Board of Education

@ChiPubSchools live-stream: https://www.youtube.com/c/ChiPubSchools/videos

While we wait for the stream to begin, here is a link to today’s agenda. 580 pages today https://www.documenters.org/documents/agenda-for-the-board-of-education-meeting-71020/

At 10:32 am the stream is now live. President del Valle just called the meeting to order and roll is being called.

President del Valle is going over the agenda, announcing that there will be a 20 minute recess after the public participation portion of the meeting.

As usual, the meeting opens with Honoring Excellence. Today two Bogan High School students are being honored for academic excellence, receiving over $1 million in scholarship offers.

The Taft Robotic Eagles are also being honored for winning the first ever Midwest Regional Robotics Competition.

Olivia and Yehansa of @FRC8122 join the meeting via Zoom and are speaking on their experience winning the competition. President del Valle expresses his pride in the team’s victory.

Stephen and Corey from Bogan have now joined the call and are sharing their stories with the board.

Stephen is speaking on how teachers at Bogan saw his potential, encouraged and nurtured it.

Corey also says that the support system from the school has been a vital part in his success. He says he has committed to North Central College in Naperville @northcentralcol.

“The bottom line is that you put in the work.... you made this happen…” -President del Valle says to Bogan students Stephen and Corey who gave a lot of credit to their teachers and counselors. He says that their accomplishments are a result of their effort.

@ChiPubSchools Chief Education Officer, Bogdana Chkoumbova, is giving her remarks on the importance of Assistant Principals and their roles in schools.

She is also honoring school clerks, as this week was Clerk Appreciation Day. She says many clerks serve schools for generations and the role is so vital as they are often the first face students and parents see.

She also speaks to the CPS Climate Action Plan intended to improve sustainability in Chicago and in the world. More information here: https://www.cps.edu/globalassets/cps-pages/initiatives/energy-and-sustainability/cps-climate-action-plan-english.pdf

She says that on April 30, many CPS students will be participating in the Dia de Los Ninos parade.

CEO Martinez is now giving his remarks. He says that Pre-K applications are now open and that CPS is moving forward in their goal to have free Pre-K programs available for 4-year-olds in every neighborhood in the city.

The deadline to apply is May 10.

As children have come back from spring break, there has been a rise in the number of Covid positive students. He did not provide any specific numbers.

He is now speaking on the budget, and says that he has seen a lot of information that is not complete or not factual. Martinez says for the first time, every school without exception will have teachers to offer students arts classes.

He says CPS has added 180 academic coaches to their staff.

He says that he recently saw Zapata Academy on the news regarding their budget cuts, but the information was not completely accurate as factors that affect the budget fluctuate and have since been changed.

He says that any school that is still having budgeting issues should keep in mind that CPS is still making adjustments, but he also says that CPS is not seeing requests coming in from schools saying that they are not able to meet educational requirements.

He is now speaking on a partnership with @LurieChildrens that creates behavioral health teams that will help schools identify students who have specific behavioral health needs and provide training to staff to better serve these children. More information TBA.

There are no committee announcements this month.

Honorary Student Board Member Isabel Marroquin is absent from today’s meeting because she is currently being awarded with a STEM award, however CPS application for the next Honorary Student Board Member is now open https://www.cpsboe.org/news/article/1033/the-2022-2023-honorary-student-board-member-application-is-now-available

Moving on to the public participation portion of the meeting. The first speaker is @SharkeyCTU1, outgoing CTU President.

@SharkeyCTU1 is speaking on the importance of the role of technology coordinators in schools, stating that many schools don’t even have one. He urges CPS to protect these roles as the pandemic has proven that technology is extremely important.

He is now speaking on budget cuts and lay offs, especially of special educators. He says these lay offs lead to educators leaving the system and CPS cannot afford this in the middle of a national teacher shortage.

He also stresses the importance of communication between what the board says they’re doing versus what is communicated with schools and principals.

