--------- I was told to to hammer a little more aggressively. So, this is Diana Hill. You can't see me because the lovely choir is in front of me. I am calling the meeting to order at 04:01. And, miss Stengelow, roll call, please. Missus Potasani. Here. Here. Missus Davidson. Here. Missus Hill. Here. Mister Fohan. Here. Mister Bragman. Here. Thank you. And I will look for a motion to approve the agenda. So move. Second. Any discussion? All in favor, please say aye.
Aye. Wonderful. We will now move to missus Reed. Thank you so much, president Hill. I'd like to walk welcome our principal Robert Castillo to the podium, to introduce the pledge of allegiance and our patriotic song. Good evening, madam president Hill, members of the board of education, superintendent doctor Pulver, members of our executive cabinet distinguished guests and our oak families Students and staff we have packed the room welcome What an honor it is to share this evening with you. My name is Robert Castillo.
I have the privilege of serving as a principal of oak middle school Before we begin, I'd like to invite our very own Lion, Mark Ochoa, to lead us in the pledge of allegiance. Mark, the floor will be yours. After I would like to ask our guests to please remain standing as mister O'Connell, director of the Oak Choir, will honor us with the performance of the Star Spangled Banner. Good evening, everyone. Please take off all hats and caps. Put your right hand over your heart. Please stand. Face the flag. Ready? Begin. I pledge allegiance to the flag of United States Of America and to the Republic
for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Please remain standing. Thank you. Hold on. Okay. I've been told I need to speak into the microphone, so mister O'Connell would you stand in the centre please? As the board of education realizes this doesn't happen very easily. And what you do, you have earned now, we've upped our our game here. It's the gold, pure gold medal of honor. Thank you for all you do.
You're the first person that doubted it was pure gold. I need you to tell you that. Okay? Yeah. Thank you. That was amazing. Another round of applause for amazing choir. That was great. Thank you so choir, thank you so much, and you were spectacular last night. Missus Reed, I'll throw it back to you. Thank you so much, president Hill. We just love starting our board meetings this way, and it's just amazing to see so many ASB students this time, from Oak Middle School. I wanna just shout out your ASB advisors, mister and missus James, for all of
this work. Can we give them a big round of applause? Mrs. James is just saying it's 78 students. And I just think that's such an amazing testament to the work of the entire Oak staff for really empowering kids to be leaders. And it's, it's just so awesome to see in middle school. But I'd like to also thank, mister Castillo who's going to, spend some time sharing about the accomplishments and the vision of Oak Middle School with us this afternoon. Thank you, miss Reed. One of the best parts of my job is watching our students step into leadership.
And tonight, two of our finest are gonna do exactly that. Please help me welcome Mackenzie Cruza, our ASP spirit and activities commissioner, and Summer Lee, our student liaison of publicity. These two young women represent everything that is right about Oak Middle School. Good afternoon, madam president, esteemed members of the board, superintendent Pulver, and Oak community. My name's Summer, and my name's Mackenzie, and we're both representatives of Oaks ASB. From our spirit weeks highlighting Oaks community to an array of contests, we're bringing you the wrap up of Oak.
Those outside of ASB may not realize just how much work goes into bringing Oak's mission to life. Fun and pride. Our team is composed of different aspects, but we work together to make our visions come to life. Mackenzie and I are from different committees, but we still work together with the same goals. This is how we thrive, different parts that connect to make a whole. We are built off of many ideas, making our mission clear, creating an engaging and inclusive environment for all students. The new school year came with dozens of new minds and our new advisor, missus James. We also got to explain expand our class from 35 students to 80.
Due to the doubling of our class, we were able to present Oak with a new event that changed the course of our year. We created and built the inaugural Halloween maze. After weeks of hard work, it was meaningful to ASB students to see kids going through the maze either screaming in terror or laughing in joy. It was worth it to see the turnout. After just one week, we had to pivot and change courses to the next big thing. Winterfest. This event is one last banger before the holidays. The theme this year was the gingerbread gal and it featured music, games, glitter tattoos, and a photo booth. Winterfest is a good chance to remember that school doesn't just have to be a
place to learn, but also a community. Currently, we have our sights set on Springfest. This year's theme is under the sea. I assure you that it's going to be totally fin tastic. Spring Springfest is the final event to celebrate the school year. For the first time, we're bringing our Spring Fest indoors. We will feature Kona Ice, a DJ, and photo booth. This event is going to be our final celebration with students creating unforgettable memories. Additionally, we've been strengthening the incoming leaders on campus through the sixth grade leadership club, teaching them important leadership skills. With all of our values in mind, Oaks ASB is looking to the future.
The bonds we've made will stick with us forever and have taught us efficiency, time management, and kindness. With the last months of the school year approaching, we're working to ensure our school year ends with a splash. So thank you once again, esteemed board members, doctor Pulver, madam president, and Los Alamitos community for listening to the wrap up of Oak. And as always, hear us roar. They are amazing. I'd like to talk about the champions at Oak Middle School, but I want to take a moment before I get into the work, because the work only happens because of the people. So Board of Education and Doctor. Pulver, thank you.
Your investment in our schools, your vision for your students, your leadership make everything we do possible. To Executive Cabinet, Ms. Reid, miss Schneur, Doctor Wieschwright, thank you for all the support you have provided me and our students. It's clear that you are invested in everyone's success from the front office staff, bus drivers, ground support, nutrition personnel, and all of our certificated staff. You care and give the very best so that we may do the same with our students in our community. To my oak admin, mister Segura, miss Kuhar, and miss Reynolds, I wanna take a
genuine moment here because these words do come from the heart. My role as new principal at the campus would not be the same if I didn't have your support. I wanna tell you that I you have demonstrated patience, grace and an unwavering focus on what matters most, our students. You are consistent when things get hard. You are empathetic when students need someone in their corner, and you are always willing to go the extra mile without being asked because that is simply who you are. Thank you for being there for our students, our staff, and our community, and for me. I appreciate you.
I also want to acknowledge someone who isn't in the room tonight, but whose fingerprints are all over the work we do. Mister Quartermarch has been a rock steady professional in every sense of the world. He offers wisdom, his insights, and his laughter. And I mean that in the very best possible way. I know he could not be here tonight, but I am certain I'll get a text from him wishing me well. Eddie, Jen, thank you for everything you do, your support, and your friendship. You are a reflection of the very best leadership this district has to offer. To our Oak office and classified superstars, I see you.
You are the first faces students and families see each morning. You set the tone. You are seen, and you are deeply appreciated. Tonight, everything I share with you is a reflection of one belief. Every student needs a champion. And at Oak, we take that seriously. From every classified to every certificated person in this classroom and every parent. Thank you. Now, Oak is built as a great school. Great schools are built by great teachers, and I have walked into some incredible classrooms this year. With the support of Artosha, miss Christine Olmstead, and our leadership team, our teachers have
been on a focused professional journey, grounded in the research of John Hattie and the training of Michael McDowell. The result is a shared instructional language at Oak, direct instruction, balance student voice, checks for understanding and academic vocabulary. Walk into any classroom and you will see these in action. Ed services has been a strong partner with us this year, providing targeted training for our math teachers and equipping our ELA teachers to better utilize the Savvas curriculum. Our science teachers have been collaborating in tandem across Oak and McAuliffe to bring consistency and shared support to students at both campuses.
This does not happen by accident, but rather through intentional support and natural relationships, like that of miss Katsuki, our science department chair, and mister Maya, a former Oak Lion, who is now teaching at McAuliffe. We've also launched a new math and ELA academy, designed to push students through learning boundaries, build academic confidence, and support success in class and on assessments. The Lion and Eagle Academies are now thriving and our students are actually enjoying waking up early for an extra period of enrichment. Our teachers don't clock out when the bell rings.
They coach teams, they advise clubs, and they build the kinds of relationships that make students want to come to school. That is what champions look like. I could talk about instruction all night today, but I remember but I'd rather show you what it looks like. In November, our science team hosted an astronomy night. Students, parents, volunteers, and community members came together for an evening unlike anything else. Students had been studying the universe in class and that night, it came to life right in front of them. That is the Oak experience. More recently, our sixth grade team arranged for every single sixth grader to visit the
Long Beach Aquarium. Over the span of two days, every student had the chance to experience the wonders of the sea firsthand. Not some students, but every student, and that is what matters. On any given day at Oak, you will find students collaborating, going on campus quests, and presenting their findings. You might even catch them working alongside high school MUN students who come to our campus to bridge learning across grade levels. Our junior MUN students have already had the opportunity to attend four conferences this year. And teachers don't just describe the learning, they deliver it.
And the learning is showing up in our data. On the twenty twenty five twenty twenty five cast, our Oak outperformed Orange County averages at every single grade level in both ELA and math In ELA, sixth graders scored 79.9 versus Orange County's 59 Our seventh graders, 79.3 against 60.4 from Orange County, and our eighth graders scored at 83.5% proficient versus 57%. In math, the standard continued.
Our sixth grader scored 69.4 against 50.5 from Orange County. Our seventh grader, 63.4 versus 48.5. And our eighth graders continued making great progress by scoring 62.8% proficient versus 46.6. Oak is ranked in the top 5% of middle school statewide and at the top 10% overall test scores in California. We are very proud, but we believe that there's still more to reach for. It is a rather ambitious goal to want more, but we believe in every student
and we want every student to succeed and score proficient across the board. We are grateful for our current progress, and I wanna be clear. These scores belong to every teacher, every staff member, every classified person at Oak, not just ELA and math. When every educator owns the data, every student benefits. And our goal is to provide proficiency and growth for every student that walks through the gates and into our classrooms. Yes, this is a tall task to take on, but it is our calling and an expectation that we champion for every student, not just the ones that do well.
When we look at our MAP benchmark data, our MAP middle of the year data tells the same story. When you put it next to national averages, it's a story worth telling. In reading, sixth grader scored 220.2 versus a national average of two eleven. Our seventh grader's 222.7 versus 214. And our eighth graders 227.1 versus 217. In math, our sixth graders score two twenty nine versus two sixteen, seventh graders two thirty three versus two twenty one, and our eighth graders score 239.3
versus two twenty six. On average, our student percentile is 74% in reading and 79% in math. Put simply, our average Oak student outperforms nearly four out of five students nationally and that is remarkable. But what I'm most proud of is what we do with this data. Every ELA and math teacher has been given the tools to review MAP scores with students, share their individual results, explain their progress, and name the gaps that they're working on together. That kind of honesty with students builds ownership of their students' progress. I'm also proud to say that we've extended that same type of transparency with our
families. Mister Quartermarch and I held a Zoom presentation in December for Oak and McCullough families to walk through the reports together. Reports have gone home twice this year, and families are using them. They're having those conversations at the dinner table, and that's exactly what we had hoped. With the support of mister Bennett, we've also paired those reports with Friday messages that give every family a proactive grade update each week. No surprises, just another effort to keep our families informed. We believe in developing the whole student. Academics are important are important, but we know that it takes more.
We wanna make meaning and make sure that students know that they must take care of their bodies, their minds, and their hearts. Our PE teachers are phenomenal. They bring scaffolding and skill development to gymnastics, basketball, football, volleyball, tennis, and more. I believe that if we had a pool, I'm confident they'd wanna train Olympic swimmers. Our intramural programs give students the gift of competition. Black football, basketball, volleyball, team handball, soccer, and pickleball. Every student who steps on that field has a coach in their corner who believes in them. Our wellness center is one of the things that I'm also very proud of at
Oak. It is a safe structured welcoming space, organized and staffed by a team that shows up every day to make sure that no student has to navigate a hard moment alone. For this, I thank doctor Jensen, our wellness and mental health counselor, and mister Ray Leong, our military and family life counselor. When you layer this with the support of our admin team, we are sure to find the right support for every student. Both mister Segura and I come with experience as counselors. And of course, miss Reynolds and miss Kuhard know every student by name, by story, and by need. Because of the unified efforts of the classified, our teachers, and our admin, I have
watched our campus come alive in different ways. More conversations, more laughter, more lions being lions. And at Oak, we believe that every student deserves a stage and our arts programs make sure that they have one. Mister O'Connell arranged for a choir night at Angel Stadium earlier this year. He's already held a fall and winter shows at Magall, a choir Burbank Blast that just happened this past week, which I believe they took first place, And of course, our Oak Choir was part of the amazing all district choir show. For those of you who know, you might even say it was a prehistoric event.
As far as band, orchestra program, mister Harrell has them competing in their first competition tonight and I'm very excited for them. By the end of this year, they will have participated in two orchestra festivals, two concert band festivals, and two jazz festivals, a trip to Disney recording workshop, and to the Knott's Berry Farm Festival. Our amazing theater teacher, miss Belle Jones, has been working diligently to prepare our drama students for their second show in April. And miss Harbor, our art teacher, has also presented amazing artwork from her students at the Los Alamitos All District Art Show.
This year, she had the highest turnout ever. She is looking forward to an upcoming field trip to the Getty with her students, and she is excited to showcase more student artwork at our April 2 open house. Her dedication and passion are clearly seen in her students' art. With the help of Ed Services and Ricky Jones, we also launched our first ever dance team. They meet Mondays and Tuesday mornings at Oak and they have already been winning awards. Our visual arts students have produced work that stops you in your tracks. From reflection entries to artwork across our campus, these students are telling their stories in
powerful ways. These programs do something that no test can measure. They build confidence for students, belonging, and the unshakable belief that their voice matters. And of course, at Oak, we believe every student should find their place and work hard and we work hard to ensure that they all feel it. We offer a wide range of student clubs that give our Lions a home beyond the classroom. From student leadership and stem activities to service clubs, the improv club, Spanish club, the international food club, and much more. Over 35 clubs in total. If there is a passion, we find a way to honor it.
Our ASB led by miss Allison John James is a heartbeat of our campus culture. They conduct spirit weeks, heritage celebrations, lunch activities. They create the moments that students carry with them long after eighth grade. And I'm sure they'll remember the walk over here today. But what I'm most proud of is how intentionally we celebrate our students every single month. Each month, we recognize a student of the month at each grade level honoring the students who show up, who work hard, and represent what it means to be a Lion. And we don't stop there. We also celebrate a staff member of the month because champions deserve to be recognized
too. Our ASB organizes lunch events, spirit weeks, and much, much more. And every month, our teachers recognize our PAW Award winners. These are the students that are recognized for demonstrating effort and hard work, pursuing academic and character excellence, and overall outstanding scholarly work. These aren't just programs. These are the threads that connect our students to each other, to their teachers, and to our school. That sense of belonging, that connection is what students need. And of course, I learned quickly that at Oak the community doesn't just support the school. They are a part of our school.
Our PTA led by miss Amanda Drucker has been an extraordinary partner this year. Their support for our students and our staff and our events is felt every single day. Here are just some of the accomplishments they've done this year. They've helped to support and sponsor 35 student clubs, student recognitions like Lion Pride Awards breakfast, honor roll, poll award recognitions, innovation grants that include portable planetarium for astronomy night, calculators for math and science classrooms, track meet t shirts, learning continuing education, paired at
classroom engagement tools, student enrichment activities, and as many of you know, we have their sponsoring and supporting our upcoming Pi Day on Friday. They also support our back to school and holiday lunches for staff, as well as staff appreciation staff appreciation week activities. Our monthly lion pride breakfast brings those students together with staff and families for a moment of connection and celebration. And for this, we thank our PTA for sponsoring it. It is one of those quiet traditions that means everything to our students who are honored and truly unlike anything I have ever been a part of as an educator.
In terms of communication with our community and keeping that relationship tight, communication is something we take very seriously. Our ASB students produce Monday video announcements and daily PA updates to keep our students energized and informed. We survey students through Google Classroom because their voices shape our decisions. For families, we connect through Instagram and every Sunday, the lions roar arrives in inboxes across our community and our weekly newsletter that keeps oak families in the know. This year, we've gathered our families in our community for veterans assembly, back to school
night, lunch on the lawn, and much more because a school is only as strong as a community is be behind it, and our community is extraordinary. I wanna take a moment to celebrate the creativity of our teachers, because what they do goes well beyond the textbook. Miss Sigman shows up to seventh grade history class in full night attire. Miss Orozco teaches algebra through a marshmallow catapult project. Our science department coordinates astronomy night and an aquarium trip. Battle bots, STEM lab, c o two cars, our teachers make learning and experience and
they do it because they know that that's what sticks. This year, we've also partnered with McAuliffe and with the support of our district, we sent our teachers to McAuliffe's campus to be trained in the five star program. So far, five star gets five a's. It's a game changer. We're excited about what it means to our school culture moving forward. And none of this is possible without the support of LAFE, the Los Alamitos Education Foundation. LAIF is funding six grants at Oak this year, totaling $13,844, which includes c o two Draxor kits, camera equipment for yearbooks, instrument cases, and much more.
We are grateful. LAIF is a true champion for our Oak students. I also want to acknowledge the spaces our students learn and grow in. I've worked at several middle schools and I can share that none of them have had a gym or an amphitheater. Our gym and amphitheater are more than buildings. They are where our students compete, perform, gather, and create memories. This year alone, those spaces have hosted intramural tournaments, performances, assemblies, community events, and recently, almost a Hollywood Bowl night event. Thanks to our orchestra and Mr. Harrell. Our campus grounds team reflect the pride this community has in Oak.
Thank you to our facilities team for making sure our Oak Lions walk to a campus every morning that tells them that they matter. Everything I've shared tonight is grounded in four values that guide everything we do Community, responsibility, equity, and commitment Community We build this intentionally through collaboration, shared voice, and the belief that we are better together This year, we continue to invest in our PLC times and a sense of teacher efficacy. Responsibility. We create space for students to practice it, grow from it, and be celebrated for it. We recognize those students that exemplify the character that is valued on our campus through
Paul Wards and Lion Pride. Their name sits on the marquee for weeks, and parents proudly see their images on our newsletter. Equity, every program, every support, every opportunity at Oak is available to every single student. That is a non negotiable. We believe in safe spaces for everyone, and we celebrate the various groups on our campus. And this year, our staff took a deep dive into the California dashboard to explore select group data. Commitment. You see it in every classroom, in every practice, in every conversation that our teachers hold with our students. When they need someone to stop and listen, our teachers are committed.
Our teachers are surveyed at the end of most staff meetings, and more than a few times, I have asked, are you willing to commit to these common practices? And the resounding answer is yes. We're here for our students and our families. These are not aspirations. This is how our staff shows up every day for every Lion. Thank you, president Hill, members of the board, doctor Pulver, and our entire Oak community. It is an honor. I'd be happy to answer any questions. Thank you, Robert. The board of education realizes it's not easy to get up here and speak. So Mackenzie and Sunny would you come up and get your medals from the board
of education? Mackenzie, I've known you since TK. You were perfect in TK. You're perfect as an educator. Congratulations. And Sunny, your mother is wonderful. I know very well. Congratulations on One more. In working with the board of education, we decided that it's not easy for a first time principal to come up and address us. But you nailed it and you get that you did it award as well.
Thank you very much. I really appreciate it. And, mister Cassello, I just wanna say that, I I loved it that you acknowledged the connection that you have, with our principals of our other middle school. It's really important to us because we do talk about it all the time that our oaks and our lions and our eagles will come together and be griffins and that you are so aligned is really important and that you support each other. Also just in awe that Oak is one of the top five statewide middle schools.
