interview would actually take place at family court. Right. Yeah, I just think this policy could determine a young person's life.

You know, the school district is supposed to be a place for, well, between the 1 and 18 is a place to make mistakes. That's what we talk about. You know, it's a place for you to go, try, you fail, learn from your mistakes and keep it moving. And I think when you start telling them on searches and calling the police to get involved, I think it just puts kids in a tough position.

It can really derail a person's life or make them have a bad taste about authority, you know, because they're getting involved. And they're just like, all I want to do is be understood, you know. So I don't like the policy personally. I don't think we should do anything with it.

So this is my opinion. Thank you, Jason. Kim, any questions? No?

Okay, thanks. Amy, any questions? No, not really. I'm torn.

I guess I'm torn on the policy. You know, I think it's hard because, I mean, I mean, I, I, I, and on one hand, like, I agree with what Jason says that, you know, we don't want to unnecessarily involve the police. But then I also think about other situations, you know, if, you know, there's a serious crime like a rape, that we're not going to be required to report that, you know, that becomes problematic, I think. I don't know.

I don't know what to do with it. I'll listen to what other people have to say. Thank you, Amy. Stacey, any questions?

Yeah, just for clarity, because in reading this a few times, I still wasn't sure, Robin, is this referring to interviews maybe about crimes that could have happened on or off our campuses? Correct. It has to do with any time law enforcement would need to interview a student as part of an investigation. So that may overlap with an investigation that the school district needs to do because it was on campus, but it might also have to do with law enforcement wanting to reach a student because of activity that happened off campus that was brought to their attention.

Got it. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Stacey.

David, any questions? I don't know if it's as much of a question as more of a pontification. I'm kind of torn on it as well because on one hand, I would like to understand what our exposure is by not having a policy versus having a policy. Superintendent, Board of Education, Proposition O, levy, agenda, motion carried.

Thank you Mitigation is worth it then dig deeper into the framework of what we drafted I guess it probably the best thing I could say Thanks David And I don know that I have anything specifically beyond what folks have said but I would recommend that given people feelings about this one and the last one that we do need to check in with our attorneys to get some advice Joe? Yep, go ahead. Can I just maybe add one other thought here? I mean, there seems to be a fair amount of, I guess, uncertainty about this.

And maybe in addition to that, is this an example of a time when it might make sense to do some additional study in either a breakout group or Superintendent, Board of Education, Proposition O, levy, agenda, motion carried. And think about this and study it a little bit if we wanted to do that, if that was what, you know. Well, Gary, I think we need to be cognizant about passing the other one because the other one strips the language. We need to make sure that they're in sync and we don't end up with an exposure.

But otherwise, I agree. I mean, we're not these aren't mandatory. So I think I don't think we have to hurry into it. Yeah, I think we definitely...

The school that they use in the beginning of the polity actually creates a liability for the school in terms of if a student is improperly removed, and then the school becomes kind of liable for the seizure of that student together with law enforcement. So if we don't adopt, regardless of whether we do or do not adopt this policy, there probably needs to be some consideration as to how, what our internal protocol would be should law enforcement come to school and decide they want to question a student. So regardless. Kim, our current practice, too, is that we do contact parents first.

And we, you know, and we, you know, if we can't get a hold of them, obviously, like waiting until we, you know, hear from them or waiting till they can come on site before, you know, any of the interviews take place. So that's what our current practice is, is to engage the parents right away. That's good. It's a good practice.

Okay, so let's see what our attorneys say and we'll move from there. We may, we may. I will just say we'll get some additional information about exposure. And then I think that, and then also looking at, you know, what we might write the ministry after administration get some more information we might have a different recommendation or a different way of looking at this before we bring it back to the board.

Sounds good. So, and these four all have some similarities. So 5.03 is then moving on to first reading of policy JG, which is student discipline. So, Robin.

All right. So policy number three tonight, JG, student discipline. MSBA has updated this policy to remove references to secluding students as a disciplinary measure because it is going to be covered in the new policy or new version of policy JGGA. And so MSBA is recommending the updates to policy JG to avoid the duplication of language.

Again, just a little bit of background information. Seclusion would mean separating a student. They would be alone behind a locked door. As a disciplinary measure, that is not something that we do.

Periodically we do have some students who we have crisis plans in place for that might involve putting some other measures in place if we feel that there a potential safety issue for self or to others But seclusion is not really a practice that we apply in the school district Thanks, Robin. David, any questions? No, no, I don't. Great, thanks.

Stacey, any questions? More of maybe a statement that I was happy that it now addresses the equity issues. And it's, I'm just wondering if you have any thoughts about how it maybe aligns with, you know, where we're headed with a strategic plan, as far as it says that the superintendent will regularly review district discipline data and determine if the policies are being equitably enforced. And I do think it probably, you know, aligns well with where we're headed with how we are going to be tracking discipline data going forward, but I didn't know if you had any further thoughts on the connection there for us.

