Board of Education - Regular Meeting

Welcome. Uh, I'm going to call this uh regular board meeting uh to order. Can I have a roll call to establish quorum? Student trustee Chuck here. Student trustee Shepard here. Trusty Boyd here. Trusty Cotton is absent tonight. Um, Trusty Hopwood here. Vice President Inklas here, President Mahoney here, and um Superintendent Stone is out tonight. We have Linda Woo, our chief business official.

Great. Can I have the uh student board members read the uh mission statement and uh uh foundational uh meeting norms? The mission of Albany Unified School District is to provide excellent public public education that empowers all to achieve their fullest potential as productive citizens. AOSD is committed to creating comprehensive learning opportunities in a safe, supportive, and collaborative environment addressing the individual needs of each student.

Our meeting norms are number one, maintain a focus on what is best for our students. Number two, ensure a safe environment for all views to be expressed, treating each other, staff, and the public respectfully. Number three, endeavor to find common solutions to issues through collaboration without sacrificing one's beliefs and what is best for students. Number four, make a commitment to effective deliberation. Each one listening with an open mind while others are allowed to express their own points of view, even if one disagrees. Thank you. Um, can I have a motion to approve the meeting agenda, please? I'll move to approve the agenda. I second. All in favor?

I. Thank you. Um, now we move on to the pledge of allegiance for those who choose. America and to the stands one nation indivisible andice.

Um and now I'm going to turn it over to uh CBO Woo um for our AOSD staff recognition program where we honor one uh certificated and one classified employee each month.

Great. I have the pleasure of actually um announcing who the two uh recipients are uh for the month of January. Our classified recipient is Vivian Baldera. I don't believe she was able to be present today, but I'd love to read um some of the some of the uh submissions uh for her nomination. Vivian oversees so much of the dayto-day needs of our school. She handles supplies, gets our copers fixed, finds coverage for classes when staff are out, and processes our time sheets, to name a few. She is also the face of the school. She greets visitors and is always so warm and helpful. Last but not least, she supports students who drop by and those that are service students with her. Viven is amazing. That's our classified staff uh recipient this month. Round of applause for that. And to our certificated recipient is Ashley Sax. I'd like to read uh I'd like to read a few um words uh from her nomination. Ashley goes above and beyond for our adults. Works countless hours to make sure they feel good about themselves, understanding their disability to the best of their ability. Ashley always has grand plans, so each month looks different. Um, I've been working for this district for almost 33 years now. I love coming to work each day to see the smiles on our young adult faces. Fantastic. Yeah. Okay. Make sure they're the same. Yep. Okay.

Okay. Let's go up to the podium and present the award. All right.

Congratulations. Like to present to you this award. Wow. All right. Beautiful. say a couple words. Sure. All right. Fantastic.

Thank you. Um, hi everyone. I did not plan anything. I did not know what this was going to entail, but um, I really appreciate this honor. I really, really appreciate my staff and my colleagues and my supervisor Brian who's here tonight. I also really appreciate my family and their support and my mom who's in town from Maryland. She flew all the way in for this. Um, thank you to the board and everyone for their um, support for adult transition. U, many of us didn't know what adult transition was until a few years ago when I got on board and now I'm hoping that everyone does and I um want to give a shout out to the ATA and the support to my fellow teachers and hope that we can continue to provide amazing education to our students which is the most important thing that we do. Thank you. That's always fun. Um, and now I'm going to ask our uh student board members to read uh our proclamation um in support uh recognizing February as Black History Month. Um, Unified School District Board of Education proclamation number um 2025 2603 recognizing February as Black History Month. Whereas Americans of African descent helped develop our nation in countless ways, those recognized, unrecognized, and unrecorded. And

whereas African-American history reflects a determined spirit of perseverance, cultural pride, and innovation, innovation and trends, and its struggle to equally share in the opportunities of a nation founded upon the principles of freedom and liberty for all people one day. And

whereas February 2026 marks the 100th National Commemoration of Black History Month, Dr. Carter, uh, Godwin, uh, Woodson, George, Cleveland Hall, William D. Hart, Groove, Jesse E. Morland, Alexander L. Jackson, James E. Stamps, institutionalized the teaching, study, dissemination, and commemoration of Black History Month when they founded the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History, ASNLH, on September 9th, 1915. Whereas in 1925, the inaugural week long observation of black history was established and year after year black history week was built on built into an institution concentrating Americans attention on recognizing and celebrating the effect of African-Americans have led on the have had on the life thought and action in the United States.

Whereas the goal of Black History Week um was to study, teach, and promote the significant contributions that black people have made to Africa. American society. Uh, from writers to inventors to politicians to teachers, artists to musicians. It was designed to document African-Americans from African God from American slavery to freedom and to fill the historical gaps deliberately overlooked. Whereas pioneers of black history and culture have made significant contributions throughout the history of the United States, including the writers of Booker T. Washington, Phyllis Wheatley, James Baldwin, Tony Morrison, Ralph Ellison, Zura Neil Hursten, and Alex Haley. Music of Mahalia Jackson, Billy Holiday, John Quain, Bessie Smith, and Duke Ellington. Resolve of athletes such as Jackie Robinson, Altha Gibson, Jesse Owens, Wilma Rudolph, and Muhammad Ali. Scientific advancements of George Washington Carver, Charles Drew, Benjamin Banaker and May Jes. Visions of leaders such as Frederick Douglas, Mary Mclode Beth Bethun, Thood Marshall, Martin Luther King Jr. and Shirley Chisum and bravery of those who stood on the front lines in the battle against oppression such as Sojourer Truth, Fanny Low Hammer, and Rosa Parks. Whereas on February 10th, 1976 during the United States bsentennial, President Gerald R. Ford made become became the first president to issue a message recognizing Black History Month. Then in 1986, Congress passed public law 99244 designating February as Black History Month. Whereas black people continue to make history, in 2008, Barack Obama was elected as the first African-American

president and served two terms from 2009 to 2017. And in 2021, Kla Harris became the first female vice presidents vice president and the highest ranking female official in US history, as well as the first African-American and first AsianAmerican vice president. Whereas the nation commemorates the 250th anniversary of United States independence, there is a shared responsibility to tell the full and accurate history of the United States, inclusive of all who have shaped it. And

whereas the history and contributions of African-American citizens have constantly been overlooked, misinterpretated, and undervalued in the curriculum of public education institutions prior to the Civil Rights Act of 1964. And whereas the history social science framework for California public schools kindergarten through grade 12 states that the history curriculum of community, state, region, nation, and world must reflect the experiences of men and women of different racial, religious, and ethnic groups and must be integrated at every level. And

whereas the teaching of African-American history and recognition of Black History Month is an attempt to uplift and empower communities and teach our children to respect and honor the contributions of African descents in America. Therefore, be it resolved that the Alba Unified School District's governing board of education hereby proclaims the month of February as Black History Month and aspires that this proclamation will spur meaningful actions throughout the district for a better present day and keep AOSD on the path for a more equitable future. District administrators, teachers, and staff will commemorate this occasion with appropriate instructional activities.

Great. Thank you. Um, now we're going to move on to general public comment. Um, the board welcomes public comment on items not listed on the agenda. Um, and to uh each speaker will be limited to to two minutes and time may not be transferred. Uh, consistent with the Brown Act, the board may not take action on or respond to matters not posted on the agenda, including comments made during this period. Thank you.

Go ahead. Um, hi, my name is Patty and I teach uh fourth grade at Cornell. And to begin, I want to state that I believe everyone in this room really cares for students and that we all want them to succeed. Um, elementary schools have gone through major schedule changes um over the two years in a row. Um, first in 2425, we changed from early bird late bird. Um, and now this year's we've changed to wind time. Um, the speed with which this windtime schedule change occurred did not really allow for meaningful collaboration with teachers or staff. Even after our Cornell teachers met with the superintendent and some of her staff to share our concerns, they really weren't addressed and the plan did not change at all. Um, this year has felt like flying a plane while building it. Uh, the plans for 45 win were absent and we are learning and building as we go. Um, the mandate from Superintendent Stone for no new instruction during win time has eliminated four hours a week of new instruction. That's uh, if my math is correct, somewhere around 25 days of instruction. Um, Upper Elementary has no way of deeply covering standards um, and listening to that proclamation really drove that home. Um, the schedule born of this frenetic change has left Cornell fourth grade with instructional blocks of 50 minutes or less. and forced Cornell first, second, and third into a two-hour block in the morning with no recess. Uh we are currently working on fixing this for the next year and we're taking our time and trying to be mindful. Something that should have happened last year. The groups of instructors and most heavily hit by this schedule are our intervention teachers and our specialists. Our art, PE, science, library, and music teachers schedules are intense. They teach up to five different grade levels every day and have 90 minutes of prep time. How are they managing to keep this all up?