I think that's a lot to be celebrated. And it also really touched me when you talk to we talk about the whole child and when you really dissected it and talked about mind, body, and heart, I think that was a beautiful way to put it. So thank you for amazing presentation and Mackenzie and Summer, I don't know how you were so in sync, but it was really cool. So it was very awesome. Thank you very much. We're, just really happy, for the presentation and to have this room full of oak lions that just never stop roaring.
So let's see if any of the other board would like to make comments. Mister Brackman? First of all, I for your first time presenting for for your school report, awesome job. It's hard to get up there. So so kudos to you. Great first year. I I was lucky enough to be on campus, I think it was last week. Right? And and I think when I looked at your core values, I I do this with my own team for my job. I always tell our team to look at their core values each week and identify what core values speaking them on a given week. And when I look at it and I think about the walk through we had on campus last week, you talked about commitment every day for every line, and I
saw that. We were there the first day back after ski week and walked into classes 08:30. I think we walked in, and it was going. And it was not a show for us. You could tell that classes were ready to go. It was time to learn. People are turning their brains back on, their bodies back on when when we saw people around campus. And so I really appreciate seeing that commitment from the staff, from the students, from the entire community to just jump right in. That's why you get the results you have. But I also think it also shows that the whole child is being completely valued because we saw that also with check ins that you were having with students, the students are having with their teachers. So thank you for for joining our family here in LaSalle and for leading this
amazing school. To see this many so we stopped in ASB or in leadership to see this many students. It's it's crazy. So, it's crazy good. Well, I love it. So thank you guys for taking taking the commitment to be leaders on campus. And I know some of you as eighth graders will be leading us as Gryphons here soon enough. So thank you. Thank you. My comments are very quick because you said that every student needs a champion, and both my grandsons have had major champions at Oak School. And for that, I am very thankful.
Great job. Missus Davidson? So, Robert, you were amazing in in what you shared. I think what makes this community such an anomaly is that we truly we don't just say we're a family. We truly are a family, and we build each other up. And that and missus Hill was so right, that connection with other schools, not just the working together, but the building towards something. We were at the MUN conference, and it was so astounding to see those students participating because when I was teaching at McAuliffe, we would ask our students to be
pages so that they could see what MUN conferences were like, and they would run notes around. But the you but the McAuliffe and Oak students were actually engaged in the whole process, and they were delegates, and they stood for a country. It was quite amazing to see what they could do. But when I walk through the classes, it always astounds me at that sense of unity, family, and and communion in that teachers are all bring their own identities to the classroom, but they're all addressing the same standards and objectives.
It's evident that there's great teamwork, which I give a lot of credit to missus Reed for building that across the district and to all of your teachers. That sense of collaboration, doesn't deny us the right to be who we are. So as teachers, you have exceptional teachers, and I love that you addressed the contributions of everybody across the entire, entire, school. Because even when I when I drive past the school, Oak's been there a long time. The way that it's been beautified, the way that it that the the plants, the
shrubs, the the banners, the the, logos on the sides of buildings are what make it different from other school districts. So your leadership is obviously be is a very positive presence, and we welcome you and thank you. So thank you so much. Thank you, missus Davidson. Missus Cortesani. Well, mister Castillo, I wanna congratulate you for your seamless integration and acclimation into the Oak Middle School. You truly have, become a lion and so quickly. So So congratulations.
You know, a couple of things you said stood out and and, I I think that my fellow board members have touched on it, but it's worth reiterating. I think the partnership that you've created with McAuliffe and also the high school has been instrumental. And I really wanna commend you on that. And and I love the fact that you recognized, mister Cordemarsh and, missus Kraus because I think that that's the that partnership in the middle at the middle school where it's really a very difficult transition for our students.
And the fact that you guys have come together recognized it and really made it something that not only helps bring up our elementary students, but also prepares our middle schoolers as they transition into the high school and I really appreciate that. And I also wanted to, highlight the fact that when you talked about the data and the achievement scores, you know, I loved it when you said that it's not just math and ELA, but it's when every teacher takes accountability for the data, that's when we see our students thrive. And and I wholeheartedly agree with that.
So thank you. And thank you to the staff and the community and the students that are here supporting your school. We love seeing you and we appreciate everything that you do. Thank you very much. Doctor. Polvor. Thank you. It's always fun to go last and to see how aligned that we are because we all pick up on, many of the same things. Great job to, Mackenzie and Summer for your wonderful speech. The synchronization was awesome, but you also showed your individuality as well, which I think is really what makes, all of us, special and kind of aligns with what missus
Davidson said is that collaboration, you don't lose your individuality at the same time. And, really how the the mantra of it doesn't you anyone can be a champion for students, and I think that that's the mantra that Oak was was using, throughout the thread here. And, I think that's so true whether it be and you touched on that in terms of, all the different staff, the the classified staff, our our office staff, our custodians, obviously, our teachers, an an array of administrators and counselors and, wellness counselors, etcetera,
that really make great things happen. And I think that's why Oak continues to do, so well. It's that collaboration. So all of us taking that ownership, as I think missus Partizani was saying, whether it be our data for academics, but that these are our kids. And so they're all of our kids, and so we have to take ownership to make sure that, their futures are wide open. And I think, Oak Middle School does an exceptional job. Their roar is loud and clear and energetic and passionate, and we love it. And I just kudos as well to to double the ASB class, is phenomenal, in
in a year. So great job, missus James. And I know that's really, again, probably, a school wide, effort, as well. But that school community is is is beyond impressive. And that collaboration that we've talked about, I too was gonna touch not just with, McAuliffe Middle School, but with the high school, particularly this year with with the, elective showcase and some of the things that we did a couple Saturdays ago. So, it's just a great place to be a student. I am so fortunate to be in in a district where our community rallies behind its youth and so do our staff.
And I think that's really the magic sauce. So great job. Thank you and welcome. Mister Casillo, I'm gonna hand it back to you. Okay. I'm not sure if we're going moving to the next. We're moving to the hero of the heart. Okay. I should have probably been a little clearer about that. I apologize. So let me then thank you for allowing me to speak to the next portion. I'll I'll begin by saying the true hero is someone who rolls up their sleeves,
leads with heart and inspires an entire community to dream bigger and do much more. Missus Amanda Drucker does exactly that. As OAK's PTA president, Amanda is our logistical coordinator, our organizer, our cheerleader, are everything in between. Her energy, vision, and relentless commitment to our students and families have transformed what our school community can accomplish together. Thank you very much, miss Trucker, for being Oak Oak Middle School's hero of the heart. Yeah. I have much more to add.
I just wanted her to come up here with me. Under Amanda's leadership, ROPTA took a bold step last year, moving away from a third party fundraising company in an effort to minimize costs and put more dollars directly into the hands of our students. The result, our community responded in a big way, raising over 100,000 this year. But fundraising isn't only one chapter of her story. Through Amanda's leadership, our PTA has fueled innovation grants that bring a portable planetarium to our astronomy night, calculators in math and science classrooms, and again, provide a pair deck
to enhance instruction. Our PTA supports 35 student led clubs, pie day, reflections arts competition, lion pride awards breakfast, honor roll, Paul award celebrations, and Amanda approaches every challenge with a let's make it happen attitude. From coordinating all the eighth grade activities, staff appreciation events, recruiting volunteers for welcome events for today, ASB festivals, and everything in between, she makes it all look effortless. Her warm and positive positivity have created a culture where families feel welcome, staff feels
valued, and students feel celebrated. Beyond her extraordinary contributions to Oak, Amanda is a devoted mother and wife. With a sixth grader on campus, we are fortunate to know that her presence in our community is far from over, and we're hopeful she'll stick around even after her daughter promotes. Because once for your daughter once you're part of the Oak family, you're a lion for life. Amanda's a doer, a leader, and a shining example of what it means to serve selfish selflessly. Her kindness, determination, and unwavering support uplift everyone around her. It is an honor and a privilege to present miss Amanda Drucker as OAK's 2025
Hero of the Year. Amanda, you are a dedication to you are dedicate your dedication to our school and your tireless efforts strengthen our community for our students, staff, and families, and it is deeply appreciated. Thank you for leading with your heart and for always making Oak a better place. Well, I I surely do appreciate this honor. I love Oak PTA. I have a fantastic team. It was very intimidating to come in as a sixth grade parent and take on this role. But I gotta tell you, between being able to, you know, first, missus Garcia and
now mister Castillo, I mean, literally, anytime I need them, they're there. The support of the admin team and the staff, it really is, you know, easy to do my job to support, you know, what the fantastic, you know, teachers, staff, everybody here, you know, leads with heart at Oates. So it's really easy to just support what you do. I am proud that we brought fundraising in house. It is fantastic to be able to, you know, totally change the attitude about innovation
grants and just really be a you know, if it supports our students, we are saying yes. So anyway, I love this school. I love this community. I really just appreciate, this honor. So thank you. On behalf of the Board of Education, we too value all you do for Oak Middle School. And you get what I think is one of our most special medals that says thank you. You are awesome, but you made a huge difference. So thank you. Mrs. Drucker, before you leave, before you leave Mrs. Drucker.
Mrs. Drucker, before you leave. Do you have any family in the audience who would like to? You know, today was a crazy day. Oh, my god. My daughter is one of she is at one of the first in many, many years, festivals for, orchestra. She's at Kennedy High School. So I am literally leaving and going. I wanted to be here to support mister Castillo, but we but, my daughter is there. My husband is there, with her. So Great. Well, I would just like to say I I have no doubt that they're exceptionally
proud of you and that you really model the behavior that we hope our students take away from Oak. The service and service above self. And so we're just really appreciative of you for that, to give so much to this school, and I know that they are very proud of you. Thank you. Doctor Pulver? Only if she needs to leave, maybe we can take, thirty seconds to take a picture with We'd be happy to. Okay. Yep. Alright. I appreciate Right up here real quick, miss Nicole, mister Castillo, missus Hill.
Yes. Coming. Two timer. Two timer. Alright. Good night. Thank you very much. Thank you. Yes. Alright. Thank you. Thank you. Oh, what an exciting celebratory night this eve is this evening. So next, I would like to call on doctor Reese Wright. Alright. Thank you, madam president. Good evening, Oaklion community. I am Ryan Wiese Wright, and I have a couple of really positive things that we get to do out of HR. And it's recognizing our employees of the year and recognizing our every student succeeding. And so I believe I'm not sure.
Perfect. So first up, please welcome up to the podium, mister Mark Ochoa. So every student succeeding is initiative that comes out of ACSA, which is the Association of California Southern California School Administrators, that recognizes students that have overcome, extenuating circumstances or obstacles and have been, true representatives of what it means to persevere, to have grit, and to be successful. And so Mark embodies all of those things. And so I'm gonna let mister Castillo share a little bit about the the celebration that we got to recognize Mark at last Friday.
Come on over, Mark. So Mark, has been a phenomenal student on our campus. This past week he was recognized at the AXA Regent seventeen ceremony and he had breakfast with, our board members. Some of our board members are superintendent and doctor Wieswright along with miss Reynolds and mister Sugura. And what we wanted to do was make sure that he was recognized. It's very important to acknowledge that Mark was born, with some impairments that impacted him and I spoke to his parents and they were okay.
Before he even left, the hospital as a newborn, a nurse noticed that something was not working correctly. So, he was airlifted to children's air Children's Hospital of Los Angeles for emergency treatment. Since that day, Mark has faced multiple surgeries and he's shown us with grit and determination that he can continue to be the very best oak lion and demonstrate for us what perseverance looks like. Mark has a smile wherever he goes and what makes him remarkable is that he is ready to overcome anything.
It's not what he does with, his comp what's going on. He is an office aide. He helps classmates in math class. And for those he is struggling I'm so sorry. He helps his classmates in math class who are struggling not because he has to, but because people have helped him. And he wants to give back. He has a support system of teachers that give him the flexibility to recover and return. That includes miss Reynolds, miss Tommy, and miss Regina who check on him. It's not just about grades, but they check on him and seeing how he's doing. So I'm very happy to say and very honored to be a part of Mark's
life because he not only shows us what it's like to be, to persevere, but to show us that he can persevere with strength and dignity. So thank you Mark. Mark, on behalf of the Board of Education, you get our probably highest medal. You are the best. So congratulations. Just so everybody knows, Mark was celebrated with, I believe it was a new Chromebook, couple of tickets to Notts Berry Farm, and some other goodie bag stuff from AXA, in addition to this medal. Yeah. The certificate. Congratulations, Mark. We're very proud of you.
Mark. Oh. Family. Mark, is your family here? Yes. Do you wanna introduce them real fast? Go ahead. Have them stand up. Thank you, guys. Mark, I just wanna say, that we're very, very proud of you and that I also really appreciate the beautiful way that you led the pledge of allegiance. And so, thank you for being in our boardroom tonight and being such a spectacular human being. Yes. Missus I'm sorry. Missus Davidson would like to add something.
I just wanna say that I was really fortunate to get to be the board member who went to the breakfast. And, Mark, you were astounding. We walked up. Every person who walked up to the table, you stood up, shook hands, introduced yourself. I sat down beside you and you you had so much to share. Obviously, your mom and dad and your brother have raised you to be this powerfully, loving, caring, compassionate soul, and you are going you are you have leadership qualities. That smile smile alone will charm the world, but but I am so proud of you. We're so proud of you, and we wish you the best. You're gonna be a great griffin.
Thank you, missus Davidson. Doctor Reese Wright, I'll hand it back to you. Thank you. More good news. So Oak was also home of one of our classified employees of the year. So please welcome up miss April Quinones. Woo hoo. So April, we were super excited to celebrate April. I think were we in December when we celebrated you? December. As one of our classified employees of the year, April is an instructional aide, in special education who's been serving the district for eight years, and is just outstanding. And I'm gonna let her principal, mister Castillo, tell us a little bit about April.
Okay. Alright. So April has served as an instructional assistant special education at Oak for over eight years. And in that time, she's become one of the most trusted and respected members of our entire campus community. She is the most requested instructional aid by teachers and administrators, not because it is her job, because of who she is, steady, compassionate, and completely devoted to her students. What makes April extraordinary is that she holds a teaching credential, yet chooses every day to show up for students in this row. She has taught summer school, served as a home hospital instructional teacher for students facing
medical and emotional challenges, and then recently joined a district level instructional aid stipend committee. She She was selected because of her deep respect that she holds among staff and administrators alike. April leads quietly by example. Students feel safe with her. Students feel confident when she walks into their classroom, and April.
Doctor I mean, Papa for Ham's coming. So so Alright. You presented us with a problem. You got our medal already. In fact, I saw you, but I have to do the mic. I think I saw you at At Oh, can I hunting? Yeah. And I gave it to you. You did. Well, now you get our biggest, biggest award. You get the trophy, and it says, you're the best. So congratulations. Thank you. I'm so nervous. Relax. Relax. We've got a few more people before you have to Okay.
Say anything. So, April, I just wanna say that, you know, we believe that this is a pretty special district with special people. And so when you rise to the top of that, that means you're absolutely extraordinary. And thank you for the work you do. It has to come from your heart and from passion to do that work absolutely every day and give the very best, to your students, and they deserve it. And I can tell by looking at you, you believe that they deserve it.
And we are very, very appreciative for, to you for that. And I am really honored to be able to give you this beautiful plaque, that has your name on it and says you're the employee of the year for one of the employees of the year for us. Thank you. Doctor Colburn? Thank you so much. And so, you you know, we are so fortunate to have an amazing team of employees who who we get to work alongside to do such great work on the on behalf of our students. But I think, no one represents a finer individual than you, April.
It was so fun to be able to go to Oak and surprise her, because it's clear not only do you have the esteem of so many here at the district office and others who were who nominated you, but at your school site. There were so many of your fellow, classified employees, teachers, administrators who were in on the surprise, or, and they knew as soon as we were able to, recognize you, that they wanted to be there as well. You clearly have a passion for students and one of the things we talk about
is our eyes light up for our kids. Your eyes light up for everyone, whether it's our kids, your colleagues, one another. But you also To our students who need us the most. You do such exceptional work. There is no job too big or too small and you and you love to make at times your job varies, throughout the year or even in the summer, taking on, some some different leadership roles. And, you know, we have over 430, 450 classified employees, and we get to recognize about three a year. And so that just shares what an exceptional individual you are.
So congratulations. We are so blessed, so honored to be able to have your your passion, your dedication, and just the sheer joy that you bring each and every single day to make sure that our kids thrive. So congratulations. Thank you. You're welcome. And one other thing, we are fortunate, to have such an amazing partnership with Laith. Laith also wants to be able to recognize our employees of the year, and so Laith has a gift card dedicated to you right here, April. You can spend however you want on yourself. So thank you, Carrie Logue, and the entire, LAFE board for, recognizing our our, classified
employees as well. Thank you. You're welcome. I just wanted to say thank you to all of my Oak family and staff and friends that I've met along the way. All of you students out there are very special. I love what I do. It's very meaningful. Not only do I teach you guys, but you guys teach me how to be a better person. Thank you. So I did wanna let you know we do have the, the lovely, trophy for you and a certificate from the board and administration. Also, certificate from our wonderful personnel commission and a certificate from Tony Strickland's office.
Thank you. Thank you so much. Stay for pictures. Okay. And we're gonna take pictures short. So I believe that we will be moving into our time of recess. And so, missus missus Drucker, we already took her picture. She left. Mark, we'd love to take another photo of you. Part: 2
discussed um student discipline but um there is nothing to report out so we will move on to open session and um I would ask if Mrs. Kia Kippia since you are here would you lead us in the pledge
of allegiance? I aliance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.
>> Beautifully done. Thank you very much. Uh I will now hand it over to Mrs. Reid to give us an executive summary of our workshops. >> Thank you so much, President Hill. We really had um the favor earlier this afternoon being joined by Oak Middle School and their lovely community.
Principal Robert Castillo introduced uh two student speakers, Mackenzie and Summer, who just did this absolutely fabulous job in unison partly to the introduction to their student board report. Um Mr. Castillo really focused on champions for every student. He highlighted Mark Archoa, the every
student succeeding um individual that was um honored recently as well as their hero of the heart, Amanda Ducker. And then we really closed by um being able to applaud one of our classified employees of the year, Mrs. April Kenyon.
>> Thank you very much. It was very celebratory and we really enjoyed having um Oak in the house. We will now move on to um one of our favorite parts of our meeting and that is our student board report. Uh Miss
Schmidt. Okay. Yeah, I'll just hold it. Good evening, Madame President, Superintendent Pulver, Executive Cabinet, members of the Los Alamos community. My name is Bren Schmidt and I'm honored to serve as your student representative to the board of
education from Los Alamos High School. Here is my report activities. Did you know that blood is needed every 2 seconds? Thanks to the generosity of Los Alamos High School students and staff this past Friday, the Red Cross Club in partnership with the
American Red Cross hosted a successful blood drive on campus. Together, they collected 55 units of blood, which has the potential to save more than 160 lives while supporting a consistent, available, and safe blood supply. Club
members played an important role throughout the day, volunteering their time to help coordinate donor appointments, guide students to donation site, and ensure that donors were properly hydrated and provided with snacks after giving blood. The event was further supported by generous food donations from local businesses
including Griffin's Grill, Los Alamos Donuts, Nicks, and Seven Leaves. With the support of faculty, staff, students, and community partners, the Red Cross Club once again demonstrated the powerful impact of student leadership and service, making a meaningful
difference in the lives of others. Academics. On February 25th, students and staff from Los Alamidos High School represented the district at the annual OC Pathways Showcase hosted by the Orange County Department of Education.