I think that your connection is accurate. After talking with our legal counsel about this particular one, they're seeing an increase in litigation related to inequities and disciplinary practices. So I think, again, things we've put into the strategic plan and in this type of language help us hold ourselves accountable to that work and making sure that we're really being thoughtful and intentional about what we're doing. Thanks.

Thanks, Stacey. Amy, any questions? No, I just, Stacey covered it. So thank you.

Thank you. Gary, any questions? I feel like maybe this is a question I should know the answer to, but is the policy that they're saying is we don't need this part anymore because it's in JGGA. Have we passed JGGA?

We have not yet gotten to JGGA. Okay. I guess I would think maybe we would do these at the same time then if that was the case, right? Or would that make sense?

Like if we're taking something out of this one because it's going to be in a new one, it feels like maybe we should be thinking about this together. Yes, that is an adjustment we can make. I didn't go back through and look at that and see where we were with that, but that just wouldn't make sense to me, I think. No, it makes sense.

We'll take a look at that. Thanks, Gary. Jason, any questions? Yeah.

Sometimes I wish I had an opportunity to discuss this with you all before we get to the board. Because sometimes when I'm reading this in isolation, it's like, oh man, I don't get this. But like on page four, where it says at the bottom of the page, it says discipline for off-campus misconduct. And it reads, on the first line, it says student may be disciplined for misconduct that occurs off district grounds And outside a district activity when allowed by law including, but not limited to the violent situation.

And then a list of situations, but like, so are we comfortable with that as a board? Like if somebody, a kid is Saturday evening chilling, doing his thing, that child, something happens. Are we going to discipline that child for their actions on a Saturday evening with their friends, for example? The threshold is really that language and number two, the nexus to the education environment.

So if we were to take disciplinary action related to a student's behavior that happens off campus or during off school hours, we would have to have a very substantial, significant argument as how it impacted the educational environment during regular school activities. So a practical example of how this plays out is sometimes say a student makes a threat via text message or on social media against another student and they say it's going to happen on Monday when you show up at school. And then families notify us that this has happened. That has now impacted that other student's ability to come to school and feel safe.

And so then that becomes an intersection of a student's ability to have access to their school programming. And so that would be considered the nexus between the event and the choice that the student made and orderly operations of the school environment. So that's just a really basic example. There are a lot of other ones, but what we looking for is that intersection between the choice that they made and how it impacted the school environment Gotcha So what if it doesn have so this is so this is the problem as I started doing the what ifs What if it doesn't, what if it doesn't have anything to do with, like, the language in which the threat took place?

Has anything to do with it being centered around school? It's just, it's just they got a problem with each other. And, you know, there could be a violent situation that takes place. So my question is, like, are we going to try to figure out whether it's centered around school?

And then maybe then we'll make a decision on how we're going to discipline that person. Or if it doesn't, then we just leave it alone. I guess what I'm saying, are we monitoring and policing these kids too much? That's the question.

I mean, the whole objective, I thought, was to give kids latitude to make mistakes, but we're policing them so much. Does this put these kids in a bad position, this particular item? And Robin, you can answer this, but what I would say is that there are many things that are happening outside of school that don't come back into the school and cause disruption. It's really about when things get to the point where it's causing a disruption, where there might be a disruption within a classroom or students making a threat in the hallway or making someone feel uncomfortable.

We can't monitor everything that happens outside of the school, but usually if it comes to a point to the school where it's disrupting the learning environment or causing a student not to feel safe, then we have to intervene and find out what we need to do to fix, you know, mitigate the situation. You know, the other thing is that sometimes things happen after school, outside of school, and there really isn't a nexus to the school and people, and it's not causing a disruption, but we still have people are saying, this happened. And you have to take care of it. And we have to say, we don't, we can't take care of that.

That doesn't really have, you know, we always want to make sure we're doing what's best for our students. But what Robin said is absolutely right. When it does have an access to the school or does something that disrupts the learning environment or disrupts a person feeling like they feel safe about walking in our building or Then we would have to look at what we would need to do. And it doesn't always necessarily mean discipline.

It could be in a mediation. It could be something that we're doing to resolve the problem. But we don't often know everything that happens. And we're not going to look for those kinds of things.

Usually it comes to us when something happens. Yeah. So I get your point. And that makes a lot of sense.

I was thinking of that same kind of example. I'm glad you brought that up. I was also thinking about, so the social emotional side of this process. Like if we're really focused on social emotional and well-being and wellness and mental health, And this kind of helps mitigate these outside activities that take place with kids, even with drugs, for example.

So I'm thinking about these policies and the measures we're putting in place to police these kids. And then the significant damage it can cause, because there's somebody who's not necessarily engaged with these policies. They just know that they exist and they're just following it. They're just following the, they're just executing it according to the policy without really thinking through the process.