In closing, I want to remind everybody that intent is very different than impact. Our students deserve our best teaching and the current schedule and speed of changes makes this a sysopician task. Thank you. Thank you.

Thank you. All right. My name is Jared Law. I'm a teacher at Albany Middle School. About a month ago, I joined teachers from Contracasta County on the picket line in solidarity. And while I was there, the teachers were discussing conditions in their school and how many of their schools could not attract educators and could not keep teachers in classrooms. So, they had special ed classrooms where teachers were teaching students where like the students were present in the rooms and the teachers were on Zoom. They had classes that had not had consistent teachers for the entire year. And I was thinking, how could this become such a widespread problem? Well, I saw it in the way that bargaining was going down there, which was that the district's bargaining team was not showing up prepared, was consistently disrespecting teachers, and that teachers were not getting the things that they need to really attract uh educators into the county. Now, I see similar things happening in bargaining in Albany Unified School District. We've had our bargaining team coming prepared with proposals every time and the district's bargaining team has frequently come unprepared. And even though we've been working on an expired contract this entire year, we've found that the district's bargaining team has come to the table now with uh insulting proposals. proposals involving cutting teacher health care at a time when the cost of living is increasing uh to a serious degree and also uh dictating the amount of time that teachers need to stay on campus a day forgetting that teachers likely most teachers are spending that time on campus already in addition to time that they spend at home. The bargaining team from the district has also proposed that elementary teachers wanting equalization of prep time that they will add prep time after the school day. But they neglect the fact that most teachers at the elementary level are already using their time after the school day to prep and time in addition to that. When they're asking for prep time, they're asking for time, you know, during the day just like other teachers get. So, I I wanted to just uh note that the way that bargaining has gone has not been collaborative and that we need a collaborative and positive bargaining

process that keeps the interests of students, educators, and the district as a whole uh at its heart. Thank you. Thank you. Go ahead.

I've taught at AUSD since 2005 and spent 10 years at Ocean View. The last place I want to be after teaching 25 second graders all day is an evening school board meeting. But here I am with a message and questions. I have to report that the morale at of Albany teachers is the lowest I've ever seen. Drastic changes have been foisted on the elementary sites with a move fast and break things mentality. We've turned ourselves inside out to adapt to a master schedule coming down from the district. Countless hours have been spent trying to make this oneizefits-all schedule work. But on Friday, when I saw the out ofthe- blue last minute demand for the district to obliterate our professional hours agreement in the contract, it was a gut punch. We've had the professional hours agreement as part of our contract for decades. And we've had it for a very good reason. AUSD used to trust teachers to be professionals and do their job. To take this away and implement a non-negotiable 10 8 hour window is a slap in the face. Teachers work more than eight hours a day, but have always been afforded the respect and flexibility to come in super early or leave late and come in on the weekends and take work home. My only question is why propose this change? Do you really want teachers to punch a clock? It definitely tracks with the unfettered control and micromanaging we've seen this last year and is so incredibly tonedeaf and out of touch with the reality in Albany right now. I would really like to know why this was proposed in a surprise demand in the 11th hour of negotiations. It's demeaning and sews even more discontent and distrust just when I thought morale couldn't get any lower. It also begs some important questions. Will we fill out a time card and get compensated for the countless hours above and beyond that 8 hour window? It is such a dark, heavy, and tragic time in our country and world right now. And it is so discouraging and disheartening and deflating that it is feels so heavy in AUSD right now as well. But for very different and in my

opinion unnecessary reasons. If it is a goal of AOSD to attract and retain the best teachers. This is so counterproductive and has already done so much damage. Thank you. Go ahead. Hi all, my name is Amanda Silas. I teach art at Cornell. I've been a teacher in Albany since 2006. I've taught um second grade. I've taught third grade. I've taught fifth grade. I've been the math coach. So, you might recognize me. I've even taught some of your children. Um I teach art at Cornell now thanks to Prop 28. I want to just say first of all, it's amazing that we have art in our elementary schools. I'll say it on behalf of students and parents that it is very meaningful for them. Many many children come in and it is a favorite for them. So I'm so I'm so grateful for that and I love my job. Um especially in the world of AI and screens and strife that we are facing. Kids can come in and make art and it is amazing. But I am here to tell you even though I have been shouting it from the rooftops to other people, not you, maybe you haven't heard from me, this job is not sustainable. Um, for the uh I have been so clear about the need for adequate prep time for me, for my music, science, uh, PE and library specialists, as well as the other teachers who teach outside of classroom teachers at the schools. Um, we all really need prep time to work and do our job well. If it looks like we're doing this job well, I hope it does, but it is only because we are doing consistent late nights, we are working weekends, we are working early mornings, we are working way beyond our

contract hours to make it happen. Um, every day I teach a typical day like today, I teach fifth grade and then I teach fourth grade and then I teach third grade and then I have a break for lunch and then I teach second grade and I teach first grade and then the day is over and then the work begins. I have 450 students. I have I teach five grade levels. I teach 18 groups of students. I would challenge any of you to think about doing that day in and day out. Please give us equitable prep to the other elementary classroom teachers. We need it. And your students learning environment is our work environment.

Great. Thank you.

Go ahead.

Hello. My name is Curtis Manano. I teach AP environmental science and biology at Albany High School. I would like to speak about the bargaining offer from the school district last week as my colleagues have. In our contract at the moment, we have a professional workday. I want to briefly describe my professional days since I've worked at Albany. In my first couple of years, I would arrive at 7:00 a.m. Oftentimes that was before the custodian would arrive and so I'd have to just wait outside in the cold until he arrived so I could access my laptop and computer and things to actually get started working. Once they unlocked the building, I would start an enormous amount of work building my biology curriculum. in that first year as a new teacher. The next year I took on the task of teaching AP environmental science and once again had to build a curriculum while maintaining the one and improving the one I already had. That took an enormous amount of work and it came with a much larger grading load. In those first two years, I would only leave campus before 5:00 p.m. on days when we had staff meetings because I wouldn't want to walk back up the three floors to my classroom. Currently, I try to arrive around 7:45 and leave at 5:00 p.m. But some days, like today, when I needed to prepare growing media for bacteria, which we're going to transform to make them glow, I needed to stay for quite a bit longer to pour the plates out that the students are going to be using later this week to get the iColi ready for that. Um, and it takes me quite a bit more time. So, I would get in got in about 7 today. All in all, my workday is generally 9 to 10 hours. So when I heard that the district wanted to mandate that I come to work eight hours each day and I was insulted. I was insulted because I freely do much more than that for my students every single day as a part of my currently contracted professional workday. And the occlusion of that portion in bargaining tells me that the district doesn't think I do. The implications that the district finds me no more responsible than my students whom I need to encourage to arrive on time to class with tardy passes and threats to take away their prom. If you can't trust me more than my

students to judge how much time I need to spend to accomplish everything I need to complete in a workday, how can you trust me to teach them? Thank you. Thank you for your comment.

Hi, my name is Jess Freriedman. Um I don't have as eloquently um written thoughts as everyone that came before me, but I can just reiterate that this policy um feels really disrespectful. Um, I would not want to the like when I looked at the contract and I saw that we are seen as really hardworking teachers that dedicate so much of our time to a better system than we were given for our students. It felt empowering and holding that those literal words in the contract is a representation of respect and this feels um pretty distrustful. I don't think this policy is for um this district. Um I think just reiterating morale is very low at the uh school say I work at Ocean View and I see that in a lot of different ways. Um I wish that when there is when there are mistakes that they were acknowledged. In my class we clap for mistakes. we recognize them and then we move on. I um you know just being pretty candid, I think that if an admin makes a mistake then I wish that those mistakes were um taken into accountability and then um re re seen and um fixed if they can be um if they can uh sorry it's like pretty nervous being up here. Um, okay. The last thing I want to say is, um, I just want to read this passage because we're living in a time and we haven't really talked about it, and I just want this to resonate with what would you do. As they turned to enter the building, both girls looked straight ahead toward the door. They did it purposefully so they would not catch the

eyes and attention of two more soldiers who stood with their guns on this corner as well. Uh Kirsty scured ahead of them through the door, chattering about the picture she was bringing home from kindergarten to show Mama. For Kirsty, the soldiers were simply part of the landscape, something that had always been there on every corner, as unimportant as lamposts throughout her remembered life. Thank you. Go ahead. Hey, my name is Linda Bishop. I've been teaching um in Albany for 28 years. Can you go a little closer to the mic?