The event highlights outstanding career technical education or CTE programs from across Orange County and provides students the opportunity to demonstrate the realworld skills they are developing through their pathway coursework. The high school participants represented
three of the school's seven CTE pathways. engineering, emergency response, and film and TV production. Students shared hands-on demonstrations and project displays that reflected the tech technical knowledge, collaboration, and problem solving skills they are
building through their programs. The OC Pathways Showcase celebrates the role of CTE in preparing students for college, career, and industry. Through these pathways, students gain applied learning experiences, exposure to industry aligned tools and practices, and
opportunities to explore further career fields while still in high school. Participation in this event highlights the strength of the district's CTE programs and the continued commitment to providing students with meaningful career connected learning opportunities.
athletics. During the 2026 season, the Los Alamos High School varsity boys baseball team has demonstrated tremendous dedication, leadership, and school pride. Under the guidance of their head coach Cameron Chin and captains Rowan Shelley and Will Adam, the team is currently 3 and3 on the
season. One highlight so far was an impressive 18 to1 victory over the Lakewood Lancers. The team continues to compete hard as they as they move further into their season. Beyond the field, the baseball team has been one of the most visible and
supportive groups on campus, consistently showing up to football and basketball games, dressed in theme and cheering from the front to support their fellow Griffins. It is exciting to highlight a team that demonstrates such a strong school spirit, and we encourage our community to come out and support
them as well. Their next home game is this Friday at 3:15. arts. The district improv show brought together teams of four from of teams of four from nearly every school across the district for an evening filled with
creativity, laughter, and school spirit. Faculty members showcase their quick wit and comedic talents through a variety of improv games including favorites like movie director, foursquare, twoline vocab, human props, I can do it better and many more which kept the audience
thoroughly entertained throughout the event. The auditorium was the auditorium was packed with supportive students, many holding colorful posters and cheering enthusiastically for their schools, creating an electric and positive atmosphere. While the comp competition was friendly, each team
brought great energy and enthusiasm to the stage. In the end, only one team could take home the win, and we were especially proud to see the Los Alamos High School team earned the top spot. An exciting moment that was met with plenty of celebration and pride from our Griffin community.
Student life. During fourth period, members of ASB and kindness collective hosted a spring fling arts and crafts event in partnership with our life skills program, creating a meaningful opportunity to connect with and support our life skills and special needs community. Led by student leaders
Adrienne Lopez and Ella Partisani, the event brought together many ASB and kindness collective members to spend time with their peers in a welcoming and inclusive environment. Students participated in a variety of spring themed activities, including making pipe cleaner butterflies, paper chains, and
pipe cleaner flower bouquets. The room was filled with creativity, laughter, and genuine connections as students worked side by side on their projects. The event concluded on a sweet note with sugar cookies, making for a memorable and joyful afternoon for our Griffins.
Student spotlight. To close out my report, I would like to highlight an exceptional griffin, Emily Partida. Emily began her journey in this district as a weaver whale, then became an eagle at McAuliffe, and is now a proud senior at Los Alamos High School. She is highly
involved on campus, taking rigorous courses including AP Psych, AP Physics C, AP Elit, AP Stats, AP Macroeconomics/APG Gov, Multivariable Calculus first semester, and linear algebra second semester.
She's also part of multiple clubs including Red Cross, CSF, NHS, Growing Up in STEM, Spanish Honors Society, Link Crew, and Christian Club. While still exploring college options, she wants to attend UCLA. Her favorite part about
being a Griffin is all the opportunities and the welcoming community. Outside of school, she volunteers at the UCI Fountain Valley Hospital, Kaiser Hospital internship, and helps her grandpa with the family business by helping pick fruit and sell it to restaurants at Swap Me at Cypress
Community College parking lots during the weekends. Emily's kindness, leadership, and dedication make her an outstanding role model, and I am proud to feature her in this month's student spotlight. With that, I would like to open the floor to any questions or comments from the board. Thank you all for joining me
in today's student board report. Thank you, Bren. Um, Mr. Bragman, first of all, Bin, wonderful as always. I want to meet Emily and understand how she has time for all of that. That's insane. Um,
thank you for sharing. I again, it always gives a good snip snipp of kind of like everything happening on campus. There's so much going on. It's actually really cool. I wanted to highlight the blood drive. I was there on Friday on campus for a little bit and I saw the truck and I actually didn't realize there was a blood drive going on in the gym. But I'm so happy that our school is doing that. My my one year as an
assistant principal to high school, we did that and it was so fun to see students learning what that process is like and get students to understand that it's something you can do. It's not scary and it is it truly saves lives. It's an easy way to save lives. So really appreciate you highlighting that. I mean, if you were to tell me I get a Nick's burrito every day I donated blood, I'd donate as much as they'd let
me too. Um, so thank you for sharing that. I just it's really cool to see all these things that you shared and and I think Dr. Paul when you shared about baseball if you were at any basketball games this year the baseball team was out loud and proud they were there at football games. We were at the soccer
game last week and so really cool just to see how it's not just baseball but how students are supporting each other. Um I love to see that school spirit that the Griffins have. So thank you for sharing that and highlighting everything you did again. >> Anybody else? Any other questions? >> Uh yeah I'd love to make a comment. So,
thank you, Bren, as always. Uh, you know, I was also at the OC Pathways um showcase. So, I love that you highlighted that and uh you know, it's really it was very impressive to see our EMT, automotive, and um uh technical
theater group there. So, like you said, there um the CTE's rotate being uh showcased at that exhibit. Um, and it's it's such a wonderful opportunity for us to not only showcase the great work that we do, but also to learn from other
districts. And um, I I think you know, next year Dr. Pulver was there with me next year. We thought, gosh, it would be so great to have even more people join us. And so, thank you for highlighting that. The other thing that I just wanted to um thank you for is highlighting that
kindness club because um you know we have so many clubs and all of them deserve recognition uh but kindness club there's something about bringing students together and really um you know just shines uh what our values are as a
community and as a school district and I just loved seeing all those faces and thank you for being part of it. Um, I think that it's it's just, you know, it's the lessons in humanity that that will go far. So, thank you.
>> Thank you. Anybody else? Thank you. >> Oh, I did mean to ask, did you have exciting news for us? >> Oh, yeah. >> Awesome. Um, I officially got into my dream school. So, I am going to SDSU as a freshman this fall.
>> Thank you. And just for those who are in the audience not knowing how a meeting is run and what our timing is like, um the first part of our meeting is reports, recognitions, and introductions. And then we will take public comments. So, we have um our
illustrious superintendent will make his report next. and then each board member will make their report. >> Dr. Bulver, >> thank you, Madam President. Yeah, and always a pleasure to follow our student uh board rep. I was going to share as
well both Mrs. Davidson, part of myself also attended the OC pathways um and the CTE and it was really exciting and I do think there would be great opportunities even for our middle school principles, maybe elementary even to come take a look at that uh for next year. And then
another thing I just wanted to highlight um is our soccer team. Uh I forgot to put it in my um in my superintendency report, but our soccer team, we were at the game on Thursday night uh and they won the CIF semiinal regional program uh
championship round and then on Saturday they won the championship. So that's like double champions because I think that was regional. we were already CIF southern section and now I guess they're going to Sacramento to play at the state level. So, um good
luck to them. Uh we're really proud of them. And then, uh I had the fortunate get to be able to be part of our PTA fourth district council. And at our at our last meeting, our PTA um really
highlighted the um the um reflections. That's the word I was looking for. and our students get to submit artwork in all different genres of of art and then it goes on to the fourth district which fourth district is basically all of Orange County and then they'll they'll
go on uh from there. So these are our our students who had uh various recipients from the fourth district uh PTA reflections in music, composition, photography, visual arts, dance, film and literature. But there are two that
we'll see that aren't on this because they actually received um the fourth district council's award of excellence and these students artworks are now advancing to the California state PTA and they will be on exhibit uh I believe
up in Sacramento. So Oliver Sepulva Williams who is a MGA elementary school student in visual arts. You can see his wonderful picture there. And then Mean Shaw, I hope I pronounced that close. Uh who is a student at Lee Elementary and
such a beautiful artwork as well. So those are two winners from our district that are moving all the way up to to the state. And I love that the PTA um has this recognition each and every year for the art reflections. Speaking of which, we had uh I know Mrs.
Reid had highlighted a brief recap, but on Friday uh we got to recognize Mark uh OOA who is the every student succeeding award for Los Alamos Unified. Every district gets to pick one student and then every district in Orange County
gets to uh celebrate with a wonderful breakfast in at the Bowowers Museum. That was Friday morning. Um, and it's really what this award is about is students who have had to overcome various challenges or overcome remarkable odds um with grit,
perseverance and um just uh with and you can see in this case Mark with a beautiful smile and so he was recognized by AXA by Los Alamos Unified. We brought him to a board meeting yesterday and he also got a Chromebook from AXA and two tickets to Knottberry Farms. So, it was
a pleasure to be able to recognize uh Mark. And then we got the best news uh since our last board meeting as well. Dan Bennett is our administrator of the year. But not only is he Los Alamidos Unified School District's administrator of the year, he is AXA Region 17, which
is basically saying he's the Orange County administrator of the year uh for career technical education. And Dan really serves two roles for us. he does our CTE and um our edtech and so we're really proud and we'll be able to recognize him at an upcoming board
meeting in May and the AXA awards dinner is in May as well in Irvine. So congratulations to Dr. Bennett. And then uh I just was so enamored you know there's if our parents and our community if you don't get a chance to read some of the emails that come home
or the newsletters there are so many great nuggets in there. And so I was excited in our uh college and career newsletter to see um just about the workbased learning opportunities that our students get to have. And so I
thought this was really cool. Uh if you may or may not know uh Simon Cassiandez uh if you know the Mandalorian uh he is a prominent actor in the Mandalorian and he was a guest speaker to our film and
television production uh class focus studios etc at Los Alamos High School and uh just a great opportunity about to connect our students who are in film about um just insights to his journey the importance of persist assistance and
skill development. Um, but just gives our students these real world uh perspectives on careers from, you know, stars and from other individuals. And so I just thought that was a a great opportunity um to to see and want to highlight because we really are about
one of our goals as a district is we know that 12th grade isn't our endgame. We're really about creating opportunities and opening more doors for students whether it be college, career, or life. And so we want to make sure that we can provide them um great support. along that. So kudos to our
teachers as well who who made this possible. And then you know soon after I'm reading that I happen to be getting an email from Mclliff Middle School which talk about an incredible experience for a middle school. Mclliff Middle School is welcoming Dan or Ken
Durio uh who is the screenwriter behind all of the Despicable Me um films. And so, uh, the Lorax Horton here is a who and the secret life of pets. And so, he's going to be, uh, presenting to our
middle Mclliff Middle School students live and in person, uh, in the multi-purpose room on next Wednesday, March 18th, from uh, 2:20 to about 3:20, so for about an hour. So, students will hear firsthand how movies go from an
idea to a big screen and about the creative process. And I just think sometimes these opportunities can get lost. Um but they're really substantial opportunities for our kids. And so I wanted to kind of give that real world connection. You don't have to travel too far uh if you wanted to get to get that
opportunity. So uh and then if you would imagine uh another enriching opportunities is our students uh our orchestra students and I know many of my the board members rather uh joined me as well. I know um what's that? See, there
they are. Right. I love it. Um, join Mrs. Partardisani, Mrs. Davidson, Vice President Forhan, I think, joined me along with others uh at Seager Concert Hall on March 2nd where our orchestra
students got to perform right on stage and it couldn't get any better. That is the most uh professional stage you can probably have. Uh it's kind of like when our students sometimes got to play at at Sofi Stadium, the football team or our baseball team sometimes get to play on
Angel Stadium. The sound from our students um is always amazes me. But then in that concert hall there their m you would not be able to tell if that was students or if it was a professional concert. Uh they just were that deeply talented. Uh and what a great
opportunity for them too to see that those visions and things are possible for them. And so thank you to Justin Padilla. He says uh there's he has to get online and try to like they do it every year and you have to sign up and the window goes very quickly. So he's late at night trying to make sure and
that's just the the passion and the dedication of our teachers who try to provide these incredibly enriching experiences um for our students. So I couldn't help but to celebrate uh all of them. It was an honor to be there um and listen to their expertise. And uh we're
coming up on our all district uh band and orchestra. It will be on Saturday, April 18th. So about a little over a month away this month. We had our all district choir concert just yesterday, which I'm going to highlight next. Uh but I just wanted to make sure we get
the word out, really encourage our families and the community to show up. The all district band is at 1 p.m. and the all district orchestra is at 5:00 p.m. at the high school uh gymnasium. And you will be in for a treat. So, please come and join our extremely talented students. And what I love about
these events is you really get to see the progression of the uh instruments and orchestra from elementary all the way to our high schools. So, it's really a great opportunity and encourage our community to support that as well. And speaking of, we had our all district
coral festival last night. It was a packed house. Uh I think the room can fit uh over 2500 uh people in the audience and it was packed. Uh and to just see all of our students who are in
show choir, who are in choir programs at the middle school and even our elementaryaries at four and five who are fourth grade and fifth grade in in our chorus programs. It was a spectacular showcase. And one of the things I think we we always talk about is we're known for our four A's. academics, athletics,
activities, and the arts. And our arts were on full display last night. And it was such a passion to be able to see the progression of of music uh across. And so there's a very quick threeinut video, just some little snippets from last night um that in case you miss it, you
won't want to miss it next year. So I'm going to press play. A lovely day. Part down. awful. I'm ready to play. Everyone that
you know you That's not the old. That's not my name. That's not one. Bless you mine.
being my open >> because I knew you I for the better knee. That's hard not to clap. >> So just
>> I know it it's like you like why did we just cut that clip? I want to hear the rest of that piece of that song. Um so hopefully that if that sparked your interest, you're going to want to uh attend the EL District Coral Festival next year. You know, our middle schools, I think there's five uh choirs uh at
each of them and then our high school as well. So and each of them got to perform. So just a really wonderful magical night and then we hope you'll support us as well on April 18th for the all district band and orchestra. So that concludes my report. >> Amazing report. Thank you so much Dr.
Pulver and I really appreciate um you pointing out some of the extraordinary opportunities that our our students have. It's it's it makes that education um translate to real life and makes it
really come alive for them. So, thank you so much. Um, so we will now go into board communication and uh, Mr. Forham, I'll start with you. >> Okay. My report goes starts with we begin what I call you don't have to go to Broadway
or Carnegie Hall time of year. All you have to do is just stay here in the district and enjoy musical theater, drama, instrumental music right here in our home. and I attended and applaud Oaks Middle School Legends Are Made
concert or musical presentation, Oaks Middle School spring concert, Losal High's Orchestra at Seagarrom Concert Hall, The Great Gatsby by our drama kids, and then last night, of course,
the Coral Festival was just plain wow. The robotics openhouse was amazing and what talented and brilliant kids we have. Best of luck to our soccer team. I think I heard it's our first state championship in soccer.
Our schools and staff do a huge job communicating with our families in addition to their weekly newsletters. A shout out to the Oak Kids for their second newsletter. I especially enjoyed reading the article by Hazel Escobar on what the eighth graders are looking
forward to as they promote to Losal High. A shout out to Nathan Berger, our athletic director, for his March 2026 athletics newsletter. Where he has the time to do this, I don't know, but he spotlights one of our athletes. And I
liked how he gave us the highlights of sports we don't often hear much about, our beach volleyball team and wrestling. A shout out for Losal High's college and career newsletter with a variety of deadlines. They provide the kids, career
guest speakers, grant opportunities, and so much more. And not to forget, of course, the Griffin News and the Griffin Gazette. And I always like to end with shoutouts to our kids. And I too, Bren, want to highlight the kindness clubs and
all the clubs that are reaching out to help our uh special needs kids. And today's botchi ball event tugged at my heart completely. Uh to Ella Partisani as senior of the month. Congratulations.
Just many accolades. I'm sure they are still coming for this wonderful kid. And then I want to highlight the varsity baseball team, too, because I got to hear all about a couple of Saturdays ago, they got all dressed up in uniforms and went out and made a difference for
the Cypress Special Needs Pony Championship opening day event. And this Tuesday, the 17th, they are going to host the Life Skills Kids pregame for activities on the field. So that's
great. And lastly, in the career and counseling newsletter, they also spotlight a student in their LOSAL works part of their artic newsletter. A shout out to Dne Stellinovich. While attending Loal, he also is the
lead developer for a Minecraft event company where he builds Java plugins and back-end systems for events for 200 to 300 players. Really? I don't even understand a word I just read.
He plans to go on and get a degree in computer science, then a master's focused on machine learning and AI, and as a machine learning engineer, build AI tools that improve workflows and decision making to support but not
replace human work. He states at Loal and in his Minecraft job, he had to communicate technical work clearly. He had to learn to collaborate with teams and build tools that support real life operations. So I think all these kids
and all our programs have changed me for the better, which is our theme for the year. So thank you. >> Thank you, Mr. Forheim. I'm going to change it up a little bit. Miss Davidson, >> I told you I'm changing. >> I know. Thank you. Keep us on our toes.
So, Bren, I also thank you for talking about the pathway showcase. It was amazing. And so, I was there partly for LEL and partly as being on the RO board for Norcrop and what it was spectacular to see what's going on across the county. Um, and our students have
opportunities if we if there's an RO class that we don't have, you you can take it during the summer. And actually, Lassal has the highest percentage of students enrolled in Norcrop summer classes of any of the high schools in in
Norcrop among the districts there. So, they're already we're already well represented. Thank you to all of you who have talked about the arts. when you only have board meetings once a month, it's a little hard, especially now you you all know there's just a million presentations. But Seagerstrom, that was
absolutely astounding. I the sound system, but it think about the sound system. If you wouldn't have sounded like you did, that would have been horrifying. Instead, you sounded like a professional orchestra. So, thank you. They didn't let everything sounded perfect. Last night's extravaganza was a
was absolute joy and so grateful to Mrs. Reed and all of your team who who orchestrated or oversaw a lot of it and to the choir directors that do phenomenal jobs and create all these miraculous gifts to us in the district.