That can be damaging to the child's growth. When we often talk about social emotional and trying to understand these children, what they're going through, why these things are happening, what they're feeling. You know, how do we get to the root cause or the crux of something before metastasizing something that could be violent or, you know, destructive or self-destructing is what I'm thinking about when I read these policies. So that's why I guess I'm so concerned about the policing nature, like this heavy hand of going in to go see somebody.

Your parents got to be there or like, you know, if it's a nexus and around XYZ, you know, we have the authority to say we're going to come suspend you or discipline you for what's taking place. Does that make sense what I'm saying? Do you see what I'm saying on this at all? Excellent.

Good. I'll say again, I think I hear what Jason's saying. I, you know, I think that the nexus thing is key. Like, for example, I know there have been situations.

Superroportionate, I don't know if it's happened at Clayton, but I'm thinking of another school district where, you know, racist comments were made off school grounds and or hate speech. And the school did discipline the kids that engaged in the hate speech, even though it didn't happen on school grounds, because there was that that nexus and it impacted the educational environment. So I would want to be sure to be able to, you know, like I, well, I do think it's important for flexibility and allowing kids to be able to make mistakes and be kids. I think there's some things that are just non-negotiable kind of that, you know, we need to be able to discipline for if it does take place off school ground.

So, again, I think we kind of run into that situation where, I mean, there's some things I like about it, but, you know, it does need, you know, and I do think now that I'm looking at the actual language, I do think that it provides some flexibility because it says students may be disciplined for misconduct. So it doesn't say that they shall. So I think that that language gives the district some latitude and flexibility to, that might be needed. I don't know.

Yeah. Let me just see if Kim and Caitlin have questions first, and then we'll come back. Kim, do you have any questions? No, I don't.

I mean, I do think that the policy does allow the school district to address things that happen outside of school hours. And there are there are issues that occur outside of school hours that this gives the district the latitude to address them. And I know personally that they have addressed issues outside of school hours that have been brought to their attention. Spervantage of Education, Proposition O, levy, agenda, motion carried.

Okay. Gary, did you want to say something, come back? Yeah, just a couple of quick points. I mean, one, I want to make sure that we understand in that section that we've been talking about that starts on page four, discipline for off-campus misconduct.

This is a list. It's not that each of these things has to apply before discipline can be, Superexpensive, Board of Education, Proposition O, levy, agenda, motion carried. You know, those were the, that fell under those three categories. And I think this is correct, and I hope that I won't say something that Robin, I put her on the spot and mentioning, but I think several of the other categories here actually track Missouri law where we are, in fact, required to take action if certain things apply, specifically number four.

So, some of these give us some ability to exercise some discretion and some of that is codifying or putting into policy what I think is actually required under the law. So, I think the result of that is it kind of comes across as a big scary list, but some of that we don't actually have, we have to actually follow. I think that's how I remember this. Anything else on this one Okay so 5 the first reading of policy JHCB which is immunization of students Okay, so policy JHCB, immunization of students.

MSDA's updated policy reflects two legal requirements that were outlined in the revised statutes of Missouri. So one of those legal requirements was that school districts are to provide information to parents and guardians of students K-12 about influenza and influenza vaccines. That's the first part. And then the second part would be that the school district requires parents and guardians of children in preschools, daycare centers and nursery schools to show evidence of immunizations or exemptions for immunizations or progress toward getting the immunizations completed.

So that would impact our students at the family center. And so this one is a legal change and, you know, updating the policy to reflect those new revised Missouri statutes. Thanks, Robin. Caitlin, any questions?

Yeah, if a student doesn't have health insurance or the family can't afford a flu vaccine, does the district provide any kind of financial aid? We have not provided financial aid. However, we do have relationships with community-based resources where we try to connect families to those resources so they can get the vaccinations they need. Not just for flu vaccinations, but really any vaccinations.

We also provide information on local providers where families can get discounts for things like school physicals if students are participating in athletics. So that is something on our nursing team's radar and our social workers team's radar as well. Thank you. Thanks, Caitlin.

Kim, any questions? Okay, thank you. Jason, any questions? Okay, thank you.

Gary, any questions? No, I don't have anything on this. Thank you. Thank you.

Amy, any questions? No. Thank you. Stacey, any questions?

Okay, thank you. David, any questions? Superintendent, Board of Education, Proposition O, levy, agenda, motion carried. Under the preschool, daycare, and nursery schools are all yellow, so it makes it sound like the only exception that we used to have was immunizations are in progress, and now we've added the item for homeless as well as for religious exemption.

Is that the change? Yes, it's more, it's adding clearer language related to it. We were already accepting the exemptions. It just makes it clearer about why people might be getting the exemptions and then also that it extends now to preschool children.

Thank you. Gotcha. Thank you, David. And I don't have any questions.

So thank you, Robin. We appreciate it. No problem. Thank you.

So we're moving on to information items. And the first information item was really on was was on the search or superintendent search. And we are just want to really have the opportunity to introduce McPherson and Jacobson, which is the company that the board has selected as our superintendent search company. And of course, we have Judy Sklare-Stein and Jeanette Tendai here just to kind of really put their cameras on and wave and say hi so that folks know who they are.