Yep. and I work at Marin. And um I just want to um bring up I'm I concerned about the talk I hear about putting alarm systems at all the sites across the district and I want to bring it um I know that ATA has asked administration to be sort of transparent about where's this funding come coming from and we have yet to hear and I'm hoping that you can follow up the public can follow up where is this money coming from from alarm systems is it for alarm systems is it bond money um has money not been spent from bond funds Um, is there there I know there pre-existing facility issues. We have HVAC issues at Marin and Cornell, things that are much more pressing and I really hope that you can hold the district accountable to fix those pre-existing issues before they even consider spending money on alarms. And please let us know where this is coming from. Hopefully, you can get some answers and we can have some clarity. Thank you.

Thank you. And any other comments from the room being online? I see no comments. So, thank you. We'll move on. Um, I believe the next item on the agenda is student board member reports. Um, so Concel and I have been working um about doing a math vision event at the high school. We've been working with Superintendent Stone and high school principal McN to create a math vision event to support the math vision team and other educational um leaders in creating a future of AUSD's mathematic education that reflects the needs of students. We've recruited students through email and school announcements as well as reached out to math educators to share the event with their students. We hope that the event will be productive and that the results will be considered a crucial part of the decision-making process.

Um, additionally, um, we've been working with Superintendent Stone, High School Principal McNal, the high school leadership and adviser, uh, just walked out. Never mind, as well as others in reimagining what the student advocacy committee can accomplish. Um the student advocacy committee uh has been giving year-round presentations to the board for multiple years um and but we want the committee to be more research focused uh and to pro promote more uh direct real change um directly within the district and so with this new stage uh we'll be uh starting recruitment for this new restructured SACE um pretty soon. Uh, additionally, uh, we have been in the planning stage for a superintendent student advisory committee, uh, which will be bringing together student representatives from every part of the district to work with the superintendent to address issues uh, within their sites and work together to make sure that AUSD's future is student centered. Uh, we hope this committee will be an opportunity for students to see effective change within their schools as well as for the superintendent to receive support and feedback on her initiatives that she brings to the discussion. Great. Thank you. Um, now I'll turn it over to uh our labor partner reports. Um, labor partners may provide brief updates to the board on matters related to members priorities or collaborative efforts. It's open communication and partnership. Go ahead.

Hi. Uh, the events in Minnesota and across the country are on all of our minds and we're focused on making sure our students and colleagues feel safe and supportive. However, as you've heard, we also want to voice how disappointed we are. in how the bargaining process has progressed. We had our first bargaining meeting more than eight months ago on May 13th. We are very intentional in our proposals and deeply engaged all of our members to make sure we were focused on their prop top priorities and those of the students we serve. We are fair and transparent internally and with district leadership. The proposals we made were reasonable, meaningful, and focused on improving the quality of teaching and learning. The fact that we are still negotiating eight months later is deeply frustrating. We've done our best to show up prepared for every session just to learn. Often the district team is unprepared. Our time of professionalism aren't being respected. We are only invited to collaborate when district leadership needs something from us and after most decisions have already been made. That's not cor that's not collaboration. From the very beginning, we've acknowledged both to our members and to the district team that our proposals most likely could not all be realized in their original form. Our hope was that district leadership would at least share our goals and make the best possible effort to address them. We no longer feel confident that district leadership share our goals, nor that they've made their best effort to respond to our proposals. Instead, they've dragged out negotiations and have not been equally transparent in their communications with the school board and with ATA. Elementary specialist teachers who deserve sufficient prep time are being told they should simply do more work before and after school. We appreciated hearing Superintendent Stone name full family healthcare as a priority during the budget workshop and were surprised when the district team proposed cutting our benefits, especially so late in the bargaining cycle. We are prepared to fight for the contract we need and stand with our bargaining team 100%. Please make sure the district team shows

up to our next meeting on February 2nd prepared to reach an agreement. Thank you. Any other labor uh representatives? Seeing none, um you're doing a report today on behalf of the superintendent? No, not today. Great. Um so we'll move on to the board committee reports. Our board members can talk about some of the work they've been doing in various committees over the recent month. I'll start with uh Trusty Boyd. Anything? Nope. Trusty Outwood.

No report. My committees haven't met yet. In English, we just switched. No, sorry.

Okay. Well, hey, I uh I went to a meeting. Um earlier this week, I was at the as part of the tech master planning committee. I'm on the digital wellness subcommittee. We reviewed materials for our next uh uh planning mate committee where we get together which will be on February 9th. And then just as a little bit of an advertisement, I've got the citizen bond oversight committee coming up later this week on January 29th. Um board reports. Trusty Boyd. I don't have an actual report. I just want to say that every member of our district, everyone who is providing such excellent services to our children should feel respected and appreciated. And I know that everyone who is working for the district believes that. Um, but I also know that intention is not the same as impact. And I am personally committed to doing the best that I can for all of those who provide such excellent service to our students. And I know that I'm not alone in that. I know that everyone believes that, too. That's it.

Thank you, Z. Hopwood.

Thank you. Second what Trusty Boyd so eloquently just stated. Um I have a short report. Um I was fortunate enough last night to attend the um AUSD Elementary, the fifth grade band uh performance at the high school. Um which was also there was also the um AMS jazz band which was amazing. They were all fantastic. I think there were 109 students performing last night in the HS gym. Um, and so big shout out to um Dr. Carlos Hernandez and Lucas Danderlay and Jeffrey Luna Sparks for um amazing music program which is supported so strongly by the Albany Music Fund. So I just really want to mention that organization too. I mean the chairs they were sitting on, the band stands, the instruments all um subsidized and supported by AMF. So, it's worth considering that and appreciating that organization. Um, and next week at Marin, which is one of my new sites, there is a site council meeting on Tuesday and um, Marin Morning, a coffee with the principal on Wednesday morning and a PTA meeting in the evening. So, I look forward to attending of those. Thank you. That's the end of my report. I also don't have an official report this week. Um, having just switched, I haven't been to any meetings yet. Um, but I also agree with um, what Trusty Boyd said. Um, I also just wanted to say that I was thankful for Superintendent Stone's email about our community and what's going on right now in the world, which is very, very challenging. Um, I know it's bringing up a lot of emotions for everybody, myself included, sadness, frustration, anger, lots of conversations at home. Um, and it made me realize that I I just I've been in the community for 21 years and my kids have been in the school district since uh TK. One is graduating this year,

another one's in 10th grade. And I am just incredibly grateful for the community that we have here, the schools, the teachers, the parents, just the general community because it would be a very hard time living in this country right now not to have this particular community. So, I just want to say thank you. Thank you for that. Um, uh, I'm going to switch topics and feel really awkward by doing that because I think you guys have said some really powerful things. I do want to comment I went to a bunch of workshops to better understand the governor's education budget or budget proposal I should say from both the California School Board Association, School Services of California and Sacramento and all capital adviserss at the Alama County Office of Education. I will say I'm glad to see in the budget that there's some additional support for special education. Um, I do worry about the governor's dependence on the bud and the dependence on the budget on the growth of the AI of AI companies. I'm skeptical that that will come to pass. I'm really disappointed by the over5 billion in education funding that the governor has decided not to give to schools immediately despite the rules of Prop 98. This five this $5 billion means a loss of over $990 per student and if given as like a cola plus up could have been a benefit to Albany of over $3.2 million. So when we think about some of the challenges we've got, we know somewhat where to look. January 14th, I watched the movie Count It Out at Ocean View multi-purpose room and it was actually kind of amazing. Um parents were there, teachers, administrators. Uh if you haven't seen the movie, I would counsel everybody here to see it is especially uh good at articulating um that if you don't have core math skills, you can't really understand how the world's going to work. Whe there's geromandding or elections, the spread of disease or the jobs that people have access to, math is critical. And as such, math really is a civil right. Aren't not math people and and math people. Everybody can learn

math. In Albany, 68% of students are at or above standard of math. And while this is like top third probably in Alama County, we need to do better. If one in three of our students are not proficient in math, we are not preparing them properly to be citizens or members of the community. And as such, in my opinion, I'll echo the uh the words of our student board members. The work of the district in the math visioning process is critical. I'd love to see a plan that gets all students to where they need to be where uh with regards to math. That's all I have to say.