Um I one of the things that I am going to focus on is I went with the PTA to Sacramento on Sacramento safari. It's an annual trip and we haven't sent a board member for a while. I was supposed to go during COVID but obviously that got shut down and it was a wonderful opport two-day opportunity. The first day there
were uh there were five of us. The first day we spent listening to uh legislators and talking with and hearing what they had to say, asking questions um experts on the budget, people who understood the issues that involve education. The next morning we were trained in in advocacy
with one-on-one with assembly people. And we met in the afternoon, our group, five of us met with uh Treata, who's our assembly person. And what I have to say came out of this is it's the incredible importance of being advocates. And
that's whether you come to a board meeting and advocate, whether you go to a city council meeting, whether you talk go to your the office of your assembly representative. It was evident throughout the day the assembly people who were truly like one of their passions was education. And then there
were times when I really felt like the assembly person needed to be enlightened. And I think sometimes not by me but enlightened I I think sometimes um we assume that that they have all knowing knowledge but they get
gigantic numbers of bills in front of them. They propose huge numbers of bills and a lot of times I think people look at Los Alamas and think wow everything's going perfectly there. They don't need anything. That's just not true. We are the lowest funded uh unified district in
Orange County and we do so well largely because of a community that loves supports us and makes things happen. So advocacy is really key and I hope all of us take that to heart. I know I plan to get even more engaged. Um I wanted to so
that's going my focus right now. Um I wanted to talk about advocacy that comes from our high school campus. Um, one of the big ideas woven into our studies of literature and history when I was at McAuliffe was power has a voice. Reflecting on the importance of using
our voices in this world, I would like to honor two student groups tonight who model the best dedication, commitment, and advocacy. The first group is not here, but we are fortunate enough to have the second joint group join us. Advocacy at its best happens when people
come together seeking to build a better quality of life in our communities, nations, and the world. The day after our last board meeting, over 300 Lowl students peacefully left the classrooms in unity with the high school students across the country to take a stand for
the rights of their fellow students who feel forced into the shadows because they're from immigrant families. In my seven years in this position, it's our students. Our students have spoken before the board, written emails, staged protests, faced adversity, made fabulous
suggestions for programs as they took a stand for ethnic studies, mental health, campus safety, and human rights. As the march um as the march on February 11th began, my husband and I followed along with parents and other community members
to keep to make sure the students were safe. However, the kids had it handled. The students walked peacefully off campus to the city hall where they gave speeches sharing their messages of hope against fear. They stayed on the sidewalks, chanted in unison, and
respectfully followed every rule. Although they were well stocked with water bottles, granola bars, and lots of other snacks, not a piece of trash with 300 kids was left on the ground anywhere. Their actions and words reflected the determination and
commitment to peacefully share their message with our community. In a world that often manifests anger, it can require great courage to be a voice to the voiceless. With tears running down her cheeks, a young lady, a loal student who was one
of the leaders, told me that she and her friends were really scared, but they knew in their hearts they needed to take a stand for their friends. Time and again, I am humbled by the courage, compassion, and tenacity of our
children. Our second group that is actually represented here tonight and for whom I have the utmost respect is MUN model United Nations. On February 14th, our M mUN brought MUN groups from middle schools and high schools from all
over Southern California to our high school campus. I witnessed students who came prepared as delegates from countries around the world to address specific needs, work together to propose solutions, debate differences, and find compromise.
The time and preparation each student invested to an um create I'm sorry, the time and preparation each student invested to be an effective voice reflected their powerful intellect, vision, and heart. You all were amazing. Every
one of them and those of you who have come to share tonight give me such hope for the future because you are the leaders who need who need uh we need in an ever challenging complex world. Leaders who who can identify needs, honor all voices, learn from one another
and understand that with change comes sacrifice. We are tremendously proud of you and grateful for the powerfully impactful roles you play on our campus and will continue to play in the future of the world. I also want to express my
greatest gratitude and respect for your mun advisor Marie Kipcha the yes she's also coached tennis. She was she teaches AP psychology and was my grand nephew and grand niece's favorite
teacher. And Colby graduated from Santa Clara with a degree in psychology. So, thank you very much. >> Yeah. Thank you. She's a soccer player. The significance of your role, Maria, in building this program, providing life-changing opportunities for your
students and helping them navigate the complexities of relationships between groups and nations is immeasurable. Not that many years ago at our middle schools, we would encourage our eighth grade students to sign up. I was teaching then to sign up to be pages
running messages from room to room at your conferences. You weren't there yet. We needed you. It was our hope that the students would find the experience engaging and seek to join when they got to Lasal. However, under Maria's leadership, our middle schools now send
their own delegations. I stand in awe of what I saw that day. We are so grateful to you, Maria, and to your student leaders for the significant roles each one of you play. I look forward to what what you have to share tonight. Thank you.
>> Thank you, Mrs. Davidson. Mr. Bragman, >> we didn't know which direction you were going to go. You're really keeping us on our toes tonight. I love it. First of all, your pride when you saw your picture up there at Segm. I don't know the young man's name that that's in that was awesome. I saw your I was I was like that's him. It's like a celebrity
sighting and I think you thought the same thing. It's going to be on YouTube. You can watch this later again. You want to see yourself again. You like autograph your own video or something. Uh but congrats. That was awesome. Um I'm going to skip I know this is always funny how we talk about this. I'm going to skip most of what I said cuz you guys have highlighted so much of the amazing
events, but uh I'm I'm just going to call a couple other things that I was able to attend over the past month. Um I I do want to shout out the soccer team was amazing. If you were at the soccer game last Thursday on campus, um we had two forfeits leading up to to the game, two forfeits by the other teams that
moved us to a point in the CIF playoffs that was not expected and that's really rough for the kids who really wanted to win and celebrate and and have that feeling of a championship. and we hosted an event on campus the Monday after they uh won the CIF championship for southern section which I know is special but to
actually have a game after about 2 weeks without a game and host the um regional semi-finals on campus in the evening with brand new lights or the Griffin Center to light up different colors. It it's it was a truly magical night for our for our young men that were on that field and I think for their families for
the people that were out in spirit cheering them on. It was just such a cool experience. I know some of us up here were there, but it was really it was just a wonderful experience and I I'm so proud of them for having gone and beaten a team on Saturday who hadn't lost a playoff game in 15 games. They've won the CIF State Championships I think
the last two years and so we we were uh we were the underdog and we I I'm really proud of our team for doing that and hope they do their best up in Sacramento this weekend. Um in terms of other things that I was able to attend, uh I know I got to sit next to Mr. beforehand at the Oak Choir uh performance, but I think just under a week before, I also
got to see McAlliff's choir performance. And I'm so proud of the choirs that we have at our elementary schools and at our middle schools. And you can really see the impact that Miss Wallace and Mr. Okonnell have and the way in which they are dedicating the the their time to growing students so that they're ready for the high school performance. When
you see what we saw last night at the amazing all district choir performance, and you see how they performed in Burbank, the high school, um it's because of the work that gets put in when students are in elementary and middle school. And so I'm really excited by the the future of our programs. It was really fun to see in the support in which these teachers provide to make
sure students are learning and feeling safe to learn dance moves and sing when many of these students have never had choir before. So I really I love getting to see um both McAll and Oak really shined. And then to see it all come together yesterday with elementary, middle, and high school was great. Again, shout out Miss Reed and the entire team, everyone of our
administrators there working. You know, it was it was a wonderful event. Always is every year. Um, another event that I just think is worth highlighting is LA's Night Out. Lif is a huge partner to us as a district and provides so many amazing grants and funds for our schools. Um, they had their big
fundraiser uh a week and a half ago, I think it was two weeks, two weeks ago, we're going to end of February, a couple Saturdays ago, um, in which they have a live auction in a band. They hosted the Sage uh, pickle ball and tennis center for the second time. very different format than they used to run the event, but money was made that's going to be
coming right back to serving our students and our schools and our community. So, I'm so thankful for LA. Really fun night. They have a band. They have there's dancing, but the auctioneer here sitting to my right helps raise money and and and again, that money comes directly back to serving our students. And I'm so thankful that Leif
uh is committed to being such great partners to us as a school district um year in and year out. So, I really want to shout them out. And then the last thing I'll show that that uh I was able to do was last week I was able to visit Hopkinson, which I hadn't actually gotten to to do a walkthrough on that campus this year. I've been there a couple times for other events and things
like that, but um to be able to visit Hopkinson and and just see the atmosphere and feel the culture that they have. The Husky pride is is just glowing. And I know Dr. Pver, myself, Miss Pardo were on the floor as students were checking in and doing mood meters. You can really see the Yale ruler work
coming into play at Hopkinson and hearing how students appreciate each other and sharing their feelings. And I think the academic outcomes come so much from the students feeling safe and comforted on that campus. So I really want to shout out everyone really that makes that happen. Mr. Farber all the way down. Um we the teachers they were
engaging with us. We we were in the CDC playing with whipped cream and and little water beads. And then we go into fifth grade and in another place where we see class to class the same instruction going on. We see them going from class to class where we can go literally from one door to the next and
you see the same place in a lesson, the same book, the same chapter, the same conversations happening which shows how teachers are so aligned to push our students in the right direction and have them be successful. So, um, again, all the amazing events that you all shared about, I'm I'm so grateful to be a part of this district and to be able to
participate in. Um, Friday, yes, the high school is hosting the extravaganza, which is our own hosted choir event. So, if you can make it on Friday, they are long to Friday and Saturday. Friday's the middle schools, Saturdays the high school. Um, come out. It's fun. It's really fun to see the middle schoolers on Friday. I know I'll be there Friday
for quite a while. It's a late night. So, decide if you're going to have your coffee or be ready to stay up late um both days, but if you can make it over to the high school, it shows great support to our team. I think it's also fundraising for our for our choir programs to be able to host their own event. You'll see our students participating and helping and our choirs
get to perform again. Middle schools will perform and then the high schools will do little showcases. They usually do like one piece from their from their uh shows, too. So, hope to see people at choir on Friday and Saturday again. >> Thank you, Mr. Bragman. Mrs. Pazani.
>> Okay. Well, thank you. Um, February may have been a short month, but I have to say it was a really busy one. Uh, I had the chance to see our students learning, performing, competing, and exploring future opportunities in so many different ways. So, we touched on many
of those, so I will not repeat. Um, but I do want to highlight a couple of firsts for me. Um, I attended the longevity celebration of our staff at Macau Elementary and this was a first for me. This is where we celebrate the
commitment um and the longevity of our staff and it ranges really from 5 years to 35 years. So to be there and to have the honor to present a pin to our employees who give so much of their time and now are dedicated to our student
success was just really remarkable. So I do want to I wanted to mention that. Uh I also got to cheer on our girls lacrosse team um bring home a couple of wins and this was uh this was really fun for me to be there because I'm actually
learning about the sport. this sport is new to me and it's got a lot of interesting rules and um regulations. So that was that was awesome and kudos to our um girls varsity and JV teams. But in addition to these events, I've
also been attending the AI task force um meetings that's led by Dr. uh Dan Bennett. And it's really been great for me to see such a strong participation and representation from our campuses. And I'm really hopeful that these discussions are going to lead to a
thoughtful roadmap that's going to help both our students and our teachers navigate the rapidly evolving technology that is AI. So stay tuned for more information on that. We have a couple of more meetings coming up this week. And um as I
mentioned earlier, I also had the opportunity to attend this year's OC Pathways event that was hosted by the um Orange County Department of Education. And while there I learned about more about uh Ryasc. And if you're not familiar with Ryasc, it's a model that
helps students identify potential career paths aligned with their interest and strengths. And this is starts at elementary and goes all the way through um high school. I even picked up a resource that's designed to help parents support their children in exploring
these pathways on the weekends and during the summer, which I am actually going to share with Mrs. Pardo and hope that we can find a way to get that out to our community. Finally, I'd like to thank Mr. Macauan for inviting me to attend the California
School Employees Association monthly meeting. Our classified employees play such a critical role in the success of our campuses and our students and it was an honor to be there representing the board. I was impressed
by their cander and their thoughtful suggestions they shared about how the district can continue ensuring that they would continue to feel valued and have a voice in the process. And honestly, it's conversations like these that remind me that when we
support the adults in our system that we create a stronger environment for our students to learn and thrive. So, thank you to all of our staff for the work that you do every day. And with that, I'll turn it back to you. >> Thank you very much. I will be very
quick. Um, and and I think that the public and our audience knows that we are very active board and most of us are at the majority of these different events. We try to really make sure that
we cover as many as we possibly can. There's a lot of activity going on in uh Lassel. So, uh just very quickly I will talk um I had the opportunity to uh just be able to sit in on the PTA council
meeting. So, we also all sit on committees and so a variety of committees are um involved in our district and so each one of us uh have a couple of committees that we sit on and um we have a rotating
school board um Mrs. Davidson is the constant on the PTA council and then we rotate and so um that was a really brilliant idea uh because I just really think it's really important for us to hear what is going on at each site with
all of our parents that are supporting each one of our sites and um PTA council is all the presidents from each PTA come together and they have a council meeting and so they share best practices and they share what's going on at their sites and they also talk about
governance and they also talk about uh different rules and regulations. They had a great deal of conversation about advocacy um because that's what PTA was first uh based on is based on advocacy. And so um also a couple of things that
made me very proud that I took away from there is that um this year we had a 108% um increase is what I wrote down over last year in membership and so they've really uh were very powerful voice when
it comes to that and and our our families really support the work and the advocacy done with PTA and each one of our PTA's groups. So, I was really grateful and thankful that I could be at that meeting. I also
had the opportunity with Mrs. Davidson to attend the McCulliff Middle School band and orchestra performance. Um, and it was just an incredibly joyful evening. And the thing that just struck
me and I remember when Mr. Fontaine came to the district uh and I was speaking with him and speaking with his wife a little bit at the event and he started with 12 students
and he has increased that program to 130 students and to me that is perfectly aligned with um our goal number three which is fostering collaboration um
partnership. Oh no, it's it is um no sorry goal number two wrong one. Goal number two um where it ensures that every student is connected to school through academics, activities, athletics um and the arts. And so I was just in
absolute awe. And then I asked Mrs. Fontaine as we were sitting there and I'm say um because Mr. Fontaine is so engaged and he just he even had to run to his room at one point in time to get something because um uh a connection.
But um I said, "Oh, does he still perform?" Cuz he sat down and played the drums on one one piece. And she said yes. And she showed me a video of him actually performing at the um All-Star game for basketball NBA basketball game
and he was performing there. So, I love that um our teachers are a and especially a lot in the arts, they're still very engaged in what they believe in and their passion, but they want to pass that down to our students and how
incredibly important that was. And it was all related to um blockbusters and billboard hits and they had movie clips behind it. It was very cute that the students kept wanting to look at the movie clips and um so it was a it was a really joyful evening and I think Mr.
Quartermarsh um is really doing a great job there and I'm just very grateful and um the uh also had the opportunity to just stick my head into our personnel commission and bring them a box of Girl Scout cookies uh to thank them for all
the work that they do in our district as well. And then I will end on what um is a a sad moment but also part of life. Um I at our last meeting I talked about a
gentleman that we honored at the Rotary who was um Mr. Dave Appene and on um Mr. grappling past on March 2nd and he was just an incredible leader in this
community and he is he started LAif a very very very long time ago and his involvement with Rotary and he started the Griffin Football Foundation and he would never want anybody to say that he started these things because he was all
about what they would do for the students in our community and how we could give back and he was a very honored Rotarian um and he really truly was um just exemplary of student of um
service before self and he's just a a very he was a very dear person to both myself and my husband um and an incredible mentor of what it means to give back to this community. So, I just wanted to have an opportunity to say
that we will miss him dearly and um that we are are really grateful for all that he has given to this community and to our district. So, um and if there when there is information, I'm sure that Dr. Pver will pass it on about a celebration of his just really incredible life. So
um with that I believe all board comments are complete and now we move on to the public part of the com comments. So I have to read this just be prepared and then um we're going to go in the order I was given the cards. So public
comments open session items nonaggenda. Uh the board welcomes input from the public. This is an opportunity for the community members to provide public comment to the board on agenda items or items not listed on the agenda. Persons wishing to address the board should
complete a speaker request card prior to the start of the meeting. Each speaker is limited to a maximum of 3 minutes. Public comment is um limited to a total of 30 minutes. Comment cards can be um submitted to the
district office anytime before 9:00 a.m. on the day of the board meeting and also will be accepted at the start of the board meeting at 6 p.m. A speaker may not relinquish their his or her time to another. When addressing the board, speakers are requested to address the board from the podium and state their
name and adhere to the time limits. You'll have a little buzzer up there, little um lights up there that show you. Um the board will um not take any action or discuss any of the items not appearing on the posted agenda and cannot immediately respond to public
comments. Speakers are cautioned under the California law. No student is I mean no person is immune from liability for making intentionally false or defamatory comments regarding any person simply because those comments are made in
public. So with that, I have to read it every time. Uh we would love to be able to start our public comment and uh Maria Kipia. Okay, good evening everyone. My name is Maria Kipia and I am the adviser for
this little club on campus um Model United Nations. I want to start just by telling you a little bit about how this fell into my lap. But like all funny coincidences, I really didn't know what I was getting into. And when I was a student teacher here at the high school,
um one of our great legendary alltime my mentor and now you know I'm so proud to call in my friend Mark Celeston told me um hey you know what you should try to get involved with as much as you can just to see what life is like on at Losal. And I said sure. So, I joined
this club and I we began with six students and um they were so gung-ho and I said, you know, just give me some time. I'll get to know what's what it's all about. And so, we started competing at local conferences and then we had our own mini mock conferences at school. And just to give you an idea of what a
conference is like, um it's like a workday. It's actually longer than a school day. We leave Losal at around 8:00 in the morning and we come back at about 5:00 p.m. And it's on all Saturdays. And so the kids actually um they're not doing this for a grade. Uh they really are just doing it for fun.
And I'll put fun in quotes because when I describe it to you, maybe you won't think it's fun, but they really enjoy it. So um the kinds of things that we're working on, I mean, it's doing a crazy amount of research. It's being able to be diplomatic, presenting your um country's viewpoint. Sometimes it's a
controversial viewpoint, but being able to convince other kids in your committee to join you. I mean it's really um really extraordinary work and I the things that my student uh member board members will be talking about today um just to give you an idea. I really hope that you'll join us at one of our
Griffmon conferences. It's always the first Saturday of ski week. So I know that that's tough but we love to be there and use the campus like we you know it's our little mu world. So um I I know I'm the sole adviser on paper but I really wouldn't be able to do this without my student board. It's about 15
of us and I call them my co-advisors cuz um everything that we do it's really just based off of one lunch meeting maybe 10 15 minutes and one board one after school meeting a week and we compete at eight local conferences, two traveling conferences. I mean we've been
to NYU, we've been to UC Berkeley, UC Santa Barbara and so everything is just done with my amazing student board. So I want to thank them. I mean, I really feel like I stand on, you know, they say the shoulders of giants. The Gordon family, Mars, maybe you remember David Gordon. Um, the Gonberg family. Four of
their kids went through Los Al. So, um, I really want to shout out to them, all the amazing families that are here today. I wouldn't have been able to do it without them. Definitely not without all of your support and supporting and signing all of our crazy field trip papers at all hours of the day. So, I really appreciate it. Thank you all so much.
>> Thank you. And our next speaker is Amelia Jen. Okay. Um, good evening distinguished members of the board and esteemed district staff and then Brin. I just wanted to start by thanking Mrs. Davidson for inviting us to speak here
tonight. So, as Madame President said, my name is Amelia Jen. And this year, I've had the honor of serving as low mine secretary general or president. And as a four-year member of the program, I feel like I've grown so much both as an
individual and as a delegate. And then tonight I just want to speak a little bit on my experiences with that and how it's honestly such an invaluable experience for all the students in our committee to develop public speaking skills, formulate arguments, practice
diplomacy and negotiation and then build coalitions and resolve conflicts. So in continuation of what Miss Kay has already shared about MUN, I just wanted to highlight that it teaches so many skills that I feel like are applicable in the real world. For instance, students learn how to effectively
research and they write papers for every conference, speak in front of a fairly large audience. I feel like I've had a committee where it's been over 100 people and then just collaborate with individuals who might not agree with them. And then across our clubs at the high school and middle school, we have
over a 100 members ranging from sixth grade to seniors. So, it's grown quite large. And then I joined the club my freshman year and attended my first conference in December of 2002. And I remember after opening ceremonies ended,
I followed my chair to my committee room where there were about 30 other students who were really wellprepared. I think some of the students had been prepping for about a month and I wrote my speech the night before. So to say I was terrified was kind of an understatement.