President del Valle says CPS is hiring 1600 teachers.

He also says there shouldn’t be any layoffs as of now, but there is a transitional period right now where some teachers may be moved to other schools to fit the needs of students, but he says these shouldn’t be called layoffs.

Chris Baehrend (@yourbuddychris) of CTU has called in to discourage budget cuts. He says “Please use the funds to help our schools thrive and recover from this pandemic.”

Claudia Rodriguez, Chief of Public Affairs of Noble Schools, has called in to share some stats from a Family Experience survey recently conducted at her schools.

The next caller asked for charter funding, and the following caller is now urging the board to not cut school budgets.

The next in-person speaker is speaking on the importance of Urban Prep in the Bronzeville neighborhood.

The next caller is a student from Urban Prep, Maurice Stevenson, who is sharing his experience at the school, saying it’s taught him so much more than he expected to receive from high school.

The next in-person speaker says that she is here to discuss an issue of equity, with the entire CPS calendar planned around Christian holidays. She says that as a Jewish person she is required to pay for her own substitutes to honor her religious holidays which is unfair.

Following her, the next in-person speaker questions the CPS Board’s duty of care, duty of loyalty, and duty of good faith saying that CPS has failed to fulfill these duties in regards to mask requirements, stating that inaccurate information of vaccines and masking was shared.

The next two callers express concern for the board’s close contact cases policy, also saying that disciplinary actions taken on students who did not mask in the previous months should be removed.

We’re now hearing from a CPS parent concerned with CPS’ out of state travel policy for unvaccinated students. She says she paid for a trip in October for her son to take a trip to DC through the school but was recently told that he could not attend bc he was not vaccinated.

She says that this policy is discriminatory and that her son was not vaccinated due to religious reasons.

CPS teacher Rachel Hobert is speaking against special education budget cuts, saying that her school is one of many who’s students will be negatively impacted if special education teachers are cut from the budget.

Juan Sanchez, an educator from Zapata Academy which was referenced by CEO Martinez earlier, is speaking on the budget cuts that affect his school. He says that thee cuts are a choice & that CPS has the funds to restore Zapata’s full budget.

The next speaker is (in my poor translation from Spanish to English) saying that Latino and Central American students deserve the same consideration as white and rich students. She says the board is cutting a ton of money from Brighton Park specifically, and that it isn’t fair.

The official translation is to follow. The translator is currently having technical difficulties.

We’ve heard from a caller concerned with CPS employee misconduct and how the board has handled specific cases of employee misconduct. He demands video footage of an instance in which a student was physically assaulted by a school official.

The last speaker today, Mary Hughes, is a CPS parent who says that special education students are often excluded from many programs, specifically mentioning GoCPS and art programs.

Translator for Juana Contreras is now present. He says that Contreras called for classes to have no more than 25 students, stating that some don’t even have a library, yet CPS plans to cut their budget even more?

Also clarification on my earlier reference to this speaker. She said African-American, not Central American

1st District State Representative @AaronOrtiz_IL says he is in attendance to vouch for southwest side schools, made of predominately Black & Latinx students. He says budget cuts will lead to overcrowded classrooms which puts them at further risk of Covid. These communities (1/2)

have already been hit the hardest. (2/2)

He says these cuts perpetuate a cycle of violence these students cannot seem to escape.

President del Valle says that while a few schools have expressed concern with the budget, he has not seen a systemic pattern of schools experiencing major budget cuts.

He says that the board is working hard to ensure that they reflect both equity and sustainability in finalizing the school budgets.

“I think when the dust settles, this budget will be much more equitable…” -CEO Martinez

Member Todd Breland tells Martinez that greater visibility and transparency are key to improving conversations about the budget

There is a motion by the board for a 20 minute recess. Meeting to reconvene at 12:20 pm.

It’s now 1:25 pm and we’re still waiting for the meeting to reconvene.