Nope. Sorry. Uh and now I'm turning it over to the facilities master planning um progress update from HKIT. Uh, CBO, do you want to do a little bit of an introduction? Yes. At this time, I'd like to introduce um Jeffrey Evans, who has been the project lead for us um creating uh basically the facilities master plan. And I'm really excited to hear the progress.

So close.

Hi, excuse me. I first want to start with some acknowledgement and appreciation for all the members of the district uh the members of the schools, parents, the students that have participated in the facility master plan process so far and I want to share my admiration for how much care and commitment your community has to its schools and how much of a privilege it has been for HKT to collaborate with you so far. Um, as mentioned, I'm going to share a brief update on what we've been up to and kind of where we're headed. Um, and just logistics. If I say next slide, does that uh or do I control?

Okay, next slide. Um, one of the things that's really important is to share what from our perspective a master plan is and in some ways what it isn't. And this is something we've done at each meeting. And what we'd like to say is that a master plan is in the most general and broadest terms the vision for our physical campus. Next slide. That vision of course isn't just about the windows or the doors or the roofs. It's also about what the people, the students, the teachers, the staff, the parents, the community need from that particular facility. And so these things come together again to form that vision. That vision is a compass direction. It's not a road map. And so again, it's general. If we go to the next slide. Uh similarly, part of our task is then to after we develop the master plan to with you all develop an implementation plan. And probably comes as no surprise often the needs exceed available funds. And so the implementation plan is what specifically out of the master plan are we choosing to use the bond dollars on? Next slide. a little bit about our process so far. Um, and just noting that we started in September, so about four months in. Um, our early stages have really just been focused on listening and learning. And you can see some of the things that we've done so far, including walking each site with principles. We've started our meetings with teachers and staff. Uh, we've formed the steering committee with representatives from each school uh, community. Uh, and we've met with some key district staff as well. And then from there um we have developed a set of materials to establish a common understanding of each of our school campuses and we have started the process of forming the guiding principles. Uh from this material we will develop master plan options to first share with

steering committee and then share with the individual school communities both teachers staff as well as parents to get feedback. then to coales around a master plan at each school campus. Uh and then from there to develop draft implementation plan options and then to again as a community coales around a recommended implementation plan. And if we go to the next slide, um actually go down one more. Um and what we have, uh what we're doing as we work with steering committee and listen to the community and the school sites is uh working with steering to develop a recommendation that can be shared with the district and of course to you the board who uh decide what the implementation plan and master plans will be. Uh next slide. Um if we thank you so much. So may come as no surprise but this has been going on for several years as is custom and proper for a school district to always have a sense of the current state of its facilities and what the needs are. And so starting with safety audit, um work in 2024 around needs assessments, um various surveys, work that's been done in early 2025, I'm sorry, in 2024 around the bond and the fact sheet and what the priorities were. Um and then again with the master plan steering committee, early part of 2025 all the way through our work. Um we're not starting from scratch. We're listening to everything that's been done and sort of building upon that and verifying it. And so if we go to the next uh slide, what we have kind of done is synthesize that into two pages per campus. Just to give you a brief overview, the first page, what we're trying to do is establish common set of data at each campus. How many students, how many potential students, how many classrooms, how many portables, and then there's some key figures in the

top about how big is the NPR, if it's there or not, how much admin space do they have. This is really key because one of the things you find with campuses that have been around a long time um is that they weren't designed in the way that they're used now. Um and the other thing we've done as you can see in the bottom right is there are a lot of different ways to measure investment at a campus. We have added up the dollars of each project that has gone to DSA. Mind you, if a district does a maintenance project, that doesn't necessarily have to go to DSA. And so, this is not a full glimpse of the dollars at each campus, but it is a way of looking at each campus. So, that's the first page. So, we start with Alb Children's Center. Sort of key thing there. Um, we know that there have not has not been a DSA project since 1998. Uh, and so that's a zero. Next slide. Um, again, an overview. what we've tried to do here and you saw that road map there's there's volumes of paper is just really say like what's the highest and biggest need and what is the what are the opportunities this is a beautiful setting it's a wonderful location it has lots of space the way that they use the indoors and the outdoors together is great and so there's opportunity to uh improve this site on the flip side there's a major major need at this campus um campus needs a major modernization and and it has some accessibility challenges Next slide. Um, as we pivot to the high school, I won't read all the data at the bottom. You can see that in common. The other thing you'll notice is the dates. So, this is really important. One, because uh, Prop 2 requirements for master plans is that you identify the age of your facilities and when you've done m when you've done modernizations. And so, this is coded in there. Um, and then it also helps you start to see a pattern. Um, as probably no surprise, the the the two buildings with the with the blue numbers, which are the oldest numbers, are the buildings that have the biggest

need because they haven't had the renovation or um the replacement, quite frankly, that the high school has had. If you go to the next slide, um the uh sort of the biggest area of need and no surprise is is of course the fine arts building. Uh and that's identified. Um, you know, the the other thing for the district to keep in mind is that you're coming up on 25 years on some of these beautiful facilities at the high school and also the middle school. And that tends to be a line where one there's modernization funding availability, but you need a refresh. And so even though the biggest need is at the fine arts building, the theater, um there's still a need at the other buildings in particular. Um and again there's a lot of detail here but there's no dance classroom um things like that. One of the other things we'll note as we go along is that the district has a presence because it's district officeices is too small. The district is using space at number of campuses including the high school the middle school and Cornell and so that's one of the things you'll note um as we go along. Uh and then of course there are a lot of other needs across you know we talked about potential reconfiguration of the admin you know needing another science classroom both here and at the middle school and so that that gets um included in there as well. Next slide. Uh spoiler alert as I mentioned um at the middle school again beautiful facility coming up on 27 years old and so it is in need of refresh and you're starting to see that u with some failed uh HVAC units things like that but of course then we have the annex across the street great condition uh designed for different use though uh next slide um so kind of the the biggest thing there again is there's a refresh needed but um the uh situation in within the arts and music classrooms as well as the

admin. You know, it's been renovated a bunch of times and it's just it's it uh can can be improved. U but of course the uh serving of lunch and the um kitchen are not sized for the current capacity of the school and there's very limited places for students uh to to eat once they have their lunch. um both at the middle school and high school there is one lunch and so that means everybody eats at the same time and so because of that we're not really looking for one place for 900 kids to eat because it's just that's too big. Um but we want to be mindful and have lots of places that are distributed around for people to eat. Uh street crossing and safety and security of the campus are big big deals here um at the middle school and again that's kind of noted there. Next slide. Um okay. Um if we look at Cornell, um similar story where we see uh some buildings that have been around a long time, have had some projects, um some smaller modernizations here and there. Um I want to also just highlight the 7.5 million in DSA projects since 1998. Um you all know you know Marin and and Ocean View had been rebuilt. Cornell has a high amount of need. Next slide. Um, sorry, if you can go up one, sorry, go back. Thanks so much. Um, number in the top right there. So, the district accommodates 13 staff at its district office. Um, it really needs to accommodate 29. And so, that just gives you a sense of the impact then you have on your school sites because the district's using space kind of around. Sorry, next slide. Um, you know, Cornell has a um major need, major modernization need on its on its main building. Uh, and there's lots of parts to that, excuse me, including some underside

spaces. You know, the entry is not at the entry. It's like back in, and that's just not something we would do today. And so, there's a lot of need there. Um, there are some old portables uh that are nearing the end of their useful life. and it's a very compact site and so that'll present some challenges for us. On the flip side, it is a hub, you know, and and as you find on all of these um all of your schools, you know, this this is a real hub weekends uh during the school day. It's sort of right there on Solano and and so it's just a great location. Um which comes with its challenges. Next slide. Um, okay. So, we talked a little bit about Marin, of course, recently rebuilt except for uh the two TK classrooms down at the end and we can see the investment that's come sort of um thanks to the community of Albany. Next slide. Um so uh though there was um a wonderful investment new facilities renovated facilities as mentioned the TK uh did did not get upgraded that time and wasn't designed for that use and so for example it's missing restrooms the other thing that happens here and it's similar at Cornell um is it's a really undersized NPR uh and so that has impacts on things like you know rainy day lunch space for PE kind of all of those things. Um, you know, the NPR is really a place where the whole community kind of comes together to experience the school. And so they're doing a lot of stuff outside uh with outdoor reading. And then they have uh some programs that are using spaces that again weren't necessarily um ideal for their I'm sorry weren't designed for their use. Uh and then one of the things one of the threads that we find is is for example science art often are pushing into the classrooms. we