And then over the course of that committee, I spoke about four times and every time I was looking down at my notes, speaking really quietly. I think the chairs asked me to speak up a few times. And then after that, I sought out some older students for advice. And that definitely helped me grow as a delegate
and as a leader. And two of the people I sought out actually ended up being club presidents before me. So that was pretty cool. And then as secretary general currently, I've consistently sought to sort of unify the club with underassmen and upper classmen and ensuring that all
members feel supported and that they're able to seek out help if they need it. And then through leading weekly lunch meetings, assisting board members in fulfilling their internal individual duties and their internal roles and working with Michael, our under secretary of Griffund, to run arguably
what's our most successful conference to date. I feel like I strive to have some sort of measurable impact on the other delegates while fulfilling my responsibilities. However, I feel that my position isn't simply constrained to the responsibilities that were enumerated in the board application when
I first applied. And I feel like I'm here I do my best to make the club as amazing for everyone else as it has been for me. So, as I'm reaching my conclusion here at within the MUN program, I'll be forever grateful for all of the opportunities and abilities the club has
given me. Thank you. >> Do a dang. >> So, good evening board and um esteemed guests. Um, I'd like to first thank you all for your kind comments about uh our orchestra program. Truly um we had a blast being on stage at Segastrom and
it's honestly uplifting to hear all your positive comments about our performances. Truly it help it it brings a smile to my face. All of you were able to enjoy our music. And another thing I'd like to say is I have had the what
most wonderful four years of my life being in the model UN program. More specifically, I've been leading and working with the crisis committees. I think um overall my four years in this program has not only helped me be to become a better public speaker but also
gained communication skills, gained a new a lot of new friends from across the country from basically everywhere. Um, and it's just a lovely it's just been a lovely like four years. And I'd like to thank Miss Kipia a lot for a lot of the experiences
that I've been able to go to, the a lot of opportunities that I've been able to attend. And I'd like to speak a little bit about the crisis committee. So, a crisis committee is uh if you don't know, it's a specialized version of model United Nations rather than dealing
with countries and um countries and country policies. Um, it can go like into it's basically a type of committee that goes into more like real world, not real world sometimes. It can be really fun. Um, I just like to say arc for crisis committees. It can be like as
fun. Like we did a Fallout committee this season. If you've watched if you have an Amazon subscription, you know that there's like a Fallout show. It's really cool. You should watch it. It's pretty good. Um, but we historically we've done committees ranging from Harry Potter to like um Star Wars. It's basically a type of committee where you
deal with um fast-paced liveaction um committees that you have to make decisions really quickly. And what I've seen from these committees is that students get a lot of experience working together really quickly on issues, working together really qu fast and working together really eloquently, I
might I add um because they have to create like really fastpaced solutions. And through the course of those this past year, we've been able to see a lot of I've been personally able to see a lot of students from freshman, from sophomores, juniors, seniors, um, all
grow into this type of niche, go learned how to like communicate with each other more professionally, more like fun. And I've just really really enjoyed this experience. And um I'd like to say that
I'd like to finally conclude by saying like thank you so much for like the opportunities that you all give us. Um, Model UN could not be what it is without your support and it is um an honor to just be here in the district to be able
to be given these opportunities and thank you >> Michael Woo. >> Good evening distinguished board. My name is Michael Woo. I am the under secretary of Griffund as Amelia Jen, our secretary general mentioned. And I'm incredibly glad to address you guys
today to talk about what an amazing conference we had just this February 14th. It's always the first Saturday of Ski Week every year. And this was the 10th conference. How do I hold this? This is the 10th conference. Okay, this is the 10th conference that we've had for Griffmon. And it's been absolutely
incredible to help direct this program. And I just wanted to say that thank you first and foremost to Mr. Forehand, to Mrs. Davidson for coming to our event and for helping support us and for the entire board for helping support our MUN program and to recognize the amazing possibilities that it opens for lots of
the high school and middle school students. So, I wanted to talk about the experience at Griffund because this is my second year on MUN and my first year as a board member and honestly MUN has been such a transformative experience and our conference is one of the most
amazing events ever. I think I've spent significantly more time on preparing for the conference than any single event I've ever done, including doing all of my college applications combined this year. And I think it's really worth the time because with almost 500 delegates
from other schools and almost 50 I think over 50 of our low salamito students chairing committees and running events and doing volunteer activities. It's been such an amazing intersection of disciplines. Not only do we have our mu team, we also worked with the film group
to make a I directed our um little film short film that we made for the conference this year as well. And it's also an incredible intersection for drama students, for example, who pass out pass out our bananagrams as a charity event for donations to the Brain Big Little Foundation, which helps kids
with autism. So, it's so much more than mun honestly, it's an entirely different world of people coming together. And I think it's so amazing because when I leave Los Alamidos and when I go outside to talk to other people, for example, at events I went to in LA, the first thing
I can mention to them is I do mu and the first thing they connect is, "Oh, me too. Where's what school do you go to? What conference do you run?" And nine times out of 10, people will know our conference because that is just how amazing that is just how incredible our team is at working all this together,
putting in hundreds of hours, making hundreds of pages of background guides to the conference. So, I just wanted to share my experience with that. It's been so amazing. I got to chair the Supreme Court of the United States conference um committee and I think it was such an amazing experience talking about current
events, talking about events that are still going on right now. And it's so incredible to invite hearing different perspectives just as Miss Davidson talked about today with advocacy and hearing about things from across the um from across the aisle and to be able to
discuss with people. That is such an amazing experience and I think that is such an important experience that MUN offers to this district and I'm incredibly glad that you guys are supporting our organization. Thank you so much Lesie Ramirez. Fellow district board, my name is Lesie
Ramirez and I am MU's under secretary of outreach. I want you to imagine this for a moment. Over 2,000 high school students from around the world such as Italy, China, and South Africa to name a few, gathered in one room debating real world global issues, negotiating
resolutions, and striving to make a difference. That was Los Alamito's Model United Nations this past February at Global Citizens Model United Nations conference in New York. Among our delegation was our accomplished alumnest and former secretary general Caitlyn Maddie, now a freshman at Harvard,
serving as head chair of the UNDP committee. For many of us, it was our first time sitting in the general assembly hall in the same seats as actual diplomats, but with the same goal to change the world. Over three intense days with committee sessions lasting up
to four hours, our delegates researched, debated, and collaborated with skill, determination, and focus. The results speak for themselves. 75% of our delegates earned individual committee awards, and their combined efforts earned Los Alamos's high school best
small delegation. These achievements reflect beyond what is considered talent. They reflect preparation, teamwork, and perseverance. But none of this would have been possible without our adviser, Miss Maria Kipia. For me personally, this was my first time so
far from home across the country in New York. While others navigated the city with ease, I found guidance and support in Miss Kay. She is more than advisor. She is a mentor who has stood by us through our greatest challenges and celebrated our greatest accomplishments.
Miss Kay, your steady guidance and belief in us turned long hours into confidence and hard work into award-winning results. The best small delegation award we brought home reflects your dedication, leadership, and inspiration you give to every delegate. We hope this award shows how
proud we are to have you leading us and that it makes you as proud of us as we are of you. Please join me in giving Miss Kay a warm round of applause. Thank you for your time and consideration. I yield the rest of my time to the district board. Have a
wonderful evening. >> Thank you. Thank you so much. And unfortunately, we can't ask questions or really comment. It's just the way that it works. But Dr. Pulver can certainly I'm sure he has a few comments. And I took several notes, although I've also
found a loophole that you might be able to comment if you want to. Um, and the reason you could comment is because under consent item H is a ratification of an overnight extended field trip for Los Alamos High School Model United Nations to New York from February 25th
to March 1st, which they just shared some highlights of that as well. So that is on the board agenda. Um but first off uh I too just congratulations on best small delegation. Um
beyond proud and uh bad on me. I did not know that you guys got that award. So I'm very very uh proud and I think we got to find a way to get some recognition for that. Um Mrs. Petardo, we got to get that in the wrap-up and but we don't have a wrap-up this week. So we're going to get it in the
following week perhaps. Um but also when when you I just want to thank Mrs. Kay as well. Uh I I can remember there was a time when our model United Nations kind of went dormant um for for a little bit at the high school and to see the resurgence and it really takes uh and we say this a lot is it's everything about
the teacher, the adviser or or or the adult who's going to really help be there and motivate our students. And then when you can see the talented students that we have. Um but when when you listen to these lifelong lessons of that we all need and this nation needs and our and our world needs practice
diplomacy um resolving conflict and coming together um just obviously clearly you guys have no problem with public speaking so it's done a great job uh in that process but really building coalitions and I think that's that's
that's a really hard thing to do uh as as as as a country as a society and the fact that you are learning those skills to to build coalitions and to get people to to follow and move alongside you for a greater cause. Um, even something as big as a as a crisis committee, even if
it's about Harry Potter. Um, there are crisis because what that crisis committee is really what I what I glean from is is that fast-paced thinking and having to think on your feet and and solutions that you don't have in the moment that you can't necessarily plan for, you have to respond to and and then
build off of the responses of others. And I think that's that's that's the power of when we get people are actually talking is sometimes we don't I don't have the best idea but once I start talking with other people their ideas feed my idea then my idea hopefully feeds theirs a little bit and so I think that's really where the power comes but
I think overall for me it was hearing and I hope this really inspires you Mrs. K because I know it's a lot of hours is that you just create transformative experiences. Uh and that that's what I think we try to create for all of our students. But to hear such transformative experiences opportunities
for our kids, uh thank you for for being that vehicle and that vessel um for our amazing students. Thank you. >> Does any of the other board have any questions or comments? >> I'd like to make a comment. >> Sure. >> Okay. Well, thank you so much. How
impressive. My goodness, I I think that all of you could uh teach a class on public speaking and I'll be the first to sign up for it. So, thank you for being here, for representing MUN and for honoring your teacher, Miss Kipia. Um, I
really appreciate what you do at LEAL. You wear so many different hats. I know you as coach K for the tennis team and you really inspire and empower our girls um in so many ways and and on the on the court and obviously outside and and our
boys. So I just really I I appreciate I know that this is all above and beyond um the role of a teacher and it just shows your commitment to the um to our students. So thank you >> Mr. Forham. Amelia, I'm not sure if it's
your influence or your parents' influence, but we have a junior me me mom me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me member here from Oak Middle School. And what are you doing about the fifth grader at Lee? Have you figured out how he could lead the work, too? >> Thank you. You guys are awesome.
>> So I h I have Oh, go ahead, Marles. >> I I just have one request. Um we'd love I'm sure that the board would love as individually. we can only come to at a time to be invited to one of your meetings to and to be able to ask questions because I just desperately
want to know when you turn on the news and some world crisis has happened, some environmental problem, some shortage of whatever, what's the first thought that comes into your mind and what question do you have? Now, I I not going to ask you to answer that now, but I just feel
like with your background, your learn your ability to critically think and dissect and go to and go to the issues. I'd love to know now how that impacts your world view. So maybe a long lunch. Thank you. >> Okay. I just have one quick question. So
I know I I and I just want to make sure that I have this right. So, I came a number of years ago, I believe, when you um were reviving revitalizing the club. And I recall that the um when they go
into um the conference, a student doesn't necessarily know what side of an argument that they will be um uh presenting on. Is that correct? Still
>> they do know. They know their company's. Okay. Okay. Okay. I And I wasn't sure if I recall that correctly or not, but but I love that. But they don't necessarily get to pick that. It was not necessarily their opinion. That's what I was going after.
They need to do the research to actually learn how to present and back up and persuade something they may not even necessarily agree with. That's the point I I I I I took away, but I really appreciate it.
Um, so thank you very much. And is everybody are we good? Thank you so much for coming this evening and for sitting through. Thanks. Thank the >> And my board will just tell you what to do.
So we are very thankful for you being here and um please do not stay. You do not have to stay for the rest of our meeting. Yeah. >> But we're really great. We're really grateful that you came and that you shared. It was perfect.
>> Yeah. Yes. We're very Yes. Thank you so much. >> Has something. >> Okay. >> Of course. >> Thank you. >> Thank you.
amazing. Thank you so much. Um so just just such a joyful um opportunity to highlight some of the extraordinary things that are being done um at Los Alamos High School. And so our next presentation we'll be going on to is
item number nine and it's information and presentations um balancing flexibility and academic integrity recommendations on outside coursework and student scheduling. Mrs. Reid, >> thank you so much, President Hill. So um
as the board knows, we've been working this school year with an outside coursework committee that I'll be talking about. And this really is um an overall view of the work we've been doing, a little historical perspective to help some of the board members who weren't around in 2019 really understand
where we've been with this work. Um the data that we focused on this school year as well as recommendations as we do have um a board policy on tonight's agenda as well. So the outside coursework committee was really uh reconvened to look at how outside coursework is
affecting Los Alamito's high school and really not only how those sections impact us but also how we monitor and record this coursework. And so there were a lot of questions over the last couple of years regarding around consistency and approval processes of outside coursework, how outside courses
are reflected on transcripts, equity and access for students as families and families. the integrity of the LOSL high school diploma as there were questions to how many courses and in which departments are students taking outside courseworks and then really the alignment with graduation requirements and our board policy. And so as a
committee we came together to review current policies, develop recommendations that really focus on equity, clarity and alignment not only with ed code but also with um district policy. And as you can imagine, um, outside coursework has really taken on a
different life since the pandemic when online courses really became highly accessible to students from multiple outside institutions. And so being on top of board policy and regularly looking at it, I think is something that came from this committee as well that this needs to be something annually that
we look at as education is shaping and evolving. And so the committee charge really was to not only look at current district policies and practices, but also the practices in comparable school districts, student participation trends and course taking patterns that we've looked at from 2018 forward, our
transcript practices and GPA implications. Um, and then impact on course enrollment, staffing, and then program offerings. And so the ultimate goal really was to identify where policy clarification and guard rails may maybe would be needed in terms of maintaining student opportunity and flexibility, but
also making sure that we felt comfortable about the academic integrity of when a student receives a loss high school diploma and the opportunities that we offer them in their four years with us. And so the committee was very diverse. And so Dr. Bennett and myself really helped co-f facilitate um the
committee. We had four members of the high school administration team and then we put out an open call to departments across the high school campus to give us teacher representatives to bring a lens from each of the departments on campus. And so you can see we have a plethora of teachers. And so really this structure
was um really pivotal to ensure that site level classroom and district perspectives are really represented as we started analyzing and exploring the implications of this work. And so, um, our committee process up to this point has really been two meetings. Our first meeting in
January, we really focused on providing a common schema for our committee members. So reviewing our history of outside coursework here in the school district, reviewing what Griffin Connections is, the impact that it's had and its projected impact moving forward, identifying key questions and concerns,
and then really coming together to identify that data that we would need to start moving forward as a body to make pivotal recommendations. And so we came back together on February 23rd. Um we looked at all of the data that committee members wanted to take into
consideration. We analyzed that data um and looked at trends. Um we did an examination of program and scheduling impacts. We talked about policy considerations. And then ultimately the committee did give some recommendations on board policy and AR revisions. And so
we really focused on intentionally moving from questions to data to policy direction um as as part of this. And really this Oh, go ahead. >> Yeah, I just want I finish that. But before you go on the next slide, I've got a question. >> You got it. Thank you. And really, I
wanted to bring the board's attention back to this charge really began on March 12th, 2018. So, the board that was sitting in the seats at that time heard from teachers who for the first time were noticing um a lesser number of
students completing core history, social science courses on our campus. And that would be world history, US history, and then the pairing of semester courses of economics um and student and government. And so the board gave direction at that time to form a committee that we called the online alternative scheduling
committee that really worked for a year and a half almost two years to produce something that initially did make impacts. And so that um now is known as Griffin connections. And so I am going to take us back eventually through a little bit of that history to see what that looks like moving forward because
it still does play a pivotal role and how we provide um summer opportunities with Lil High School staff to really help ensure that our students get to um have a history social science experience with our teachers. >> So I have no question because you read
my mind >> perfect >> because it was to better understand in the history of Griffin Connections. I have it but I know the rest of of the board does not. Absolutely. >> And so to take us back in time a little bit, um summer of 2019, we really um dug
in and did a lot of work. And so I do want to bring the board's attention to the difference in um course work that's taken online or off-campus. Some of its remediation and we need to allow students to do that. We do not offer every course that a student may not pass. Um and so our summer credit
recovery is really to the key graduation courses. So, if I'm a student who, for example, um did not do well in pre-calculus, we do not offer a pre-calculus summer course. So, off-campus remediation of that grade would be necessary. First instruction would mean I'm taking an
off-site course that's going to count for a high school graduation requirement for something as for first instruction, a course I have not taken. So, it's not something I'm taking for a second time. It's literally replacing the first time I would have sat in that course on the Los Alamos High School campus. And so
when we looked at the summer of 2019, there were 305 students who completed 391 fullear courses that summer and 319 of those courses happened to be the three core social science courses. So 81% of the coursework completed offsite
in the summer of 2019 were all around world history, US history, and then the pairing of American political traditions, also known as government, and econ. And so at that point, our initial committee really focused on a solution to those three courses because
81% of our off-site courses were happening in our core social science. And so a lot of the why is that there isn't a lot of course articulation between those history social science classes. So if you think of a science, a mathematics, a world language, um those really build upon each other and have an
articulation scope and sequence. And so they're much I'd say they're more preferable to take full school year in a sequential order. Whereas history, social science courses, although the skills and the analysis build upon each other, the content is separate. World
history, US history, economics, and government. And so I think students feel um better equipped to take those in a shorter period of time because the sequence and the daily repetitiveness of like a world language doesn't hit there. And so we really focused not only on
looking at those courses but doing a little digging into what are students replacing in their schedule when they took um those courses during the summer as well. And so just to give you a perspective of the impact that Griffin
Connections had in their first summer, um, summer 2019 was our last summer preg Griffin Connections where we had 319 of our core social science courses taken outside of Los High School and summer of 2020 was our first um, Griffin Connections or postgriffin connection
summer. And so we were able to reduce by 52% the number of core history social science courses taken off site. And so for us that was a huge step forward to be able to take what was very large and
um knock that down by 52%. As we fast forward and we take that view a little longer, these are all Griffin connections years and look at the summers of 2019 through summer of 2020 25. That yellow box still highlights the
number of social science courses um taken outside Los Alamos High School. You can see that we are consistently in that last row offering more Griffin Connection summer course, but you can see after summer of 2020 that we're once
again seeing a return to the number of students who are still seeking outside core history social science courses. So, you can see that we're still making a great impact. We went from offering 138 courses um in 2020 to 172. But you can
see that the number of core social science courses is also increasing kind of in alignment with um our offerings. And so I think it's important to go back to the work that we did in 2019 because we did a lot of surveying of our
families both parents um and students who for the past two years that would be summer 2018 and summer 2017 asking why they took an outside course. And so that really was part of how we developed the solution of Griffin Connections because we wanted to make sure that our solution
was actually focused at the want and desire of those stakeholders. And so the the top one was by far the majority 80% of families or more shared with us it was the scarcity of time in the master schedule their students master schedule
meaning six periods of a day did not meet the threshold for their child's engagement in the 4A and so outside courses were needed to create room in the schedule without sacrificing rigor because many of these students and I'll share some data reenroll in other
academic courses including additional advanced placement courses as well. There was also the next um reason families gave and students gave was a perceived advantage in college admissions. So this additional or advanced coursework signals academic
drive, maybe intellectual curiosity and this readiness for college level work. In particular, for those students who were able to add additional APs in an interest area, for example, if I take US history over the summer, I can replace it with AP psychology. I could replace
that with AP envir environmental science, something that's still of rigor but maybe is more of an area of interest for myself. And then two of the other ones that were smaller but were noted in the survey were control over pacing. So outside courses allowing students to learn at a faster or more flexible pace
than a year-long traditional process because we do see students take outside courses to accelerate themselves. Um and then access to niche or specialized subjects and that's really small and few between. A great example is that we always have some students that will enroll in Mandarin or Hebrew outside of
our uh school day because we don't offer those um foreign languages on our campus and they're of interest to particular families. And so I don't know that that one's ever something we'll be able to fully um have a solution to because we are a ma a student driven master schedule um at the high school. And so