1:27 pm President del Valle reconvenes the meeting and we’re moving on to presentations, starting with the Whole School Safety report.

This is a look at the Whole School Safety process. CPS is currently in the “develop plans and decide” step, the final step of school-based implementation before engaging in community feedback. https://t.co/rjnw7Fd1cn

Per the report, 64% of schools voted to reduce SRO presence in their schools.

Here are some of the ongoing recommendations for whole school safety that go beyond just SROs. The issue of transparency and accountability comes up again. https://t.co/kj5RQcBgXf

Schools that voted to complete remove SROs from their schools are not allowed to reinstate them, they will receive the same recurring funding from last year but can choose to allocate it elsewhere.

This is the timeline for the res of the school year for schools that still have SROs. https://t.co/3LbPSVjVFl

This presentation was done by Jadine Chou, the Chief Safety and Security Officer at @ChiPubSchools

We are now hearing from some of the partners involved including Mikva Challenge, COFI and BUILD.

Maria Degillo says that engagement between parents, youth and the district is critical to ensuring safety and transparency.

President del Valle says “We know our students are more safe in schools than on the streets, and that’s why this work is so important.”

Karen Lynn Morton of COFI says that street violence is just the tip of the iceberg of issues that youth face. She says it’s an injustice to youth to not address the underlying issues that cause violence.

Degillo says that the lessons learned through this program can be implemented in other areas of the system and outside of CPS.

Member Revuluri asks how safety is being measured.

Discipline data should be up within the next couple of weeks.

Member Todd-Breland states a point made by one of he partners saying “Policing is not what keeps us safe. It’s us that keeps us safe.” Stressing the importance of building community.

Member Melendez expresses admiration for the work conducted by the members and partners of this safety program.

We’re continuing presentations with the Student Specific Corrective Action updates.

This corrective action planned was formed in response to problematic procedures found by ISBE in regards to special education services in 2017-2018.

These are current remedy amounts available by category: https://t.co/p6XCsFDUGB

We’re now going over an accountability redesign presentation which states that the district is working on a completely reimagined approach to accountability.

The advisory group consists of 26 people of “diverse backgrounds and areas of expertise”. No specific information on these individuals.

Here’s a look at the Stakeholder Engagement Design Team: https://t.co/cJSoYiVcV0

All meeting notes and materials from these meetings will be available online in both English and Spanish.

The measures of this program will be reevaluated every 3 years in order to ensure continuous improvement.

The district is taking the rest of the calendar year to fine-tune the details of the policy.

Member Sotelo speaks on the importance of “mutual accountability” to meet students where they are, in the environments where they are.

He continues to say that the metrics in measuring accountability are important. He gives CEO Martinez credit for strategically thinking about this.

The final presentation is the April 2022 Board Briefing from the Finance and Audit Committee.

These are the core pillars of auditing done in the district: https://t.co/J5YJxMEAya

Due to the pandemic, a continuous monitoring audit program was implemented which allowed auditing to continue although less time was spend physically in schools.

Here is a brief overview of plans for the next six months: https://t.co/0KJOJzWP5P

Continuing on to the vote on public agenda items.

Items RS1, RS2, EX1, EX2, OP1, OP2, PR1-PR15 are moved.

Items AR2-AR10 are moved.

Items EX5 and EX6 are moved.

Item RS3 is moved.

Items MO3 and OP3 are moved.

There are no more items on the agenda. The board is moves into closed session. There is no set time to reconvene although the meeting is scheduled to reconvene today and vote on a few more items.

My “in real time” coverage of this meeting will end here, but I will update this thread later tonight with what happened after the board reconvened. In real time coverage ends at 3:33 pm.

As promised, I’m back to update this thread with the conclusion of the meeting. The closed session lasted around 49 minutes.

The board came back to move items RS4, RS5, RS6, EX7 and RS7.

The meeting was then adjourned. End of thread-