don't necessarily have space for science and art to have their own classroom. Um, other thread here I'll just touch on and this came up. Uh, TK is here. Um, TK went into the space where kindergarten was and kindergarten kind of went into a space that wasn't necessarily designed for kindergarten. That's happened at all three elementary schools. And there's a real robust conversation about um the challenges of having students that young on this campus. Um beautiful school site uh and great great project to build it as it is now. Next slide. As we go to Ocean View um similar you know rebuilt recently um really nice project and beautiful campus. They have a lot of space for administration as compared to say Cornell or or as compared to Marin. And um sort of the one building that got touched less was the NPR. And so that if we go to the next slide that has a need there is NPR particularly the kitchen small kitchen here small kitchen at Cornell and at at Marin and serving here is also um sort of undersized and so that's an area of emphasis that we we find again some older portables in the back that need to be replaced. Um there's some things about the site layout, site design that um could be improved, but really great start. Um you know, very nice campus. Um if we go down to the next slide. So this just shows all of the schools and the investment that has happened again in DSA project dollars. No escalation, no adjusting for inflation, but just adding up the dollars. far right is ACC and Cornell and then high school on the left. And if we go to the next slide and you know kudos to the district that you're really looking at it um fairly stable enrollment or in some cases

potential for a slight uptick. Um we wanted to then look at sort of the dollars per student, not just the dollars but the dollars per student. Uh and you can see it's sort of a similar pattern or trend across across the district. And so this is information that we've been sharing out. You can still see drafts on the pages per campus because we've been getting feedback and we'll continue to do so. Um, from there, next slide. What we've tried to do is put together a set of guiding principles to create a shared vision for the master plan. Um, and really helps us synthesize but also build consensus. And this can become an objective tool to help us assess the master plan options uh and also to help us potentially score and look at things for the implementation plan. If we go to the next slide, um what you see here is a draft that we reviewed with the steering committee at the previous meeting in January. Has not been updated yet since that, but we had a really robust discussion about these um guiding principles. So the guiding principles are kind of the headlines on each of the five boxes and then below that we've given some examples from the type of work um that's needed and most critical on the different campuses. Um and this will continue to be refined because we'll share this out at each of the u schools and we'll continue to edit this and again kind of decide is are we missing a guiding principle? Are they the right ones? that we need to have some more detail in there. Next slide. Oh, that was it. Okay. Um, welcome. Any questions you may have?

Yeah, thank you. Are there are there any questions from the board? Have one. Um, what is the process to finalize those guiding principles? Because I I or maybe it's two questions. I assume that they'll be used to weigh and determine priorities because there's likely not enough money to do everything. Correct. So, can you talk a little bit more about that?

Uh, great question. Um if you think about sort of the concentric ring kind of structure um what we're had the meeting with steering to kind of see those first and help us start to shape then we're going to start to share those guiding principles with each of the school sites um to get the feedback and then we'll come back to steering and say this is what we've heard this is comments we've heard this is what we think um the revised sort of guiding principle should be and then that becomes sort of a part of the package that we'll base the master plans on and and that will eventually come to the board to review and confirm. I didn't mention the overall timeline is we're I'm trying to get I went through the schedule really quickly, but essentially we're trying to do the master plans kind of here in February and review the options in March and then cost them out and finalize April and start to develop implementation plan options April. start to get feedback April, May and then eventually coales to an implementation plan recommendation uh for June.

Should be for us, right? Yes. Yeah. Thank you. Any uh any other comments from the the crowd? Go for it. Um, I only really know AMS, but I just as the urgency of different projects is being weighed, I hope that all the additional lunch shelters that were installed in I think 2021 um are being included and factored into the that versus bathrooms versus having the annex and all that.

Great comment. We will see you all tomorrow. That's when our meeting is. Um, what I didn't mention is that we're also working on a website um that will be put together, have all the information so people that aren't able to make it to actual individual meetings can still learn and provide feedback.

Fantastic. Um, any comments on on Zoom? Oops. Not seeing any anything else? Uh, thank you so much as as a member of the the steering committee. It's it's been fun to kind of see all the different groups come together with parents, teachers, board members, administrators, and like it's actually really um maybe not maybe it shouldn't be surprising, but it's definitely really heartening that when talking about all these different sites, a there's a lot of consensus around what the needs are. It's not a it's not a conversation of people fighting back and forth. It's people building upon those sorts of things. So, that gives me a lot of hope that we can come together with a plan that'll buy into you. So, thank you so much and thank you for all the great work.

Thank you. And now we are up for our local control accountability plan midyear review LCAP for those of you playing acronyms at home. Um and for that we have executive director Ren Shriner.

I'm just going to test the clicker before we start. Technology is my enemy. Excellent. Okay. You've conquered it today. Don't speak too soon. Uh good evening, CBO Woo. Um standing in for Superintendent Stone, to our school board, our community members. Um I'm here to share a pretty brief update, but a pretty exciting update um around our midyear progress towards our local control and accountability plan or our LCAP. See, you jinxed it. Blame me. It's fine. the blame for everything. Anyway,

um so just as an overview, our LCAP is basically our our blueprint for how we support students and allocate resources over a three-year period. We're in year two of the 2024 to 2027 cycle. And we always start from a fixed baseline um which is our 2023 data which helps us see progress over time. And so each year, uh, the data shows us what's working, what needs adjusting, and helps us make informed decisions about where to invest resources for the biggest impact on student outcomes. So tonight's midyear update is our chance to sort of pause and look at how things are going, highlight what's working well um and identify where we still have gaps um especially for focal student subgroups holding an equity lens in mind um so that we can adjust our plan and make sure that all students are set up for success. Our LCAP focuses on three big goals that guide everything we do. The first is all about equitable, inclusive, and rigorous instruction. We want every student to have access to highquality learning that affirms who they are, removes barriers, and helps them grow academically. Our second goal focuses on the whole child, which is really about supporting mental wellness and a sense of belonging, student agency, social, emotional, and behavioral support. And our third goal is about our systems. And we're really working to um grow in our ability to strengthen shared leadership, use data to drive decision-m and engage voices in a way that fosters uh equitable outcomes and continuous improvement. And to understand how we're progressing on our LCAP goals, we use a variety of state and local metrics. We've got our CASP assessments which give us state level satellite data in different subject areas along with our LCAP which measures our um multilingual learners progress towards English proficiency. And then we also use data from the California school dashboard as well as our local indicators um to provide information on academic performance,

engagement, conditions and climate um that helps us identify gaps and also monitor progress. And additionally, we rely on the California Healthy Kids Survey to get insights into students school connectedness, their engagement, and that's going to be available in spring 2026. So, we don't have a report out on that quite yet. And lastly, we use um CDE data Quest, which gets updated all the time to track enrollment, our multilingual learner data, staffing, and a variety of other metrics. And taken together all of this data when we analyze it and synthesize it down gives us a pretty comprehensive picture of our student outcomes, student engagement as well as school conditions so we can continue to improve um and make informed decisions. So I'm going to share a little bit about progress towards our goals um before we have a little bit of a discussion or questions at the end. And we're going to start with um our first goal which is really grounded in our student academic um outcomes with a real lens on satellite data. Some of this is a review from our fall vital signs and some of it is a bit of a deeper dive um because in the fall we really focused on our major priority of literacy. So the headlines here really are that our ELA proficiency for all students increased slightly and we're seeing some gains for our Latino students um but our black students and our multilingual learners are not showing improvement and in fact our multilingual learners declined. And so there's some that gives us a little bit of um information that we need to target additional support um look at how our u multilingual learner support is going um and identify additional interventions to close gaps. I'll talk a little bit about that um later on in the presentation. In math um our proficiency also increased slightly overall and our largest improvement there um is for our black students which is encouraging. Um, our multilingual learners and students with disabilities, however, continue to