as we looked at the difference in work from 2019 to 2425, something that remained consistent is that our area of social science still remains the highest in the content area by which students are accessing outside coursework. So
when we looked at the summer um of 2024, you can see that 364 courses were taken off-site. Now those numbers include remediation. It's very hard for us when we go transcript by transcript unless we look at a student's entire transcript to
know what exact course was taken. We know that the majority of those are for first instruction, but that does include remediation courses in it as well. So, history, social science classes still remain the largest percentage of courses taken off-site for high school graduation requirement. That has not
changed. We're making a a jump that the replacement of courses hasn't changed either. It's a lot of work. It took us a year to do some of this work when we had the initial committee in 2019 to go student by student transcript to look to see what the replacement course was, but
we did that where previously and at that time um the schedules reflected an emphasis on the 4A. 67% of students who took an off-site course replaced it with an advanced placement course. 39% made room for a visual performing arts. So that could be someone with a double
choir. Um that could be someone who also plays an athletic and has an arts. 39% replaced a social science class with another social science class. So you might have taken US history but replaced it with APsych. You might have taken world history but replaced it with psych
and military history. And then 24% of students needed it for elective. 33 students needed it for it to clear up a space in ASB. Many of our ASB students are also highly academic students. And so when they get to sophomore, junior, and senior year, if they have two A's,
their activity of ASB and any of the other A's plus academics, your schedule is locked. And so they were using it to put ASB in their schedule. 17% of our students using it because, as you know, junior and senior year, we do not have a PE requirement. In the state of
California, it's only two years. So they lose a spot for their athletics if they're trying to maintain high UC academic admissibility in their transcript. So we're making a presumption that that hasn't changed much. All of our data seems pretty
consistent with the data that we pulled in 2019. And so the committee did not ask us to go back through and reook at schedules of of all of our students. Taking that into consideration, we did do a deep dive into two main areas. Overall outside coursework completion
for first instruction, looking at the class of 2026 and 2025, as well as Griffins taking those core social science classes off-site for first instruction. there were a lot of talk before the committee and I think we heard a lot of just buzz because it's an
unknown and so when there's an unknown you know um they can get I don't know blown out of proportion maybe or misinformation and so what we did learn is that out of the class of 25 and 26 um
one course is taken by 18.4 or about 15.8% 8% of students, and that's total first instruction, not just history, social science. So, when we graduate, about 18% of our kiddos are taking one off-site course. About 9% of our kiddos
are taking two courses. About 3% take three courses. And one about under five students take more than four courses. And that's not just in history of social science. That's total in their time with us. When we drill down specifically to
the core history social science classes, there were a lot of people that wondered, do we have kids graduating that have never taken a history social science course with us? Is it a large number of students? And so when looking at the classes of 2025 and 2026, you can see approximately 14% of students
completed one social science course offsite, about 6.5% completed two and 1 to 3% completed all three of the core history of social science courses. If we go back though to that discovery we did in 2020, I want to just remind everyone
that in that percentage of students, that 6% or 1 to 3%, 39% are traditionally replacing that with a social science course, 67% with the preferred AP course and 39% down to 17%
in one of our other four A's when we say we're about all four A's, making that happen for kiddos. And so I think this data was really paramount in helping clarify the percentage of students completing all off-site courses and then really a relatively small amount which
take more than one course offsite in the core which I think really helped focus the committee on to what broader program impacts are happening because if these are true to the numbers why are the numbers less on campus when we're looking at course enrollment in the core
and so that's when we really started started um digging into our board policy and then leaning into the policies of other Orange County school districts. And so our current board policy only mandates enrollment in English every semester enrolled on campus. And so all
the other courses could be up for an off-site course. It's just English. If you're enrolled with us, you must be enrolled in the English class. Um currently we don't weight GPA of outside courses. So, even if you're taking a course that would historically be weighted on our campus, if you take it with an outside provider, we do not
weight those courses um on our transcripts. We have no maximum or total units established by which you would max out of outside courseworks currently. And then we really had to talk about what's policy and what's practice
because those two things are very different. Sometimes we repeat things that are practice as if it's policy and it's not. And so I think something else that became very clear in our meetings is that we wanted to have our practices written into policy through either a BP
or AR to really make sure that they're transparent to the community and that we're also getting equitable transcript practices for all students because when it's just a practice, right, it's hard to ensure. And so currently what's a practice is that we require prior
approval for outside coursework. We we share that with the community. We have since I've been in the role, we have paperwork by which students turn it in, but it's not written into our policy currently. It's a practice. >> Yes, Mrs. Davidson, >> can I just ask, so in making this
approval, what's the criteria? Like, if I'm I'm one of you and I'm trying to decide whether or not to approve it. What is the criteria for? >> So, there's not a ton of criteria. It's really individually meeting with your counselor to look at a the need and the why. And so really the reason for the
approval is to make sure that students aren't taking a class that isn't Wasque accredited, Augg accredited or if they're an athlete that it's not NCAA accredited. So before my time, Dr. Stone, who had sat in the assistant principal role at the high school, shared with me as outside coursework
first started becoming popular, students would sign up to take a course and they would turn in their paperwork and we would share we can't add that to your transcript that you took geometry in a nonASP from a non-WASS accredited institution. And so a student had spent a lot of time over the summer investing
in a course by which wouldn't be considered for graduation credits in the state of California. So the initial reason to get prior approval was to a make sure students would be taking a course that counted. It was also to help account for sections in the master
schedule. So if I'm an assistant principal building a master schedule and I don't know that 250 students are going to take off-site courses in world history, US history, and econ and gov. I'm building in sections and FTEES of teachers into their master schedule to
serve 250 students to get that paperwork late in the summer and be scrambling with either uh history social science staff that's too large and maybe we should have reduced our um FTEEs in that area. Um and so it was causing a lot of
conflict in other spaces. It wasn't so much what makes it permissible because we didn't have guardrails for that. >> That was really informative. Thank you. >> You're welcome. We currently have a practice of requiring enrollment in a full school day when we approve a core social
science class to be taken during the summer because the initial impetus of Griffin's connection was to alleviate that flexibility and schedule for students who are impacted. The rationale was if you're taking a history social science class over the summer, it's
because you will be enrolled in six periods that you need that space in your schedule. And so we have been that's been a practice that's been in place. Um and so we don't also sign off on an outside coursework for a core history social science class until Griffin
Connections is full. That's also been a practice we had is that our program fills first, then we would sign off on outside coursework and we only sign off on outside coursework if the student indeed has a plan for a sixth period day. Now, that not being in policy
creates some challenges when students change their mind the when they come back the next school year. That's the reason I'm bringing it up. Something else in practice has been the only things that we add to an official Los Alamos High School transcript is a a pre-approved high school graduation
requirement to a pre-approved A throughG course. Most of those are are courses that we don't offer. A great example is environmental science. We only currently offer advanced placement environmental science. There are many students engaged in the sciences who don't want the rigor of an advanced placement course. And so
we'll take uh A throughG college prep environmental science class during the summer that we approve that then could get added to show that on their transcript and then a pre-approved remediation course that we would add to the transcript. There are definitely instances where
different things have happened because we've had families email us and say, "This family had this put on their transcript. We want this put on our transcript." And you know what? It's our really obligation to make sure that we're equitably adding information to transcripts. So that's a practice that
we should be memorializing in an administrative regulation or in a board policy. So it's very clear to families prior to taking a course, what courses will go on their transcript, what will not, because students are always welcome to take outside courses that they don't expect to put on our transcript and then submit that through the college
admissions process on their own. And then also families should know how it will be weighted on our transcript as well. And so we have a clear practice and but the committee's goal really is to have all this information memorialized in either a board policy or administrative regulation so that we're really clear with our community.
>> Um do we put on transcripts dual enrollment classes? >> So no, we do not put on transcript dual enrollment classes and that's because that's a college transcript that you're submitting in partnership with your high school transcript. So, it's that's very different than um a high school course
and you would want that on a college transcript um because it speaks highly of the rigor that you have engaged in when you submit to a college or high school transcript and college units. >> So, when you applied, you put both trans >> you put both you put both on.
Absolutely. And so, we then started in looking at district comparison data when it came to board policies. And so we asked the committee the districts they wanted us to look at. And so they asked us to look
at some that we compare ourselves to and some that were similar to us in build. So Irvine Unified, we're always comparing our data to Irvine Unified Schools or another high performing school district. Huntington Beach Union, that's probably the largest high school
district adjacent to our um community that we're comparing ourselves in when we look at athletics and academics. um Elsa Gundo and Breo Alendo are single high school districts with similar uh demographic populations and student outcomes. So looking at their board
policies and then it just so happened one of the administrators at um Brea Oinda had just come from ABC Unified and so she said I can share all of ABC Unifides with you as well and so we said we'll take it and so key patterns emerged. Almost all the districts had
outside coursework limits. In fact, all of them either had a 40 units total maximum across four years of outside coursework they would allow on the transcript or some school districts said 10 per year, but in the end equating to that 40 unit total. Almost all districts
did not weight outside coursework in GPA calculations. In fact, Irvine Unified was the only one who honored it high school by high school based on if that high school weighted that course on their campus. Um, but they were the only one that we came into contact with in our investigation. Nearly all the
districts required private approval for outside coursework and it was delineated in their board policy as such. And then several districts also had dual enrollment and/or early college pathway programs that allowed students to earn college units that also counted towards
high school graduation credits. And so that would be a true dual enrollment program. The reason I bring that up is that creates flexibility for students in a different way. So although they had a 40 unit threshold, there was a way to still eliminate high school graduation
credits with replacing it with a rigorous course because in many of these institutions, you could take a world history course at your local community college, get college credit for it, and also check the box for your high school graduation requirement. So when we're
talking about limiting our students, I think it was a really important part of the dialogue to recognize that our program is not a true dual enrollment program. So when we put thresholds on on a student, they don't also have this additional lane to check the box for a a
graduation requirement, but at the same time replacing it with a a course of rigor. And so those pathways all looked very different. and we gathered all that information simultaneously um at each school district and how they ran those programs. And so these
comparisons really showed that LOSAL currently really has fewer explicit guard rails than comparable districts when it comes to outside coursework. And so um something we noticed when we started going through board policies was that many districts required juniors to
be enrolled in a full school day. and our board policy currently only requires ninth and tth graders to be enrolled in a full school day for us here that sixth period. So that became something we started looking at as well because we were really also always looking at where
are these students who would traditionally be enrolled in US history, world history econ and gov on our campus when we saw that the off-site coursework was not as high in those core courses we as we had thought. And so we started really looking at LOL
cell meters high school student schedules. And so we really started with juniors. And so a key finding for our committee is that currently out of our class of 2027 which has 691 students only 324 juniors are enrolled in a five period
day. I think that number was really shocking for our committee. I know I I was taken back by it. This means that nearly half of our juniors are not enrolled in a full school day. Um this finding really shifted the discussion when within this community within our
committee from um not only looking at a regulation of outside coursework but really examining the overall student engagement and comprehensive academic schedule that we're saying is required for a loss also high school diploma because I think there was always the notion of the value and integrity of the
diploma and I think that our vision of our school district and in particular the high school is the 4A and it's a one-time opportunity for four years to be engaged engaged and connect with meaningful adults with curriculum that you find um complex to find a passion on
campus. And so if we have half of our junior class already not enrolled in a a full school day, are we really serving that purpose? I think that became the next metric we really started looking at. And so we started doing a regional comparison on the full school day
requirement. And so we contacted every Orange County school district with a comprehensive high school and Long Beach Unified because Long Beach Unified is a neighboring school district from ours, which I think there's a lot of talk sometimes about differences in programming. And so I think it was a
great addition to the table. And so what we learned is that 10 of the 15 school districts, so the 14 in Orange County that have comprehensive high schools in addition to Long Beach Unified, require juniors to be enrolled in a full school day. And so that's Long Beach Unified, Anaheim Union, Brea Oinda, Fullerton
Joint Union, Irvine, Lagona, Newport Mesa, Saddleach, Santa Ana, and Tustin all required juniors to be enrolled in a full school day. And so this really raised a policy question on whether we should be aligning with regional expectations for full academic enrollment. And really, did our board
policies and commitment to students call for that? And I think that in the committee that was a unanimous yes. um in particular when we look at the value of what's added on our campus for a sixth period of the day and so through that exploration oh
question I'm sorry >> yes no thank you Mrs. uh you know, have we engaged the juniors, the students, and asked them um why they're doing like the half of them that are only enrolled in a five period uh school day.
>> We haven't actually spoken to the students. I did go and meet with the counseling team on Friday, so met with all the alpha counselors and brainstormed all of the reasons, and there really are a wide range of reasons. Many of them said most students
just want to be done at the end of fifth period. Some students have jobs. They thought that was really few between um a few students taking community college courses. Um but really just saw it as a perk for junior year to have one last
class. Counselors also did share though there is a subcohort of students who might have five AP courses. And so now not wanting to just add in another rigorous course when worried about their GPA. And so that is a a a contingency of
students as well if you think about it because as you're looking to evolve your GPA above a 4.0, every college prep class you take that's not weighted has a negative impact on your evolution past the 4.0. So that would also be
>> something that we'll want to take into consideration. Um, and so just want to remind you that anytime we have a board policy, we can also have a system for a board waiver of a policy. And so, um, >> I'm just going to make this up right now. If we had a board policy that
required juniors to be enrolled in six periods and the committee and the board felt, you know, passionately that students who are enrolled in five APS would be eligible for a five period day, those are also things that can be further explored if we feel that that's
a significant population or constraint for students. It's also something that would be reflected in our school profile. So, I know we spoke a little bit with the board previously about the school profile that Los Summer's High School puts out that really represents for colleges through the admission cycle
of what our expectations are. And so, that would also represent that we require juniors to be in a full school day much like Irvine or Lagona. And so, if there was being filled with a college prep class and the GPA were to come down, it would come down equally across the class and that would also then be
outlined in our in our school profile. >> Yeah, thank you. I I would be interested to see why that is and if it is if it's the majority of the cases because of the rigor that they are taking five APS then that's something for us to consider or if they're using that time to do extracurricular
um internships and you know hands-on experiences if they have a job it just makes a difference other than just wanting to have >> so an internship would actually be considered a course on campus and so the one thing that we did talk about and I'll get to it in a little bit is um
bringing back our work study course and that's you'll see there's a recommendation to delay this by one year um so that if you did have a job it could be counted as your sixth period and so many moons ago we had a work study period >> and so that would eliminate a lot of the things the counselors were concerned
about because if you're an internship that is a course on our campus and if you had work study to come to check those boxes I can definitely say the majority of our 324 aren't enrolled in five AP courses we have a small percentage of students students who take five AP courses in tandem.
>> And so that would be easy data I could also share with the board as well. >> Okay. >> Absolutely. >> And and I was going to ask about the work study and I'm very glad to hear that that's something that we might have as an option for those students that need it. >> Absolutely.
And so as we were doing this work um and looking at schedules, something else that came to light that I think is just something to take into consideration and some work that we want to do is there were 140 juniors and seniors enrolled in sections of TA and so teachers assistant
and for some of these students it's one of their five and so we have done some previous work around the teachers assistant um section. These currently do not include our lab assistants or our student mentors. So, our lab assistants in the sciences and visual arts, those
have specific course curriculum written for them as they're performing specific functions. Same thing with our student mentors. That is a course that's recognized um in doorways that students are enrolled in. They are credit no credit class. They are non A throughG credits for gra basically just
graduation electives, but sometimes they serve as a soft landing for a student who drops a class. And so, um, in some cases though, students who competed completed an off-site coursework enrolled in TA during the school year resulting in reduced academic schedules.
And so, this did raise some concerns around academic rigor, program integrity, master schedule impacts because if you recall, the main reason why we're creating this space is for flexibility of those emphasis on the 4A's, not really for a contentless
course. And so we currently are working with the high school under the guidelines of Assembly Bill um 102 which talks about contentless courses and restricts um schools from placing students and courses without educational content. And so this engagement just
opened our eyes to additional work that we need to do and some students um were placed there for a soft landing. So I do want to give an example of that. You've been in a rigorous course for eight weeks. I'm going to say I'm going to use AP psychology and you're not doing well and with the amount of weeks left there
is no way for you to salvage your grade and we don't have a level down for you. So our psychology course already has 35 students in it and so so that we're not ruining your GPA you want to drop we let you soft land into TA for the closing of
the semester. that would be an appropriate use of TA. But to let a student initially choose TA as their fulllong semester commitment is where the committee started having some discussion around restrictions of that for students who are taking an off-site
summer school course. And so some of the key policy implications that I just want to bring up as this committee really focused on balancing student opportunity. So really flexibility for athletics, arts and activities for acceleration,
remediation. There was, you know, the shared interest on that program integrity. So that rigor of the Los Angeles high school transcript, the integrity of the diploma, and then program sustainability. Because when you're talking about 324 students not being enrolled junior year in a sixth grade class, you are talking about
enrollment stability, teacher staffing, and course availability. Because if those 324 students would have been in courses, there perhaps may be a place for the advanced placement psychology student to land into a not full section of psychology, which is a very popular
one semester junior college prep elective in our schedule. And so these considerations really guided the committee's policy recommendations. And so we decided on really a two-phaseed approach. So really coming tonight, bringing forward the foundational change
to a board policy. However, knowing that a new outside coursework board policy and detailed administrative regulation would be the next phase, something that really encapsulates everything into um one policy. And so
these were the shared interests that were identified in our first um committee meeting by staff for staff district students and community in terms of the policy and regul and reg and regulation uh recommendations. And so opportunity for students, balance of
course load, cost of family, opportunity for remediation, finding ways to offset the limits of a sixth period day, rigor of the transcript, value or integrity of the diploma, protecting jobs, quality of teachers, sustaining and building enrollment, impact on ELA, which I think
is something that we haven't talked about, but currently English on the high school campus is the only course every student is enrolled in. So, anytime counselors are rolling out with an announcement, anytime we have to do testing for something all in one grade level, it impacts the English classroom,
they're the ones that see the deficit in instructional time because it's the only class on campus every student takes at each grade level. And then also the impact on senior year graduation requirements. some committee meeting members really feeling there's a dilution of rigor if um we don't have an
expectation for students to be enrolled or to complete a certain amount of courses on site at Lositos high school and so the emerging recommendations really are to require juniors to be enrolled in a sixth period day and that would not be beginning with the class of
2028 so next year's juniors it would be beginning with the class of 2029 which would allow us to adequately educate the current freshman class, add back those courses like work study, bring back courses on our enrollment sheet for when
you're moving into junior year, courses that haven't been offered. Um, and also explore other opportunities in this year for soft landings for students. Um, currently we also don't offer semesterl long uh visual arts or fine arts
courses. So reexploring that as an avenue for students as well. So if you had a student who was in five APs, you have appropriate courses that still look great on a college transcript like in the fine or visual arts but don't have
the same homework or cognitive demand as another advanced placement course on their transcript. Um establishing a maximum of 40 units of outside coursework, 10 units uh per year. And so we did really land on 40 units total. Um
and then clarifying transcript policy so that when outside coursework um is added, it's only if a it's been pre-approved, meets graduation requirement and/or meets a required A throughG course that hasn't been completed at the high school
or is a course not offered at Los Altos High School. Require juniors and seniors completing a graduation requirement in the summer to be enrolled in a sixth period day. the following school year. So, not seeing taking those core history, social science classes as a way to escape taking a a course on our high
school campus. And then not allowing initial enrollment in TA when you're taking an outside course and then really continually continue to work to significantly limit TA enrollment in alignment with um AB102.