They'll be engaging folks in the community and parents. And so we wanted to make sure that as we move through the process and kind of officially post the position that we had introduced Judy and Jeanette, who will be fixtures of our community, at least for a little while. So and I don't know if you, Judy or Jeanette, if you wanted to say anything really quickly. Just a pleasure to be a part of the Clayton School District We very honored to have this opportunity to lead your search And we look forward to seeing many of you during our stakeholder meetings, which will be November 17th and 18th and more information to come.

Awesome. Thank you. And, and Jeanette, did you want to say anything or? Great.

Well, thank you, Judy and Jeanette. We, again, are already working with you and appreciate it and look forward to continuing to work with you. So thank you. Likewise.

Thank you. So we're going to move on to our next information item, which is 6.02, the fall enrollment staffing and class. I would just echo what Judy has said. Great.

Thank you, Jeanette. So I think maybe we have a delay. Sorry. So, all right, we're moving on to 6.2.

Mary Jo, you're up. And Tony, I think. Okay, great. And Tony.

There's Tony. Okay, so I'm going to go ahead and share my screen. Can you guys see that? Okay, so there are two annual enrollment reports presented to the Board of Education.

The fall report, which is presented tonight, provides the current reality and the historical data about enrollment, staffing, and class size within the district. And the second report is in the spring, which provides forecasted enrollment projections. So tonight, when we look at enrollment, the 2021 enrollment is 2,529 students, which is 90 students less than the 1920 enrollment of 2,619. As you can see from the demographic breakdown of reductions in each resident category, the primary reduction is in resident students.

And this is due to a larger than normal resident graduating class, which was 200 students last year. And the average graduating class over the last five years was 169 students. On page 38 and 39 of the enrollment report, I did provide a demographic breakdown of learning at home and responsive learning. In that report, which was dated as of September 30th, which is the date of the official count date, there was 417 students who were learning from home, which represents 16.5% of our total population.

So this was different than what Sean reported tonight. Since we've had announced coming back to school, we've allowed people to change. So what he reported tonight was 520 students. The demographic report is not based on that number.

It's based on the 417. But based on that official count date, there was 15 percent resident students who elected to learn from home. VST was 39%. Board grant was 11%.

And board grant is students and employees. Statutory tuition students, there was 64% of them elected to learn from home and 7% of our personal tuition students. Of that, the ethnicity of that group is 31% Black, 11% White, 26% Asian, 12% Hispanic, 26% multiracial. So Tony will go ahead and speak about changes in staffing.

Great, thank you. Good evening, everyone. So this annual report is an opportunity for the board to understand the reality of our enrollment and demographics and how that impacts the staffing overall. And administration uses this data to make decisions with long range planning and staffing.

So it's always helpful information for us to review for staffing decisions for each school year. So I'm going to give you a few of the highlights regarding staffing for the 2020-21 school year. So overall, the district increased the number of FTEs by 3.87. This year, due to the unique circumstances of the pandemic, we hired two additional interns at Captain Elementary.

Also, due to increased enrollment, we increased the orchestra by 0.35 FTE, which is shared across Superroportionate Proposition O levy agenda motion carried Additionally, at Clayton High School, we increased English by 1.0 due to enrollment, and for performing arts or vocal teacher, increased by 0.30 FTE, which is moving toward our goal of increasing enrollment numbers in the program overall, which is what we're hoping to do with getting that enrollment up higher and getting someone in full time eventually. As I mentioned earlier, orchestra was increased at Clayton High School, specifically at this building by 0.30 FTE, and we also increased social studies by 0.4 FTE. The only decrease at Clayton High School this year was for the Learning Center, and we decreased an intern by 0.33 FTE. It's also important, I think, as part of this report to note that due to the district's partnerships with Truman University and Missouri State, We do have an additional nine interns this year that are helping to support and teach our students.

And that's essentially at no cost to the district. This is twice as many interns that we compared to what we had last year. And it's an incredible value to the district. And we're really fortunate to be part of this partnership.

When we talk about class sizes specifically, our targeted class size for kindergarten and first grade is 18 students per class. Superintendent, Board of Education, Proposition O, levy, agenda, motion carried. The learning at home teachers are represented in the sheet with an asterisk and their FTE in each of the schools is aligned to the percentage based on the number of students they're serving from that building in their own classroom. On pages 15 and 16 of the report where it shares the number of sections that are over standard, at standard, or under standard, the chart reflects the sections on page 14 that are combined into single classrooms.

I hope that makes sense. So what we try to do, so it may appear that there are more sections that are coded under on page 14, but once you combine them to accurately reflect the numbers that are actually in that teacher's classroom, is what the chart is reflecting. So the chart is trying to give you more of an accurate picture of what those class sizes actually are. In kindergarten, in grades K through one, there are four classrooms that are over standard, three that are at standard, and 10 that are under standard.