lag. Um, and so those groups remain um a focus for us for targeted support. Overall, our science proficiency showed a slight decline um with multilingual learners and um students with disabilities showing the largest decreases, which highlights a need for that focus support across content areas. When we shift um a little bit to look at college and career indicators for our high school graduates, we're seeing really strong growth overall that we're excited about um at Albany High. Um from 67% in 2023 to 82% in 2025. And all of our student subgroups are really showing meaningful gains here, which is exciting. Um our black students increased um 19 percentage points. Our Latino students increased 21 points. Um, so those gains are super encouraging and it speaks to the incredible leadership of our AHS site staff and our incredible teachers. Um, and again, our our continued focus is on monitoring persistent gaps um for students who um fall into our focal subgroups so we can ensure they're getting the education they deserve. When we shift to look at the percentage of students who are completing courses required for UC or CSU eligibility, we're seeing also strong growth overall up from 66% to 76%. Um with some gains that are especially significant for our black students and our students with disabilities. Um so we what this tells us is that more of our students are completing college prep coursework. Um and again some of those persistent uh achievement gaps are our focus area here. Looking at another indicator here that um is important for us, our AP exam performance. We're seeing strong growth overall. Uh the percentage of students um who are passing with a score of three or higher improve from 62% to 85%. And the gains here are are particularly

impressive for our groups of students who um are historically the furthest from opportunity. um our English learners increasing by um 61 percentage points. Um our students with disabilities making incredible gains. Um so some really really exciting work uh that is happening for our students who are taking AP classes at um Alb High. Shifting a bit u we're going to look specifically at our multilingual learners um and their progress. Overall, uh the majority of our multilingual learners are making progress in their English language proficiency. And where we're seeing um if we drill into that subgroup even uh further, our long-term English learners, our ELTs who have remained with us for u many years and who've not yet reclassified as English proficient. That's really the group of students that we're digging into um especially with Michelle Sinclair and our ELD teachers who come together about monthly in a community of practice to really look at individual student level data to understand what some of the root um of of that stuckness is there. And just pulling us back a little bit. Sorry, I think I changed the order of the slides on accident there. Um, this uh this slide sort of just highlights on a a broad on a broader scope um some of those trends that um I was just speaking to in terms of the growth but the the need to really support our long-term English learners um who have declined in their achievement. This is why it's important to number your pages of notes. Um, looking closely at our graduation rate, again, um, highlighting some of the incredible work at Albany High. Our graduation rates continue to be really strong for us here in Albany. Um, and

really exciting to see that graduation rate improve from 93 to 99%. Um and especially exciting to see that each um subgroup showed improvement. Um big gains there for our students with disabilities, for our multilingual learners in particular backwards. Okay, so shifting slightly away from academics towards a connected priority um here around belonging um but some data related to our chronic absenteeism um and suspension. So, when we look at our data here, we've seen, as we talked about in the fall with our vital signs presentation, um really strong reductions in chronic absenteeism across the district. Um, and I think the deck that you all had had an error, so this one is corrected. Um, but we're excited about that decrease for our black students and for our Latino students as well as our socioeconomic uh socioeconomically disadvantaged students. um which really just gives us some insights into our efforts to increase engagement um increase attendance and maintain safe and supportive climates um are working and of course there's still more work to do um for some of our subgroups of students. So sort of overall that was a lot of information and a lot of data in a really short amount of time. Um there's really big wins to celebrate in terms of our college and career readiness, our AP successes, our UC and CSU course completion, um with some pretty big gains, um for multiple student subgroups. Um and you know, we're seeing some modest system level growth in terms of ELA, um and math outcomes. Um and so we can we can sort of take that holistically to um synthesize that our focus on equitable and rigorous instruction is paying off. And there's certainly some gaps that we need to do a better job addressing. When it comes to our whole child development, um it's really exciting to

see our chronic absenteeism declining and getting close to precoid rates. Um as well as um pretty stable suspension rates that are um showing some improvement, especially for our decreases with um our black students and our students with disabilities. And when we think about that third goal around systems improvement, it can sometimes feel a little bit obtuse or vague or hard to grasp. Um, but I think it speaks a lot to the leadership as well as the collaboration of our Albany High leadership with the teachers and the department leads around some of these changes and systems and structures that have been put in place to help students access things like more AP courses um, and to be more college ready. And overall when we think about some of those big challenges, you know, we've talked about this a lot in this space when it comes to data presentations, but really the persistent and in some cases widening disproportionality that's existing for some of our subgroups um in particular when we're thinking about our multilingual learners. And there's certainly not um a way to sort of distill down into the exact reason that these are the outcomes that they are. It's something that our ELD teachers in particular are looking at. and that I think it's a bit of a call to look at not just um on the instructional level of the individual teacher but really what our systems um and structures are doing or are not doing. So for example, we've talked in the past about um that we're going through a curriculum adoption process at the elementary school um and we'll be having a new English language arts curriculum. And a big part of the reason that our teachers have distilled down our options to the two that we're considering is because they're knowledge building curricula. Right now we don't have an approach that is knowledge building vertically across our system. Meaning that you know if I'm in kindergarten I study habitats and then in first grade I study ecosystems and then in third grade etc. Um, and there's a lot of research around how

important it is to build that background knowledge, to build that vocabulary, especially for multilingual learners. So, it's a bit of a thought about why some of this data um exists that way. Um, and the other piece that we're interested in sort of u peeling back a little bit is what are the systems and structures around designated ELD at each site? Um, and where are their similarities? Where are their differences? Where um are we seeing some improvement? where are we seeing some things that are lagging? Um, and I bring that up because there are some of our sites right now who are providing designated ELD in addition to core instruction. Um, and unclear how consistently that's happening across the board. And one of the things that really matters is for our multilingual learners to get all of their core ELA instruction and not have that supplanted by designated ELD. So something that we're, you know, trying to learn a little bit more about And I forgot to click the slide and then summarize some of the next steps that we're taking. Let me take a moment to see if there's anything that I missed here. Okay. Um we're currently I guess I'll speak a little bit to some of the this data driven piece here um that we're interested um in engaging over the next couple weeks. We're in our middle of year assessment window right now um with a lot of exciting gains that are happening. Um some of our teachers that were here today um are just absolutely incredible. You know, moving starting the year with 65% of their kids able to read and now at 95%. That's incredible. Um and over the next couple weeks, our grade level teams and their principles as well as interventionists and ELD teachers will be looking at that data um in a really student by student level to make plans for what shifts can happen um over the next few months to support our students. And I think I'll pause there

to to turn it over to CBO Woo to share about um some of the ways our LCFF budget um is connected to this work.

Thank you for sharing that. Um I don't have anything as exciting to share, but this is not new information in terms of like the budget overview. you know, as a part of the LCFF funding is ensuring that enough uh funding actually supports those in the highest needs and the categories that were um updated, you know, from the executive director, um Shriner. So, with that said, when we adopted the budget, it was $45 million LCFF budget with approximately $3 million for supplemental funds. Um that hasn't shifted too much as per reported from the first interim update. So, we're still circling around approximately 45 million LCFF funds and $3 million in supplemental funding uh to support the students. Next slide, please. And with that said, you are all familiar with this slide. Uh for the most part, it's just a snapshot of uh where our district stands uh financially. Um it is a requirement that we include this as a part of the midyear update. But however, it's really just saying that you know in terms of unrestricted funded revenue is nothing new that we reported since first interim. You have about a $69 million budget. Um our expenditures are are about 75 million right now. Um we're able to meet our reserves and so forth. Um and so there's nothing like super exciting to update you on here. And that's it. I'd love to, you know, have any questions or any discussion from the board.

Have a question. Yeah. Um, what makes up the college and career indicator CCI? Is it is it just um college readiness classes? I mean, it's career as well. Do you guys like figure out if kids can cook and do their laundry? Great questions. Yeah. Let me find our slide here. Here we go. Can do their laundry and will do their laundry is sometimes different things in my experience.

That's a course we're thinking of adding next year for all the families. Um that's a great question. So essentially, um when we're looking at different indicators, students are essentially, um I don't know if grouped is the right word, but placed in the prepared level on this indicator. Um, and so that is indicative of how they perform in particular classes that match to that indicator level. And I'm happy to get those the sort of granularity of what those particular courses are and share it out. Yeah,

thank you. Um, I had a couple questions. Uh, one is, um, I want the focus to be on the subgroups obviously, but when we see all cohort, I'm assuming that those subgroups the the averages kind of are reflected in the all cohort, but it would be helpful to me, I think, to see how our white students and our Asian students are doing so we have more of a comparison amongst all the groups. That's just a thought. Very helpful feedback. Thank you. And then the other um question I had was um

I know that our students have made great gains in literacy and we've seen that demonstrated. Um but talking about as you've mentioned the disparity in say multilingual learners just to use one that subgroup as an example. Um I'm just curious how windtime is helping to support those students. You know we heard from a teacher about how during win time there's no new instruction. For example, I understand that win time is designed to actually support students who need a bit of extra help. I mean, do you think it's actually really doing what it needs to to address the um those groups, the subgroups basically, and how to where they need to be?