And so on the agenda tonight is a first reading of a proposed um amendment to board policy 6146.1 high school graduation requirements. And so there's really only two things that are currently up to be discussed. And so
I've underlined new language and I've stried through old language to make it very clear. The new language we're proposing is no more than 40 credits of outside coursework may be allowed to count towards credits of graduation requirements and that all outside
coursework must have prior approval. That is in alignment um with our neighboring school districts as well as part of a practice that we currently have in place at the high school. And then beginning with the class of 2029,
that students in grade 9 through 11 shall be enrolled in at least six courses each semester, five of which must be on campus. And students in grade 12 shall be enrolled in at least five courses each semester, which must be on campus. All of the other information
that we discussed tonight would be something that would really land towards phase two. um when we talk about taking practice to policy and so once we get board direction on support for that
then tackling all of the items that would come from there >> you know Mrs. Reed, I was looking at what you just said in the prior. If you could go back, please. Of course. >> Um, in in this slide, you know, it says students in grades 12 shall be enrolled in at least five courses each semester,
four of which must be on campus. But in the slide prior, do we want to adjust? Is that does that say the same thing as the third bullet from um bottom? Because does that say a sixth period? Does that >> It's not the same. So, this is different. Let me give some clarity to
that. Absolutely. So, this third builder from Baldm would say that if you take an off-site summer course, >> you actually will take six classes. You won't be allowed to take five. >> Because otherwise, you could have taken the class during the school year, >> right?
>> Oh, >> so yeah, >> that's that complicates it for seniors especially. >> That does. So, that's saying junior your rising senior summer. So, after your junior year, if you take an off-site coursework, so I'm just going to say
>> um Gov and Econ, which is the one most popularly taken, you're committing to being in sixth periods the next year because otherwise, if you weren't, you have space in your schedule to take Gov and Econ with us. >> And that space, that sixth period can be off campus though, right? Well, on as as
a senior, you have to take six classes. If you took an this is saying if you took an off-site summer course, you would be enrolled in six courses. One course could. So if you were in a work study or currently our CT internship or an RO course, those count as courses for
us, but they're not on our campus, but it would count as a course. But this is saying you would engage in six periods because the whole reason we sign off on taking an off-site course, the main reason anyways is because you don't have enough room in your schedule,
>> not just because you were choosing not to take a course with us. So that is a change >> that frees it up so that you would have the opportunity to do the internship. >> It could free it up, but I think what Mrs. Partisani is actually getting at is that this is will be different for seniors. >> Yes. So currently we have a practice of
this but not a policy. >> So currently if you take one of our three history social science cores and we sign your offsite course agreement we say to you you'll you're agreeing and they initial they're agreeing to take a six period day but it's been a practice.
So sometimes students will come back and two weeks into the school year say I think I really want to drop AP psych. And so now they're in five classes even though they thought they were going to take six. And we with being a policy, we would say, well, actually, you took that
off-site course because you said your schedule was impacted. And so, we totally get you don't want AP psych, but we're going to need you to fill that with a six class and not just be on a five period day as a senior. >> Okay. Yes, that that helps explain that.
Thank you. Uh, so in essence, uh, that's always been the practice. So the paperwork that they fill out today lists that and says you are we are agreeing to you um to take this course offsite because you want to free up your
schedule to take more courses on site at Lois. Okay. >> And we actually asked them on there to put the six classes for next year. Okay. >> And their counselor sees that. So it's been a practice but it's not a policy. So then when students come back the next year and our counseling team believe you know a this happens to a couple of
students and then people get wise. Mhm. >> and enroll in six and drop because it's a practice. >> This would put teeth in it, >> right? Where you would say, well, actually, we have a policy. You you initialed on your off-site course um
document that you understood you were going to be enrolled in a sixth period day and we also have a board policy that says when we've signed off on that prior approval, you're committing to a full school day. And so if you don't take a class during the summer of your um
senior year, uh you are able to sign up for a five period day. >> Yes. >> Okay. So help me understand that. Does that seem like you're penalizing kids for taking a course during their summer? It feels like if you don't take a course, you can sign up for a five
period day. If you to do take a course, you have to sign up for a six period day. >> I'm going to give it a different perspective. Okay. >> And I absolutely see your thought process. >> I think the perspective of the committee was every student is taking a sixth
period day. We offer six periods. We're funded for six periods. And so a five period day for a senior has always been looked at as a perk because you've met all of your graduation requirements um ahead of time and so you're able to leave campus early. But we're now going
to let you take a class not with us under the the rigor, the expectations of a little summer's high school class. You're going to take it in the summer so that you can leave early. >> So, I think there's it's just it's a they're both just different perspectives at the same thing. I would think
teachers would believe if students aren't impacted in their schedule, why wouldn't they be taking the govern econ class with us on campus? M >> why would we give permission for them to take it from an outside provider so that they could leave school early if it
wasn't for an internship a job because all of those could count as a course. >> I see. >> So I I don't think there's a wrong or a right. I think they're just two different perspectives. >> I think it's also helping educate our um community on what that means. Kind of like how you and I are having this
dialogue. I think it's going to be very helpful to have this dialogue with our families so they understand that this is not necessarily a new policy. It's just practicing what we've already had in place in a more formal way. >> And I think it's really great timing. So
we just sent out two weeks ago all of our Griffin Connections information. So all those families who turned in their documents by last Friday, this is the week we go through our numbers and assign open seats this Friday. all just recently signed that document, put their initials on there, and slotted in their
six classes for next year. >> And and one last question, is there a particular class that you can take that doesn't necessarily um it doesn't fall within the social science and history elements or or um A throughG courses that we offer, but it's a class that you
want to take during the summer. Does that preclude you from having a five um period day? >> No. In fact, we're only reporting the courses that students submit to us for transcript recognition. >> Okay? >> There students are welcome to take as many outside courses as they'd like for
their own learning um and investigation curiosity and they can submit those courses separately to any institution of higher education they apply to. >> Yeah. So, they can take college courses and have separate transcripts be sent, but they're not necessarily part of their high school. It would only be if
they take a core graduation requirement class that you would normally everyone's enrolled in during the school year. If you take that during the summer, it would preclude you for the five period day. Not that you took an additional course. No. >> Okay. >> Does that make sense? >> Yes. >> Yeah. >> I think so.
>> Oh, I I think maybe it's a question or maybe it's a comment. I don't really know. But when I hear what Miss Partisan just said about students and and the taking that sixth period, the commitment and you know, I think one of the things that I'm I'm trying to think about and I don't have a high school age kid, but a student that is a
senior that says I took it in the summer, I want five periods because I'm playing soccer. I'm in choir and I'm going to be practicing till 10:00 and I'm going to use that extra hour of the day to do my homework. like that that that is something that might be really valuable and I'm not living the life that your children are right now. But I
I'm also wondering is that a place where the the students that are in those upper grade levels need that extra time because they are I think about what choir students do every day and they're practicing and they're going to private classes or dance or cheer all those things that not having a sixth period day might be really beneficial to them because I don't know how they're fitting
in homework. I >> athletics are sixth period. >> Yeah. and and understanding that. But even so, maybe I'm picking the wrong one, but there's so many other things. >> I think you're really talking about just a reduction of time, >> right, into their schedule. And so, I think that really is a question. Is the
reduction of time something that's valued more than taking core classes that are part of our core academic standard at Los High School. And I don't think there's a wrong or a right, but those are the two competing interests. >> Yeah. Right. Because not having high school age kids, but also having a sixth
grader that's doing so many extracurriculars already struggling with homework and balancing >> and having two high school kids, one that graduated, I had to go take seven periods to fit in both song and cheer and ASB for my son to be playing volleyball and be in a CTE pathway. So,
I don't know that the athletics or highly invested student actually could take five and still have those in their schedule and make the core graduation requirements. Go ahead. >> Just so but the waiver a possible waiver
does enable us that flexibility, right? >> Absolutely. >> Yeah. Okay. Thank you. And I think when you develop a if you're intending a policy that you're thinking there will be a a significant group of students who may want a waiver, then those should be things that we clearly outline what a waiver would be used for and
administrative regulation so that we don't find waivers being a practice and not a policy and waivers being something that aren't equitable to get because a practice can be inequitable when multiple people we have an amazing counseling team but there's no way they can talk about every student in every
situation on campus. And so what one counselor puts a waiver forward for and another one doesn't, those would be things that we I think we would want to talk about in advance in our bigger policy and administrative regulation. >> Couple questions.
>> Couple questions. Thank you very much. So um you gave me the years when it would be starting, but what what incoming class would that >> Our current freshman class? >> Our current freshman class. So, we have plenty of time to message this and to
get them all on the same page. That was number one question to and and I'm just going to to speak. Mrs. Reed, I've known you a very long time and I have seen you the the uh
amount of thought that you put into things and the amount of speed that you work with things but it not feel like it's being rushed. And and it is it is such a gift that you have because this is something that I think rose to the
top within the last month month and a half. I know when I met with LAA it was this was a topic that came up that wasn't very long ago. And um the what what excites me about this is that
I think we have so much regard for our school and the rigor that we have and to find that maybe there was a bit of a gap and that we can be that much better and
have a really amazing plan to be able to get there. um with all parties it sounds like and that was my next question really on board and feeling like they're invested um is just phenomenal work and
to that do we feel like we have all parties invested and thinking that this is the right direction >> I think we have all staff thinking this is the right direction but I think to be very transparent this is the first time
we're bringing that to a community forum and it's also why we would want to >> engage multiple times around a policy like this and so um you know bringing it this wouldn't be something we're bringing back for just one read >> right >> does that make sense
>> yes but but I meant from a staff perspective >> I think from a staff perspective absolutely so we've had LEA being involved Nathan Howard our LE president actually was part of this committee we have teacher representation from all all the departments um myself and Dr.
Bennett from the district level as well as Mrs. Krauss, Mrs. Reyes, Mrs. Vienna and counseling Gail Davenport sitting on the committee. So I think from an internal organizational structure yes but I think this is the first time
coming forward in terms of sharing this in a broader light that it's that it's happening which I think is the process right we start with internal communication recommendations and then we come to the board and loop out and I think when you make a change like this anytime you're talking about a board
waiver I think there will always be a need in the initial years because even though we be starting with the freshman class there'll be things perhaps that we can anticipate. Maybe there are, as Mr. Bragman described, these one-off situations that we need to, you know,
make allowances for for families that have unique needs or students that have unique needs. And I think something that our staff has always been focused on is meeting each student where they're where they at. We bring multiple waiverss forward for all sorts of of policies each year. And I think we would have to
come in with the mindset that that would still be work that we'd be engaging in because there's no thing there's no such thing as a one-sizefits-all when we're talking about 3,000 students and their individual needs and how those change yeartoyear. And I think uh in one of my last slides, one of the things that I
really wanted to touch on is that I think the committee agreed that this is really something that we need to annually reconvene this committee to really look at continue to look at that data because as graduation requirements changed. We know the personal finance um changes coming to high school graduation
for class of 2030, we could see additional dialogue and recommendations that could be made. And I think something that really came out of this so that we continue to provide opportunities for our students is the need to explore true dual enrollment
options for our students. So really looking at those college and career access pathways and partnerships that lead to early college programs that we see some other some other districts have because that can do two things simultaneously. Allow a student an opportunity to take a community college class for credit that
also meets a high school graduation credit. And so really maximizing that bandwidth kiddos have to engage in the other four AS and have that time for rest and homework as Mr. Bragman said earlier. So I think that this signals a recommendation from my office would be
to begin exploring Trudeau enrollment on our campus as well to make sure we're continuing to serve all of the sections of our campus. >> Well, and I think I heard from the board when we were chatting right here, but you can make comments. Um I I do think
that for the most part this is something that will really resonate and align with our community because people come to our community for a very high-erforming high rigor high school. So um anybody else have any comments before we move
forward? >> Sorry, just a couple of things. So, um, one, I appreciate the fact that you did, uh, sort of set out to do a benchmark study with other neighboring districts, and you found out that 10 out of 15
juniors are all enrolled. 10 out of 15 districts have juniors that are enrolled in a full day. I think that's key. One of your guiding principles, it sounded like, is around um, making sure that we have academic rigor and program integrity. I think those are all great
things that we all pride ourselves as part of a LEAL community. Um, you know, highly driven successoriented community. Uh, I I feel like I I I am 100% on board when it comes to like freshman through juniors having a full day and really
taking advantage of the courses that we have on campus. I love the idea of bringing true um dual enrollment back in as an option, leaving um making work study be part of the you know one of the periods would be satisfied because I think that's one of
the things that I hear about from students that they want time in their schedule to be able to go out and get internships and work in the fields that they're interested in. The part that gives me pause is the seniors because you know um having have yes you know
having one currently and um seeing the workload uh I think that a lot of the seniors design their schedule so by the time they get to the senior year when college applications are due when um you know all the essay writing as you know I mean that the process is a full-time job
that they do have that flexibility in their schedule. So sometimes I feel like they do take those courses that they can take on our campus but only to allow them to have flexibility too. >> Oh, Griffin Connections wouldn't count. So if you took Griffin Connections with us in the summer, you can take a five
period day. >> Okay. Well, there you go. That answers my question. >> It's when you go to an outside entity. >> And so I think to be honest, there's a rub there too that we should be aware of. We're not currently able to accommodate every senior who wants
Griffin Connections. So I'll give you an example for this year and this would also give us time because this wouldn't impact policy to the year after to make sure we could so this year I had 64 requests and I'm able currently to honor 45. So we could shift where our second
section of Griffin Connections is because we offer two in one of the core areas to be always emphasized on the rising senior class so that that wouldn't impact a student. But that is part of the planning and kind of the rationale why we would want an
additional year. >> Thank you. >> You're welcome. >> Yeah. So Griffin connections wouldn't be an outside course just to make that clear for any of the levels. >> So in 2018 in the drama over being history, I felt personal bias and
indignation thinking that we were sort of dismissing the value of history, government and economics and all that. And so thank you because this report and showing the small percentage of people actually taking all history classes off
course off campus helps. But what really made a difference to me was when you said I could take US history and then take an AP history social science which I I think is what's happening but wasn't what I understood. So this committee
working with the teachers has to be really enlightening and empowering for them too. I have one quick questions about Griffin uh Griffin connection. >> Do the one of the components that I where I honored the on online course and the fact that we were building that from
our campus was that there was a certain percentage of hours required for the students to return to campus for discussions like it wasn't all online. They had they could be studying something about government and then come back for five hours every two weeks. is
is that to to be in a classroom and have those discussions >> that's not what it currently looks like. So the course has evolved to meet community demands as well >> and that was also pre-COVID and so I
think to be transparent teachers felt similar to you and then our same teachers changed their views when we went to teaching online and so what our course list look like now is there are two three weeks uh semesters and during the three weeks there's a ma one
mandatory classroom day and then you have mandatory learning days each week there are two hours in a zoom format where they still lead those online socratics discussions. It's just not forcing students to be in a brickandmortar building. So it gives what some of our families shared is they
want to travel. They want to spend the summer with grandma and grandpa these other experiences. I still want to engage in learning but they might not be here in Los in the 90720. And so we still do have weekly online learning and the one mandatory day, but everything
else is asynchronous. So it's a blend and our teachers feel really good about it. We have the same staff teaching those sections as we did when it originally started and they've really evolved and are masterful at it. >> Well, and how many of our of our meetings now are Zoom? I you know, so
it's very powerful interaction. Thank you. So, if I hear you correctly, it might also give an opportunity for more of our staff to be able for us to be able to offer more classes in the summer
in Griffin Connection. >> Not really. >> We don't really additional cost to us because we're funded because remember the majority of >> at the time and still majority of these students weren't taking it to take a le
less of a day. They're taking it to have a seven period day, right? >> And so we're funded for six periods. So when we're doing when we do Griffin Connections, I don't know of any other district that does this. They just let them take outside coursework. It actually costs >> money three additional sections. I
believe uh to the master schedule um that that we're really not getting additional funding for, but that's because we have a commitment to our students to want to be in the 4 A. >> Um but every time you add, could you? Yes. But there was a financial cost to
that that I think we had to have our eyes wide open to. >> Great. >> So something we currently have is we have teach three teachers that teach a section and then we leave it open for any teacher who'd be willing to teach it at summer school pay. And so we've been very lucky every year to have a teacher who's willing to teach it at summer
school pay. So that the hourly summer school wage wage, sorry. And so been able to float a section to one of the impact areas. So if I get 150 in US history, I'll put that extra summer school section there. So when Mrs.
Partisani was asking about seniors, I think it makes a lot of sense. You can float your extra summer school section to make sure you can fulfill the need of rising seniors and grip and connection. So it wouldn't ever be that taking an outside course would be a reason why they wouldn't get a five period day. >> Got it.
>> As a solution. >> Great job. >> Perfect. Thank you. >> Amazing. >> Thank you. Thank you so much. >> I think we were we were um all wrong on the timing of that um when we had agenda planning. Um so let's move on to some
business. And I think we also have a another um >> consent. >> Yes, I I know. I got it. >> Got it. >> I just was trying to I know everybody's waiting. So, um, so I would like to make
I would like for a motion um to um for consent items A through AE. >> Second. >> Are there any polls or discussions? All those in favor? >> I.