And most that are over are only over by two or three students, with the exception of one learn-at-home classroom, where we have created a co-teaching model with another additional certified teacher in there. And that was to accommodate our Learn at Home sections that just continue to grow in the fall. For grades two through five, six of the sections are over standard, one is at standard, and 24 are under the standard. And much of this will continue to evolve throughout the year based on parent selections to remain in either Learn at Home or in the responsive learning phases of the district at the time.

When we move over to YDOWN, the YDOWN class size data, the average in core classes is approximately 20 students, which is in line with our five-year history of average class sizes there. When we go looking at classes specifically, I'd like to take some time to look at the class sizes that are under 10 students and provide an explanation for that. So at YDOWN, when we look at classes that are under 10, 57 out of those 63 classes that are under 10 were intentional based on the content of the classes. Some examples of that could be band classes that are specialized by instrument, exploratorium classes where we typically aim for 8 to 12 students per class, small group reading classes, math strategies.

So all of these classes really are designed to be much smaller than our standard. Superroportion O, levy, agenda, motion carried. Here's the growth trend that we've noticed over the past several years. For 2020-21, we have 1,451 students enrolled in AP honors.

And that's right in line. It would continue to increase from the previous years. I think it's down slightly from last year where it was at 1480, but compared to the other years, it's still an increase. So as we continue to move forward with our equity initiative, we are conscientious about the diversity in our AP and honors courses, and we are going to provide additional information regarding the specific racial breakdown and a future equity update to the board.

Additionally, in the report on pages 32 through 34, you'll see the number of sections, I'm sorry, the number of students enrolled. And then you'll also see how many of those students are considered overrides. And I wanted to get some clarification as to the term overrides. So overrides is the term that we that's used when a student is enrolled in a course that was not recommended by either the teacher or the department.

So when we look at the high school classes that have less than 10 students, there are several reasons why some of the courses are offered with enrollments of fewer than 10 students at Clayton High School. And this can be due to scheduling imbalances, capstone classes, advanced classes, support classes, and sometimes single course offerings. Superintendent, Board of Education, Proposition O, levy, agenda, motion carried. Superintendent, Board of Education, Proposition O, levy, agenda, motion carried.

To the most effective use of teaching personnel and the practice of high quality teaching methods. And I think that the instances that we have where there are outliers, we have intentional reasons. Also, we've utilized our human capital to the fullest extent to make to make the experience the very best it can be for our students. And the last page of the presentation is just a summary of the enrollment board and the staffing and the ratios.

So at this point, if you guys have any questions. Yeah, so this is an information item, but any, I just want to give the board a chance to ask any clarifying questions. So I am going to start or make any comments. I'm going to start with you, David.

So being the new guy on the board, can the override idea, can you just explain that? Is that I understand you said it's not recommended, but is that like if I I didn't do particularly well in Algebra one, but I just really want to be an honors Algebra two and I plead a case and I get accepted. That is that kind of what the override is? Yes.

So it would be when the teacher or the department's not recommending the student to for the course, but the student is enrolled in it. So maybe the parent is advocating for the students to enroll in that course or they have an interest in it. That's considered an override. And do we track how those students do in those classes once they elect the override?

Are you asking, do we disaggregate the data of how the students that are considered overrides, how they're doing? I can look into that and get information for you. I think it might be useful in terms of some of the equity work that we're doing to see if, you know, students maybe that were missed that who had parents are advocated for themselves to be in those classes, if they were successful. Yeah, Kim, I think that's a great point.

Yeah, because I would argue in the other direction, if we're not leveraging that data, then why do we collect it? Right. So why do we care if it's an override if we don't do anything with that data after the point? So hopefully we do have the ability to disaggregate it.

If we don't, then the logical follow-up question is, then what are we doing with the override count? Thanks. Kim, any questions? Any other questions?

Great. Thank you. Stacy, any questions? Yes I do actually First of all that page 14 you referenced Tony the elementary class size data I realize that numbers don always tell a whole story because you know we can have 25 kids that have no IEPs and no other issues that is easier to handle than a class of 15 that does However, it struck me that Merrimack has the most full-time teachers and has no in-person classes that are over our class size guidelines.

And Captain has the least, and they have a lot of yellow boxes. So I'm just wondering if you've noticed that or what you think the correlation is there. I don't know. It just struck me that Captain has a lot of yellow boxes with classes over our standard, but the least amount of full-time teachers.

That just didn't seem to add up to me. Right. And I think, and I would have to go back and look at specific numbers, but I think that maybe, I think initially my thinking around that was that Merrimack might've had the least amount of students that were learned at home, that selected learned at home. And I also know that we were trying to be very specific with how we were organizing So we were trying to kind of cohort.

So if I'm a teacher at Merrimack and I'm a Learn at Home, I would have mostly Merrimack students in my class, but maybe some from Captain. So we were trying to do that as best as we could to keep the continuity and consistency going for our students. Okay. Although most of these seem like they're in person.

Well, maybe not. Okay. Sorry. So I had one more concern, and it's really about Y down.