It's a great question. Um I've been looking at the data nightly as it's been coming in, and there are really really exciting gains that are happening and for our subgroups, but not just that. Um research says that if we can maintain 95% of kids who are at or above over the course of the year to stay at that high level of achievement, that's an indicator of strong tier one structures, systems, and instruction happening. And that's not happening in every classroom, but it's happening in a lot of our classrooms. So what that tells me, and I'm not a teacher, I'm not on the ground or having the experience that they have, and that is an incredibly important part that we need to understand. That tells me that from the literacy achievement perspective that our students who um are at really low risk or are advanced are maintaining that level of achievement while we're also closing gaps this year for kids who are not there yet. Um when it comes to our multilingual learners, something that I'll say is that my understanding is that each elementary school structures their English language development support differently. So my understanding, for example, is that one of our elementary schools, they structure their windblock so that if I'm a multilingual learner and I need to develop the language, I go to the EL teacher for part of the windblock, but if I also need to learn to read, then I get a second level of support there. I don't believe that's the case at all of our elementary schools um at this time.

Thanks. Yeah. And I guess our data in the future will will tell us if it's Yeah. been super in a couple weeks. Yeah. Great. Thank you. Other questions? Um, sorry. Did you have I didn't need the order is at your boy.

Um I I just uh wanted to appreciate the focus the various folky um of the different groups and it's and just say that it's really lovely to be looking at data and to see pluses in so many categories and you know pluses and for so many of our of our various subgroups. it doesn't at all mean that we take our foot off the pedal or take you know remove our focus in in the areas that um that you flagged but but I um you know we can't just sort of push to be better without you know celebrating and acknowledging all the hard work and and and real focus and and commitment that goes into bringing those numbers up. And so I just want to um acknowledge and appreciate and say there was a smile in my smile on my face and and in my heart as I was looking and saw pluses in in all of those columns. And then um you know specifically on the the regarding the multilingual learners which seem to you know sort of come up in in a few different

um categories information like what you're flagging about you know how there can be differences among the different elementary schools and how these things are um are sort of uh attacked at this point. I'm I would I'm guessing that the the goal is to kind of bring those groups together and and you know collaborate and talk about you know what's what's agreed upon as the sort of best route forward and makes that consistent across the sites. I just wanted to

Yeah, that's a I I appreciate that. And actually this Thursday, all of the elementary instructional leadership teams are coming together. And one of the things that we're doing is we're reflecting on the state of our current instructional schedules with a lens on literacy and what research and best practice tells us about designing those schedules. So there'll be time for a little bit of input on research, but then time for sites to have engage with a self-reflection tool and ask like are we doing this thing? Are we not doing this thing? Are we kind of doing this thing? and then begin a discussion to collaboratively develop instructional schedules for next year which which I believe were referred to today and I know um principles over the past each principal is going about it a different way but have been engaging their ILTs and their grade level teams um to be designing schedules because while there are some things that should be tight um there are many things that should be loose and should be driven by the data and the context of the school site um and so the hope is this Thursday we can um you know really empower teams to making those decisions within um clear sort of sandbox.

Yeah. Um I guess so I would I would share um Trusty Boyd's uh enthusiasm. I' uh haven't been on the board quite as long as some, but I've gone through a couple of these presentations where there's a lot of negatives. Yeah. And a lot of questions of whether or not we're spending our money wisely. Um, this one gives me a sense that we're making some real progress in some really tricky areas and like kind of blown away by the numbers on like graduation rate, college readiness, AP the AP exam thing was kind of crazy in a good way. Um, so kudos. Um, I like probably the other others at the up here. The multilingual learner thing really is feels like thing that we're is is stuck.

Yeah. Um I'm c and I'll ask you a question that probably is unfair of me to ask but I'll ask it anyway and then we can just pass it on or you can get back to me later which is it would seem to me in a state like California that some of these problems are a little bit I don't want to say solved or somebody else has found some sort of success for it. So love the collaboration across the elementary schools, but are there opportunities to find other people within the state or whoever who have had some academia maybe, but have have found some success there to get some traction because that one's been stuck for a while for us. So curious your thoughts on that.

Yeah, it's a great question. Um, over the last month or so, I know Michelle Sinclair has been engaging with Alama County to sort of understand what are the systems and structures that other school districts use. Um, I didn't write I didn't bring my notes for my one-on-one today, but my memory from the conversation I had is that Al Albany is outperforming all of the local school districts with MLL achievement. That doesn't mean what we're doing is enough yet. Um, but I just want to sort of lay that in the context. Um, where it's double or triple the outcomes of nearby systems. Um, and that doesn't mean that it's not a solvable issue because there's plenty of research out there around how much um, being multilingual is such an asset if the way that we're teaching and leveraging the language as an asset is in place. Um, and we have incredible teachers who do a phenomenal job of that that are GLAD trained, for example, they're using um, language acquisition strategies on the daily. Um, and I think it is a little bit uh, inconsistent um, and it it also hasn't been our focus. And so I think it is a really good push and a call to as we adopt new curriculum next year um consider how we can really leverage the expertise of our teachers who um have real skills with supporting language acquisition um so that we can uh really scale that impact because it's an important one.

Um extra question for Vice President. Extra question three-pronged actually. So wait, did you see what did you say? Threepronged question. Oh threep prronged. Okay, I'm ready. So, you see CSU that the third bullet up there that says we overall a 10% increase. Uhhuh. Um, do we know why? Do we have any idea why? And was it a goal? Because I'm not sure I remember ever seeing that. Those are the first two. Mhm.

The third one is around um we hear that there's a lot of extra pressure on our students in Albany here, right, to overachieve and the counselors talk about it when you listen to them. So, how does how does that feeling sort of go along or not with that that goal or that achievement

around the UCSU course piece? It's a great question. um being here for 7 months, I take absolutely zero credit for and like half of this. This is really credit to Albany High. Um I will say that um in having many conversations with Principal McN um as well as Principal Mes as we think about instructional coherence across the land of secondary, I know their team has done so much work to dra to do some dtracking and make access to more courses accessible um for students. And I know that um there's a real stance there of, you know, I'm nervous to try this course. I don't know if I'm ready. Well, try it. Give it a try. If this doesn't seem like the right fit, there are other courses to sort of jump into. Um, also I don't I forget what the rules are about how much of this a discussion this is, but I would also absolutely invite, you know, the perspective of our student board members um in their experience. Um, so I think it's a it's a great question. It's one that I'm happy to dig into more with um, Principal McN. Um, I don't know that this was an explicit goal outside of the every three years with the LCAP, but I think there's a lot to learn there um to see what we can scale.

Yeah, Shepard. Um, I would just like to say about um like students feeling like they have too much on their work. M um me personally like I can feel that sometimes but I consider that a privilege

and I think that a lot of my like my other like classmates would agree and to even just have that workload is like something that like like our teachers have to push for with us and like you like I don't know how to like phrase it right but like it's like a privilege you know and like a lot of other students like who like look like me like don't have that privilege. So I think like that just like closing that gap to even like have them feel like they are having too much workload is like something that needs to be like talked about. Thank you. Mr. Chik,

I'd like to um back that as well. Um I like to remind everybody here that we talk about um course load and stuff. Um stuff like AP courses are an option. Keep that in mind. They're not a requirement. Um and so when students choose to take that obviously they're going to complain about it, right? I mean it's more work, right? But they're going to also appreciate that um the ones I've talked to all appreciate and in fact um some of the surveys we've done in the previous years with the student advocacy committee have actually said the opposite. They want more AP classes. They want more selection especially humanities. I think that's a big topic. Um they actually think there are there isn't enough.

Um so that's one thing. Also again I'd like to say that all those above those are really great. Um in particular I was kind of surprised with the UCSU because again I feel like it came out of nowhere. M um I didn't see that coming.