The seventh and eighth grade, and I guess the eighth grade in particular, to have five sections of core classes that are over 25 seems really far over our threshold of 20. And I'm just wondering, did we anticipate, I know the last year's eighth grade was a huge grade also. Did we anticipate these numbers or did we only, were these a lot of late enrollments or did we just find out on that September date? And I'm asking because I know just now when we started second quarter on Monday, a lot of white-owned kids had their schedules changed and even their teachers changed.

I'm wondering if, was there any thought to that being a good opportunity to have added a couple sections? I mean, over 25 is not just a couple kids different. That's a lot. That's a big difference in those sections, and that's a lot.

So is there any thought to adding sections, or had there been previously? I'm just wondering what your thoughts are about that. Well, I know at YDM for the core classes, there was two challenge algebra classes that were at 25 this year. So I don't know if they were in at the 25 and over, if they got put in there that way.

But I know that with the three levels of math, it can really skew the numbers of those other classes as well. So for the core classes that were over 25, I know that was one of the exceptions. But as to with the enrollment, if we had last minute enrollments here right before fall, I can't speak to that at this time, Stacey. I guess what grade were you asking?

Was that eighth grade? Eighth grade. Yeah, because that class actually reduced by five students. So I think it's more like what Tony was saying is that it's just how the students elect their classes and where they fall versus like, because actually the class is smaller than last year's class.

So I guess my question then is, I mean, I just know that our community values small class sizes and to be at 25 or over seems a lot higher than 20 to me. And so at what point do we consider other sections? And are you considering that? I'm going to take a few more questions.

So, first of all, thank you for taking the time to ask your questions. I'm going to ask the first question, which is, what do you think about the reason behind the number of students who are requesting classes? At this point, we have not considered making the additional sections. And so, but I do think it will be important for us to get a better idea about what that those classes are.

So Tony, we can look into that a little bit more and see what, what is the reasoning behind those classes at eighth grade. And then. Usually what happens is that every spring, what we look at the number of students who are requesting classes. So at that point, Y-Down will then request whether or not we need additional staffing.

And then we will consider about what additional staffing we need, if we need to shift staffing. So usually we are pretty good about making sure our sections are pretty good size in terms of class size. Not sure if any of these are being co right now So it could be that there co classes in there So we can get some more information about that Okay thanks Thanks, Stacey. Amy, any questions?

No. Okay, thank you. Thank you. Caitlin, any questions?

No. Great, thanks. Jason, any questions? No, no, thank you.

Thank you. Gary, any questions? No, I don't have anything. Thank you.

Great. Thanks. And I don't have anything either. So thanks, Mary Jo.

And thanks, Tony. Appreciate it. Okay, so we are going to move on to our action items. We've got four action items this evening.

And our first one is 7.01, the second reading and approval of policy IC, the academic calendar. All right. You ready for that? Yes, please.

Okay, 7.01. I move that the School District of Clayton Board of Education approve the changes to policy IC as submitted. Second. It's been moved and seconded.

Any comments or questions? Any questions? Okay, all in favor? Aye.

Any opposed? Passes unanimously. Thank you. 7.02, the second reading and approval of policy IHB class size.

7.02, I move that the Board of Education approve policy IHB as submitted. Second. It's been moved and seconded. Any comments or questions?

Okay, all in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Passes unanimously.

Thank you. Okay, moving on to 7.03, the second reading and approval of policy IKF, which is graduation requirements. 7.03, I move that the board approve policy IKF as submitted. Second.

It's been moved and seconded. Any comments or questions? All in favor? Aye.

Aye. Any opposed? Passes unanimously. And 7.04, which I need to recuse myself.

So I'm going to jump off here and then somebody can tell me when you are done. Okay. Gary, can I get you to read that motion, please, for I think it was 7.04? Certainly.

7.04, I move that the Board of Education approve the part-time temporary employment report as submitted. Second. All right. It's been moved and seconded.

Is there any discussion or questions? Okay. All in favor? Aye.

Motion passes. All right. Somebody text Joe. I did.

Okay. Okay. So we are now moving on to the consent agenda. 8.01, I move that the Board of Education approve the consent agenda items 8.02 through 8.05.

Second. It's been moved and seconded. Any comments or questions? All in favor?

Aye. Aye. Any opposed? Passes unanimously.

Thank you. All right. We are moving on to the financials for August 2020 and September 2020. Do we have a motion?

Sorry, I turned the page too quickly there. 9.01, I move that the Board of Education accept the financials for August 2020 and September 2020 as submitted. Second. It been moved and seconded Any comments or questions Jason Yeah no that Mary Jo are you there Hi.

No, I was just going to say that, yeah, to me, the numbers didn't look, I really can't tell what's happening because the expenses are different. That's why I'm looking at what I'm using. I'm looking at these financial expenses. And I really can't tell if they're out of whack because this is kind of a new territory that we're in.

Would you agree with that, Mary Jo? A little bit. A lot of the items that are showing up as expense that will be the larger impact COVID items really haven't posted yet. So we just paid like for the HVAC upgrades this month, which was about half of it.

So half will be this month, half will be next month. The Center of Clayton, we haven't paid that yet. So everything else is only around in the expense category for PPE is about $150,000, which is a minimal amount of our budget. And then the other things are salary fluctuations.

And those are kind of hard to see in some of those categories. Superintendent, Board of Education, Proposition O, levy, agenda, motion carried. When I look at it now, I can't tell if it's similar to last year or what's going on. Those reports, it's a little too early.

You'll start seeing it more in the October and November. Gotcha. All right, cool. Thanks.

Thank you. Any other comments or questions? Mary Jo, I just have one. How many more dollars do we have in TIP funds?

I noticed that we had some big expenditures for technology that we used TIP funds to pay for computers in August. Do we still have money left in TIP funds for that type of expenditure, or is it all used up? So that gets budgeted annually, and we do spend the majority of it in the summer. I would have to look and see.

In January is when we calculate the carryover because of the middle of the year, we have to carry over the funds. Superintendent, Board of Education, Proposition O, levy, agenda, motion carried. Technology improvement plan budgets, I would say they're minimally impacted. There's some impact, but minimal at this point.

Yeah, and with technology, the majority of it was software expenses, which that's in that $150,000 number I've been mentioning. Yeah, I just wondered if it was higher maybe this year because we are doing so much remote learning and probably replacing broken devices and whatnot also because of the increased use of tech. And we have warranties on a lot of the products that helps with that. Agreed.

Thank you. Any other comments or questions? Okay, we have a motion on the floor, so all in favor? Aye.

Aye. Any opposed? Okay, it passes unanimously. Thank you.

So we're moving on to public comment. Sean and Chris, do we have any public comment? We do not have any public comment this evening. Okay.

All right. Then we are moving on to board communication. Does the board, anybody from the board have anything to report in terms of Committees and liaison kind of stuff. I'll say that I got an email today from the Center of Clayton that they were closed down, I think, until Friday for COVID-related incident in the swimming pool, I think.

Thank you, Amy. Any other board reports or communication? Okay, so we need to move to adjourn and we are going to adjourn actually into executive session. All right, 12.01, I move that the Board of Education adjourn to executive session, sorry, pursuant to RSMO 610.021, 3 and 13 for discussion related to personnel issues.

And we do need to take a roll call vote here. Second. Great. Thank you.

Yeah, we call the roll. Gary. Amy. Yep.

Jason. Yes. Gary, yes. David.

Yes. Kim. Yes. Stacey.

Yes. Joe. Yes. Yes.

And just as a reminder, we'll all have to hit another link. So onward we go. Thank you all. Thank you.

Page 1 of 4 + #2 Mark Twain Circle Clayton, MO 63105 T: 314.854.6000 F: 314.854.6093 claytonschools.net Business Meeting of the School District of Clayton Board of Education October 28, 2020 Meeting Minutes Members Present: Mr. Joe Miller – President Ms. Amy Rubin – Vice-President Mr. Jason Wilson – Treasurer Mr. Gary Pierson – Board Secretary Ms. Stacy Siwak – Director Mr. David Gulick – Director Mr. Kimberly Hurst – Director Kaitlyn Tran – Student Representative to the Board Central Office administrators present: Dr. Sean Doherty – Superintendent Dr. Milena Garganigo - Assistant Superintendent of Teaching and Learning Dr. Robyn Wiens - Assistant Superintendent of Student Services Mr. Chris Tennill - Chief Communications Officer Dr. Tony Arnold – Assistant Superintendent of Human Resources Ms. Mary Jo Gruber - Chief Financial Officer Mr. Jeff Puls - Chief Technology Officer Mr. Cameron Poole – Director of Equity and Inclusion Sandy Menchella – Administrative Assistant to Superintendent/Board of Education 1. Call to Order Information, Procedural: 1.01 Statement of Adequate Notice, Pledge of Allegiance The business meeting of the Board of Education was held virtually via Zoom due to the coronavirus pandemic. The meeting was called to order at 7:05 p.m. 2. Recognizing Our Own Information: 2.01 Red Ribbon Week - All In Clayton Coalition Ms. Kimberly Sherony, Project Coordinator of the All In Clayton Coalition, and Keira Hoisington, student representative from Wydown, were recognized for Red Ribbon Week. They shared information on Red Ribbon events and activities in the community. 3. Superintendent Communications Information: 3.01 Superintendent Communications Superintendent, Dr. Doherty, spoke to the Board and the community about the Return to Learn Plan, the Strategic Plan and Equity work in the district. 4. Student Representative to the Board Information: 4.01 Student Representative to the Board of Education - Update Kaitlyn Tran, student representative to the Board, discussed the first quarter wrap up and how teachers are providing revisions on being flexible on deadlines. She also reported how students feel about returning to in- person learning and upcoming events. 5. Study Items Study, First Reading: 5.01 First Reading - Policy JFG - Searches of Students Dr. Robyn Wiens, Assistant Superintendent of Student Services, presented the Policy JFG - Searches of Students for a first reading and discussion.