Um additionally, regarding uh instructional coherence in math, um we talked about it individually about the student trustees not attending some of the math vision events. Um but I didn't say it publicly. So, I wanted to say publicly that I'm still in support of um students being involved with some of um some of the process. Um in particular, I would have liked to see some alternative. Um, I also still kind of feel that a math vision that doesn't um fully integrate student at least student trustees, not even just students, but student trustees um into the process. I don't want to say it's not a real math vision, but it it kind of feels um against the superintendent's um wishes that I mean at the start of the year when talking about um integrating student feedback into the process. Um, I don't mean this as an attack. I just mean this as like a public announcement that I of the student trustees and what we feel. Um, and additionally, I would like to see more um, we're always happy to help. As you you said earlier, we we're like, you know, we'll do it. Um, and we'll make it work. Um, but there has to be opportunities for us to get involved and like to see more of those essentially.

Thank you so much. We're looking forward to having you at the next meeting. Really appreciate that feedback. Perfect. Um, any any comments from the the from the from the room? Go ahead.

Oh boy, I thought that was aixed to the table. It's not. Be careful. Hello again, uh, David. Um, thank you again for your presentation. Appreciate all the work. Um, so many thoughts. I think I brought this up last time in the fall.

The cohorting. Yeah, the cohorting it feels like we're making apples to oranges comparisons even in comparing these overall percentages of I think it's percent proficient uh in 2023 to 202526 where like two years of students are not in the district and two more years of students are in the district. Um, I think it's especially apparent with the AP stuff. That's often one cohort of kids, right? And in this case, I think it was an opportunity, which is awesome that more students are getting the opportunity. You can see it. The total number was 200 versus 140 or something. I forget exactly. So, that was about opportunity. I almost would love to see a percent of students taking APs in the in high school because that's I think actually uh access is also something we should we should measure. Um, so just that cohorting question at the core of all this of like are we really making apples to apples comparisons? And then another layer is like are we looking at where kids are starting? Like so if we're going to compare third grade now to third grade two years ago, we should take the starting place of all the third graders two years ago and see how far they went and the starting place of third graders now and how far they went. I mean, that's why that seems like the more appropriate thing about our kids learning because if a different cohort of kids comes in that are just more ready for whatever reason or less ready for whatever reason, it's going to look totally it. We're going to see pluses and minuses and celebrate and be sad for reasons that are not about what's happening in the classrooms. Thank you again for entertaining my my thoughts. Appreciate it.

Thank you for your comment. Uh any comments on Zoom? Great. Seeing none, thank you so much for the work. Thank you so much for the presentation and the conversation today. I really appreciate it. Thank you all so much. Now we are moving on to oh our chief human resources officer Marina Gonzalez um with resolution for um determining tiebreaking criteria for certificated employees.

Yeah. Can you hear me? Okay. Good evening everyone. Uh those of you who have been here before will recognize this item as just an a thing that comes to the board annually. Um under the ED code, if um well, I don't want to say if. Under the ED code, we are required to create and pass a resolution that identifies the tiebreaking criteria for certificated employees should we have to do layoffs. This isn't this isn't intended to imply that we are planning layoffs. It's just uh check the box. Yeah. So, any questions about this

questions? student board membersh.

Um so I mean I say this lucky uh okay um I was so we were looking at it together a little bit um trustees and um we were wondering um well first of all how common is the tiebreaking process? We haven't laid off in many years. So, I don't know how common it is, but it's common in other districts that have sort of that do sometimes have to encounter layoffs for their certificated staff. Um, but each year, like when you see on the personnel reports when we're hiring folks, all of our teachers have the same start date.

Um, they start two days before the first day of school. And so any of those folks that were hired in that year um would all have the same seniority date.

So it's it's common for a lot of certificated staff to have the same seniority date. So in this case, if we were needing to bring a layoff, which we are not planning to do, um but two two people had the same seniority date, then we would use some of these criteria here to determine the tiebreaker. So for instance, you can see um that that a person with a preliminary credential would only get a half point. So when teachers get their credential, they're issued a preliminary credential and they have five years to complete um like a mentor program uh that is usually about two years long and then once they complete that program then they get a clear credential. So if you were just looking at two people with the same credential, one is preliminary, one is clear, that person with the clear credential probably has more experience and has um made the effort to to complete all of their credential requirements to get it cleared. So it shows a little bit it might be indicative of more dedication to the profession. Does that answer your question?

Yeah, I had like a I'd like a slight followup. Um is there like no is there no like points allocated for performance of the teachers during their prof like professional day because I I see it's a lot of it's like credentials and like subject and like like certificates in general and like their education

but I don't see any that like if I' I'm gonna be honest here. If one teacher had like master and one had a bachelor's, the bachelor's student, sorry, the bachelor's teacher was teaching better, I'd still want the bachelor's teacher. I mean, I don't know if that sounds crazy. So, I just wanted to like know if there's it. It doesn't sound crazy. And no, there isn't a crit criteria that's linked to performance. Okay. Just wanted that noted. Is there any for like evaluations when teachers go through evaluations? No.

Because if a teacher if any not just any teacher not I'm sorry not just a teacher an employee is not performing well then that should be addressed differently not during layoffs. Questions from the question great questions from our student board members. I appreciate that questions from the board. uh questions from the audience. Go ahead. This is purely just idle curiosity, but it says like that they were paid on like for sorry if a person worked for the district then left the district for a number of years and then came back from the district. Would it use the first time they were hired by the district or the second time they were hired by the district?

It depends on if they came back within 39 months. Then it would be their original seniority date. Carol, we've got some extra board questions, so I'll go to I'll go to uh Trusty Shepard and then I'll go to you, Vice President Inklas. Um I just have another question about the seniority date.

So like two teachers, one could be teaching for like 20 years and then one could be teaching for like 19 years. Like the 20 year still has higher seniority even though the hiring dates are the exact same. Like it's like like years count more for seniority and like the dates are just if multiple teachers have been teaching for that same amount of years. Like you can't go based off of the day because they're all hired on the same day. That's what you meant by they're all hired on the same day each year, right? And then there's another there's a whole another layer since we want to talk about this. So let's say we have two teachers. They're hired on the same exact day and they're hired in a temporary status. Um, but then we decide that actually we have a true opening and we want to move one of those teachers into a probationary status that becomes their start date becomes their seniority date. But then if the temporary teacher doesn't get probation until two years from now, then they have less seniority. It gets there are a lot of rules around this. Yeah. A lot of ed code.

Vice President. Yes. So, I I looked at this. I asked a few questions behind the scenes, but I two questions. Has this does this change year over year? And is it pretty typical? Um, I think this has been our same resolution for before me. Yeah. Go ahead. Sorry. During layoffs, is this like a common thing? Like if like if it were going through a layoff like does this like happen a lot doing tiebreers?

It could. Yeah. I but we haven't laid anyone off for many many years so it hasn't come up so I couldn't speak to our own individual experience in the district. Okay. Any any questions on Zoom? Seeing none. Any other questions on the board? Great. Uh, can I have a motion? So, I move to the right. Here we go. Um, to um approve resolution number 2025-26-08 to determine tiebreaking criteria for CI for certificated employees. A

second. Uh, any debate on the motion? I'll go a vote. Uh, all in favor? I I against. Should we do a roll call because we have to do a roll call for this one? I'm sorry. Can we do a roll call for this one? Sure. I think we know the outcome. Student Trusty Todd. Yes. Trusty Shepard. Yes. Trusty Boyd. Yes. Trusty Hopwood. Yes. Vice President Inklas. Yes. President Mahoney. Yes. Thank you.

Motion passes. Great. Thank you. Um, now we're going to move on to the consent calendar. Does anybody have anything they want to pull from consent?

Great. Yes. Okay. Um, do I have a motion? Uh, no. I do have any public comment on the um consent calendar. Great motion. I move to approve the consent calendar as is. Second. All in favor? I

against. Motion passes. Now uh topics for future uh board meetings and agenda items. Anything? I have one. And I want an up I would like to get an update at some point when it's appropriate on the math vision work. Um I'll add that to the calendar. Uh then we'll move on to going into close session. In close session, we're going to do have a conference with legal counsel about anticipated litigation, a public employee evaluation, and a conference with labor negotiator. Um before we go into close session, do I have any public comment? Seeing none in the room. Anything on Zoom? Seeing none, then I um we will go to uh close session at uh 7:40. Thank you. Well, I guess I should I can pound

I thought Um uh reconvening after being in close section closed closed session, pardon me. In closed session, the board took no action. Um, I'm going to Do we have a move to adjourn the uh meeting for tonight? I move to adjourn.

I second. All in favor? I have good night.