Page 2 of 4 Board of Education Meeting October 28, 2020 Page 2 Study, First Reading: 5.02 First Reading - Policy JFGA (New) - Interviews with or Removal of Students Dr. Robyn Wiens, Assistant Superintendent, presented the first reading of Policy JFGA for first reading and discussion. Study, First Reading: 5.03 First Reading - Policy JG - Student Discipline Dr. Robyn Wiens, Assistant Superintendent of Student Services, Policy JG - Student Discipline for first reading and discussion. 6. Information Information: 6.01 Superintendent Search Joe Miller, president of the Board of Education, introduced our consultants, Dr. Judy Sclair-Stein and Jeanette Tendai, from our superintendent search firm, McPherson and Jacobson, who will be conducting and facilitating the superintendent search for School District of Clayton. Information: 6.02 Fall Enrollment, Staffing and Class Size Report MaryJo Gruber, Chief Financial Officer, and Dr. Tony Arnold, Assistant Superintendent of Human Resources, presented the fall enrollment, staffing and class size report. 7. Action Items Action, Second Reading: 7.01 Second Reading and Approval - Policy IC - Academic Calendar That the School District of Clayton Board of Education approve the changes to Policy IC as submitted Motion by Gary Pierson, second by Amy Rubin. Final Resolution: Motion Carries Yes: Joe Miller, Gary Pierson, Amy Rubin, Stacy Siwak, Jason Wilson, David Gulick, Kimberly Hurst Action, Second Reading: 7.02 Second Reading and Approval - Policy IHB - Class Size That the Board approve Policy IHB as submitted (excluding the final highlighted yellow paragraph) Motion by Gary Pierson, second by Amy Rubin. Final Resolution: Motion Carries Yes: Joe Miller, Gary Pierson, Amy Rubin, Stacy Siwak, Jason Wilson, David Gulick, Kimberly Hurst Action, Second Reading: 7.03 Second Reading and Approval - Policy IKF - Graduation Requirements That the Board approves Policy IKF as submitted. Motion by Gary Pierson, second by Amy Rubin. Final Resolution: Motion Carries Yes: Joe Miller, Gary Pierson, Amy Rubin, Stacy Siwak, Jason Wilson, David Gulick, Kimberly Hurst Action: 7.04 Part-Time Temporary Employment - Miller Board president, Joe Miller, left the meeting at 8:57 p.m. and returned at 8:59 p.m.

Page 3 of 4 Board of Education Meeting October 28, 2020 Page 3 That the Board of Education approve the part-time temporary employment as submitted. Motion by Gary Pierson, second by Amy Rubin. Final Resolution: Motion Carries Yes: Gary Pierson, Amy Rubin, Stacy Siwak, Jason Wilson, David Gulick, Kimberly Hurst Not Present at Vote: Joe Miller 8. Consent Items Action (Consent): 8.01 Motion to Approve Consent Agenda 8.02 through 8.05 That the Board of Education approve the consent agenda 8.02 through 8.05. Action (Consent): 8.02 Approval of Minutes - October 14, 2020 and October 21, 2020 Action (Consent): 8.03 Approval of 2020-2021 Bus Route Action (Consent): 8.04 Personnel Action (Consent): 8.05 Approval of Grants Motion by Gary Pierson, second by Amy Rubin. Final Resolution: Motion Carries Yes: Joe Miller, Gary Pierson, Amy Rubin, Stacy Siwak, Jason Wilson, David Gulick, Kimberly Hurst 9. Financials Action: 9.01 Financials - August 2020 and September 2020 That the Board of Education approve payment of current expenditures and investments for August 2020 and September 2020 as detailed below Motion by Gary Pierson, second by Amy Rubin. Final Resolution: Motion Carries Yes: Joe Miller, Gary Pierson, Amy Rubin, Stacy Siwak, Jason Wilson, David Gulick, Kimberly Hurst 10. Public Comment Information: 10.01 Public Participation at Board Meetings There were no public comments submitted for this board meeting. 11. Board Communications Information: 11.01 Board Calendar, Committee, Community and Liaison Reports Amy Rubin reported on the Center of Clayton

Page 4 of 4 Board of Education Meeting October 28, 2020 Page 4 12. Adjournment Action, Procedural: 12.01 Adjournment That the Board of Education adjourn back to executive session. Motion by Gary Pierson, second by Amy Rubin. Final Resolution: Motion Carries Yes: Joe Miller, Gary Pierson, Amy Rubin, Stacy Siwak, Jason Wilson, David Gulick, Kimberly Hurst The open session meeting was adjourned at 9:05 p.m. and the board members returned to executive session. ________________________________ ______________________________ Gary Pierson, Board Secretary Joe Miller, Board President Approved: December 16, 2020