Now we move on to our action items and um approval of the first reading of the revised policy 61461 high school graduation requirements Mrs. Reid cuz she got back to your desk. I'm
really President Hill. So we're bringing this forward as a first read tonight and so we'll be bringing it forward again with revisions. And so the first revision that we know of already is we would be recommending the um
the sixth period day for juniors to not start until the class of 2029. >> Wonderful. >> I move approval. >> A second. >> Second. >> Any discussion? >> Uh just quickly this is about what we
just talked about, right? Yes. >> Okay. So the other things that we talked about to enhance this policy in terms of making sure that we prioritize you know Griffin connections for seniors allow courses taken on um Griffin connections to count towards seniors. So those types
of things um you know um maybe even talking about the true um dual enrollment uh would that all kind of be enh added to this policy? >> No. So true dual enrollment would be a whole I would recommend from my office a whole another committee to start and
really vet out what that looks like because it it can affect teacher FTEES and I think we would want to engage a lot of um stakeholders and LEA and teachers at the high school in that process as we explored. We do plan in phase two to bring forward a new policy. So I could prioritize that policy to
come with the second reading >> where we could look at um all of the items transcript-wise and all of the minutiae we talked tonight to be a memorialized in a new board policy. What we noticed when we explored other districts is it was almost impossible to find all this information. Nobody had it
easily accessible in one policy. It was in seven or eight different policies and so we all agreed we would want that in one standing policy. And so we will bring that forward in complement to the second reading. >> Okay. Wonderful. Thank you. >> I have a first I have a second
discussion. All those in favor? >> I my discussion just simply would be um initially when we were working with the committee that the second reading we thought about whether we would bring it uh at our next board meeting which is March 24th which is which is just a
midyear workshop and we don't have the full meeting. I think given the fact that we're already waving this for the following year that it would be smarter for us to allow for a regular board meeting to have the second reading be at the April 21st board meeting. That's a
lot of time um in between. >> Are we in agreement? >> Yes. >> Yes. >> Do you have that, Miss Tina? All those in favor? >> I >> I >> thank you Dr. Pulver. Um, the second
thing is approval of four new courses at Los Alamos High School. Do I have a motion? >> So, move. >> Do I have a second? >> Second. >> Any discussion? Uh, I I just want to make a comment. Um, I think that one thing Oh, sorry,
Andrea. >> No, go ahead. Do you do you want to talk about these four new classes? I did not give you the opportunity. >> Thank you so much, Madam President. I would actually just like to thank the high school staff in particular the administration team and the office as well as the teachers who have been
behind these. I think it shows a lot of forward thinking about our new CTE pathway and business and entrepreneurial that both the AP business personal finance class as well as the AP cyber security um path would lie into and then ukulele as being a soft landing. So a
new class that you could add to a rigorous schedule for just fun and enjoyment and showing an appreciation for music. And then really wanted to clarify because I've gotten a lot of questions about the esports class. This is not an esports class where kids are playing games and competing. It is an
industry studies class. So it really is competitive gaming and industry studies. So it's a wide look at what is now the most valuable gaming industry. I just read a recent statistic that it brings in more money than all of the professional um sports leagues combined
in one year. So, it isn't just a plane of games. It's a business study of what that model looks like. >> Great. Thank you. And I I am sorry that I did not. >> Um, so I was going to say um I I just really
appreciate and what I don't think a maybe a lot of the public knows is that um when you talked about it earlier is that our our master schedule is student driven. And so that means there has to be students that enroll in the classes
for us to hold those classes. And so it's a little bit like um I think sometimes the teachers have to go out and learn to do a little PR to get kids uh students interested in these classes to for us to actually float them. So um
any other questions or discussion? All those in favor? I >> I >> um approval of amended and restated joint use agreement with the city of Los Alamidos for Oak Middle School Gymnasium and Community Center. Mr. Schneer. Thank
you, Madam President. We are bringing forward for approval an amended and restated joint use agreement with the city of Los Alamos for the Oak Middle School uh gymnasium. The update modernizes a decade old agreement and clarifies scheduling, maintenance, cost
sharing, insurance, and liability responsibilities. The agreement would also transfer ownership of the field lights at Oak and McAuliffe to the district, allowing us to manage their use more consistently and generate revenues when outside
groups uh request lighting. This agreement also includes a minor lot adjustment to reflect areas already maintained by the by the city. >> Thank you very much, Mr. Scher. Do I have a motion? >> Second. >> Any discussion?
I just want >> I would just add as well that the city of Los Alamidos has already approved this at their recent city council meeting as well. So this uh both parties have to agree to it and they've agreed to it already and then um we're we're following suit.
>> Great. Thank you. And I just want to say my great appreciation for our partnership with the city of Los Alamidos. Uh the this has changed many times in my tenure on the board. Um and it's always been to whatever is the best
benefit for uh both our students but also um as a public facility to be used. and um I appreciate the the partnership we have. So um any other comments? All those in favor? >> I >> I
we are now moving on to the presentation and approval of the 2025 2026 second interim report and revised budget. Mner. >> Thank you, Madam President. I would like to welcome our director of fiscal services, Mr. Tim Golden. uh he has been
super excited and just eagerly awaiting to present to the board the second interim who um I just want to sincerely thank Tim and his team for the amazing work that they do every day but uh when it comes to second interim they really
have gone above and beyond. So thank you very much Tim. So all yours thank you Tim. >> Awesome. Well good evening board president Hill board of education Dr. Pver executive cabinet and uh staff in the Los Alamos community. Uh before we
begin, I also like to reiterate uh a thank you to the fiscal services team. Anna uh Crips and Jennese Kamacho played a Rodriguez, I should say. Um that's her maiden name, but uh they played a critical role in contributing to the
success of this report. And so I just want to make sure I highlight them. All right. So here is just where we are in the annual budget cycle. So as you can see we're in March and we're at the second interim and we're going to be presenting
information based on January 31st. And so uh keeping that in mind as we go through and the purpose of this report is really for stakeholder uh transparency. And so we want to be able to show the board, the community, and
everyone that's involved with um our school district what the numbers look like through January 31st. But it's also to certify the financial condition so that the district can meet the 3% district recur district required reserve in the current year and the two
subsequent years. So that's really what we're going to be asking for from the board tonight is that certification of our financial status. Looking here, we're going to be viewing the second interim multi-year projection assumptions. And so in blue, we've highlighted what those changes are. Some
of the things to draw your attention to, the cost of living adjustment is down about a half% in the second year and the third year of this. And so as you are looking at that, that's going to be a reduction in some of our revenues and uh in our multi-year projections. But we
also have a reduction in our PERS rate. So are for our classified employees um that work 20 hours or more, we're going to have a projected decrease in those rates in the subsequent years. So that is a positive impact to those expenditures. One of the things that we looked at
during second interim is our enrollment projections. So as we looked at the current um enrollment at 8,661, uh that's about a 79 uh student decrease. We updated our projections in year two and year three to be about 30
to 40 students better than what we were projecting at first interim. So that's another positive indicator because um we're noticing that our declining enrollment isn't quite what we expected um based on trends that we were looking at before. So that's a positive impact. Um and
uh in relation to that, our projected P2 ADA, so our actual ADA has gone up just ever so slightly. Um and then our funded ADA has also gone up just ever so slightly. So a little subtle increases in both of those positive indicators to our budget. And so um those are things
that we're looking to continue. One of the things that did change um is our unduplicated pupil percentage which is based on our socioeconomically disadvantaged student counts. And so we did have a decrease this year of about 284 students. Um and so that resulted in
about a 75% decrease in our UPP. Um as shown there, all of these factors impact our projected LCFF entitlement and so there are some subtle changes in those bottom numbers as well.
>> Can I ask a quick question? >> Absolutely. So um do we really feel that that is a decline in our unduplicated count or is it a or is it um getting them to report?
>> So the unduplicated count is just a reminder for everyone is either students uh are e uh lowincome or foster youth and our our biggest population and they can only be counted once. So if you're e and low income you're only counted once.
Uh our biggest one would be low income of the 17 to 18% that we've hovered over the last few years. Um but as the state and the uh has provided universal meals free to everybody regardless of income
um there is less of an impetus for families to apply and indicate to us that they're low income. And so we think some of that is hurting us uh in some ways because that is affecting our supplemental uh dollars. But to families
uh who would normally qualify, there are other benefits. They would qualify for ELOP if they're sixth grade and below. They would f could qualify for free transportation um and some other uh areas reduced rates. So, we will be working uh how how
we can be a little bit more strategic to try to make sure that our families understand even though you get free meals, there are other reasons why you should if you qualify for under low income, why you should still be filling out that form in addition to providing more funding for the district and
providing resources for for economic resources for students that there are other benefits to them as well. So, we're going to be having to strategize and work on a better um uh information campaign for that. >> Thank you very much. >> It's a good question. This next slide
here is the enrollment um comparison with actual and funded ADA. Um and just one thing to remind everyone is that we are largely funded on our P2 ADA which is certified in April. So, uh, in April, we usually have a report that we send,
um, to the state to give us those, uh, ADA numbers that, uh, critically impact our funding for, uh, local control funding formula, LCFF. So, looking at this, uh, this chart here, you're going to see in the blue uh, the bars are
going to be our enrollment, and in red, you're going to see the actual P2 ADA, and you'll see in black is our actual funded ADA. One thing to note here is that we don't include our countyf funded ADA which is for our students that are in county programs because those
students actually we get the funding for but it gets passed through to our county office. So we don't technically include them in this because that funding is essentially uh transferred. So um looking at this you'll see that trend where the funded ADA was above during
those COVID years in the middle where there was a lot of uh statute that was put into place to um mitigate the the loss of ADA during that time. And so now that we're getting into uh the years postco we're at the point where we're
funded on the prior three-year average ADA. And so, um, as you can expect, if we have about 96% attendance, but we lose 3 to 4% of student, uh, enrollment o year-over-year, we're almost funded at
what our enrollment is, but it's just not quite. So, it depends on your enrollment loss, um, year-over-year. And so, um, looking at that information, it's just a demog, it's just a graph for us to be able to see kind of those relation uh, over the years. looking at our uh changes from first
interim uh to the unrestricted general fund because that's generally where we live is on the unrestricted side. Uh and so there's not a lot of um changes typically from first interim to second interim. There's usually a bigger swing from our adopted budget to first interim because we're projecting at adopted
budget and then we're trueing up at first interim. And so not a ton of changes here really highlighting the big changes on the revenue side. Uh we did have with our supplemental early retirement uh plan, we had increased enrollment of our retiree benefits. And
so um what that means is we actually are transferring in about another $400,000 from our fund 20 which is uh specifically designed for retiree benefits. And so that's what makes up a largely of that transfer in that $400,000 increase revenue. Uh on the
expenditure side, we had some reductions to using our one-time sources. we had some reductions to uh contracted services and so we were able to create a little bit of a savings to the unrestricted side um by utilizing those one-time restricted uh sources for that.
So really the net impact at the bottom line to the unrestricted is about 716,000 um and I it was about I think 200,000 on the uh restricted side that was a positive impact. So all good things that we like to see.
Looking at the unrestricted multi-year projections uh again for the unrestricted side. Um it's going to reflect where we anticipate we are going to be um by the end of this year and the subsequent years. The focus here is on the ending fund balance. And so um we're
looking at in blue those percentages. The first one that you see is going to be the percentage of our reserves for the unrestricted general fund. And then the one that you see at the very bottom is going to be combining the unrestricted general fund with our fund 17. And so uh it's not adding them both
together. The bottom line one is um summitative of both. And so looking at those numbers um we do show uh a a healthy number in those. So that would indicate our positive certification. And so we do um put our best assumptions
that we know at this time into these. We we budget conservatively. That way we understand um there are a lot of changes that that come about during uh each of these multi-year. And so it's just making sure that um we understand that
the impacts of our negotiations are not in these numbers at all. So any um collectively bargained agreements would obviously impact these numbers. So, this is as it sits today with no agreements in place. Um, and just as a reminder, we do have in the current year and the
second year um as part of our stabilization plan a $450,000 transfer from fund 17. So, that is in the current year and in year two. It is not in the third year, but that was part of that stabilization plan that um was act in
effect starting from last year. So, just >> that was going to be my question. So when we see fund 17 go up again in 2027 2028 that is from uh that's from the >> interest that has been earned within
fund 17. So the benefit of that is because as you can some of you might have been on the board several years ago when we did had to dip into fund 17 because that's always makes the board nervous because it's an additional reserve um that when we as we gave raises back to employees they wanted to
uh the board wanted to replenish whatever we put put out of fund 17 and put back in. The good news is is interest rates are a little bit higher the past few years uh than they were several years ago. As you can see, even though we dip uh this year and next, uh fund 17 is almost restored in the third
year out where we won't have to, which will allow us to have funds available, albeit little, um for uh employee salaries, health benefits, etc. >> Great. Thank you. >> Perfect. >> All right.
>> So, looking at the road ahead, where we are right now is at in that middle point there at second interim. Um and what we're asking from the board tonight is just the certification of the second interim report. Uh next up will be the governor's uh May revision. Between now
and then, we're going to be doing a lot of budget development um and reviewing our numbers, enrollment, and staffing. Uh and so looking uh ahead, we'll have the governor's May revise or May revision in in May. And then in June, we'll have the two meetings where we'll
have the preliminary budget and then we'll have the final budget. uh towards the end of that month. So with that, were there any questions? >> Mrs. Davidson, >> so I don't know if this applies, but do
we have any indication yet why whether the governor is still intending to hold back that portion of Proposition 98? >> So we won't know any any new update to that until the May revise. But in his January budget, he was uh projecting to
hold back a 5 6 5.7 billion dollars that should be towards education dollars. Um and he already did that last year to about 1.4. So, uh it's setting an ugly precedent which is going to take continued advocacy uh on all of our
parts. Um I know Orange County superintendents have a ledge action day with our local legislators coming up in March and that'll be a big topic for us as well. >> Um >> great question, Mrs. Davidson. Thank you very much. So, um, uh, I haven't had I'm I'm sorry.
It has been a really long day. Um, so do I have a first? >> Yes. >> And do I have a second? >> Second. >> Any other discussion? >> Thank you. >> I just want to thank you for this report. It's it's uh, you know, year after year or midterm after midterm,
it's it's very well done. And thank you for the thorough explanation going through the numbers. It's very helpful. >> Of course. Thank you. All those in favor? >> I opposed. >> Good job, Tim. Got a five. Got a five
right there. >> Bring snack next time. Okay. Oh, >> cookies. Um, okay. I don't even ask for cookies. So, now we're on to action item E. Acceptance of a bid 252606
approval of agreement with Keystone Builders for campus restroom projects at Los Alamos High School. Mrs. Schneer. >> That's okay. We're all tired. >> We are all tired. >> I apologize. >> No problem. >> Anyh who, uh we are bringing forward um
approval of um an agreement with Keystone Builders. They are the uh only biders that provided a a bid for the restroom renovation at the high school. >> Wonderful. Do I have a first? >> So moved. >> Second. >> Great. And um we did but we did have a
walkth through and we did put it out to bid and awesome. Thank you. All those in favor I opposed >> passes 5. Uh we're now working on the adoption of a re not a revolution a
resolution of the board of education for Los Alamos Unified School District Orange County uh California authorizing moving I always love these moving the holiday observation of Lincoln's birthday from February 12th to February
16th and Dr. Reese Wright. >> Yes. And we're bringing forward the resolution which allowed us to pair the two president's birthdays um side by side so that we could take the president's week off in February. >> Thank you, sir. And I believe do I have
a first and a second? >> First. >> Second. >> Thank you. Uh I This is a roll call. I stopped myself. >> Thank you, Mrs. Pisani. >> I Mrs. Davidson. >> Hi, >> Mrs. Hill. I Mr. Forehand. >> Hi, >> Mr. Bragman
>> I >> passes 5-0. Wonderful. We are now on to the approval of warrants. Warrants are the uh checkbook of the district and there's a total of um 3,415,949,54.
Don't forget the 54 cents. 46 pages. And uh do I have a motion? >> So moved. >> Do I have a second? >> Second. >> Um any other discussion? All those in favor I >> I. >> And we now move on to the acceptance of
donations. Thank you to a very great Thank you. Oh, I love the drum roll. Um, so do I have a motion? >> Do I have a second? I'll second. Great. Uh, discussion. Thank you to a very generous uh
community. All those in favor? >> I >> I >> uh passes 5-0. We are now moving on to the classified personnel report, certificated personnel report, and administrative p personnel report. I'd love to be able to take those all
together and or for a motion to take those all together. Um, Dr. Ree Wright. >> Thank you, Madam President. Yes, tonight the three personnel reports reflect all personnel changes since our last board meeting and we recommend approval as submitted. >> Um, I have I have a motion. Is that your
motion? >> Second. I move. >> He moves. We have a second. All those Any discussion? All those in favor? >> I I >> passes 5-0. We're now moving on to a piece of business for the California
School Boards Association delegate assembly election and um uh Dr. Pver. >> Yes, Madam President. So, this is uh part of your governing a part of your process of being a part of CSBA, your your local delegate assembly. Um and you
can vote for up to seven people. There are eight uh candidates who submitted their nominations to CSBA timely and then there are two who did who did not meet the timeline and so now are being asking other districts to consider them as writing candidates. So there's a
total of 10 and you can vote for up to seven as a block. So I'll let you discuss how you want to. >> We can vote up to for up to seven. Okay. Um, >> and we vote as a board. >> Correct. It's a holistic vote for the
Los Alamos Unified will send in one vote. >> Okay. And the onate >> Well, we can in um We don't do We don't have a motion yet. Um, do I have a motion? >> Do I have a second? >> Second.
>> Discussion. Wait, you're looking quite inquisitive. I'm trying to figure out how we're making a motion if we haven't chosen our candidates. >> Well, don't we have to do that to have a discussion? >> Do we have to make a motion with the seven candidates where we're going to approve? >> I think you'd do that in the discussion.
>> Yeah. Don't we do it in discussion? Yeah. >> Yes. >> Yeah. >> Okay. >> But we have whatever you want. >> Tomato tomato. We we'll get it ironed out once you once you get it all. Okay. >> So, Mrs. D, you'd like to advocate. >> Okay. So, normally I have no clue who
anybody is, but Carrie Buck from Plenty or Belinda and Amory Randall Trio, she's one of the writeins and I'm sure she's a write in because she does a million things and she just didn't get it in on time. They're both on um the Nurcrop RO
the RO board with me. They're incredible advocates for children. They are everywhere and anywhere. Um they're they've helped me so much on the board. I I would follow these women just about anywhere. So that's my >> I would like to agree more or less. Um
Emry is also on this board. So this is a very involved, very caring person. >> Well, I was just going to say that um so I I missed the deadline once and nobody wrote me in. And I think sometimes when
you miss a deadline, you miss a deadline. But um so I but I hear advocacy for her. So >> also just a reminder any name with an asterisk means they are currently on CSBA delegate assembly. >> Yes. >> Miss Hill. Oh good.
>> Yeah. And I know Carrie Buck very well um and would completely um follow her. Um I do believe from what I have um been exposed to um that delegate assembly is doing really good work. I don't hear
about any drama. I just hear about them moving work forward. So, I would say that to me the um the incumbents are doing are doing a good job. >> And that was my my question uh to put out to the team was actually I was in favor of trying to propose voting for
all the incumbents and we would have one leftover that wouldn't that we could add. >> Yeah. So, there's six incumbents and one of the new people is from from a district already represented. So, I I would love to actually have different representation. And we have two from elementary districts. So, I was
wondering if we could add the six incumbents plus either Henry or Art. Um >> Oh, and they're from the same. >> They're they're from the same. So, to have one of the two just so we have an elementary school district to represent. I I don't know either of them to speak to the to their
>> Okay. And do we have to vote for seven? >> You don't. You can choose uh however you want. Obviously, that either can help or hurt uh because what will happen is all the votes will get tabulated from all all the districts. >> Correct. I I don't feel I don't really
like the idea of just throwing a dart on a dart board when I don't know somebody. >> Um where I feel good about the six and even the writing candidate, the six that we have. Any other feedback? >> And also um and Anaheim Union is
gigantic and doesn't have another representative. >> Oh. >> So, so we made a motion to move forward. >> So, now we would go back and we would >> with the six incumbents is the suggestion. >> With the six incumbents and an Marie
>> if we're all in. >> She's one of the six. Yeah. >> So, just to be clear, the six incumbents, Carrie Buck, Carol Crane, Katie Mchuan. >> Oh, yeah. Dina Miller, Barbara Schulman, and Annie uh >> Randall Trio.
>> Yep. >> Okay. >> Okay. So, um I have a motion to move these six candidates forward. Do I need another second, >> Tina? No, we can just vote. >> We can just vote. All those in favor?
>> I opposed. >> Passes 5. Great work. What a great team. Um, okay. Amazing. And now we're moving on to the approval of an agreement of a stipulated
um suspension. And uh me Mr. VP. >> Yes. I move approve approve and I move approval and and an agreement and stipulation to a suspended student expulsion waiver of hearing and appeal
rights. >> Second. Uh, it's not a roll call. All those in favor? >> I opposed. Passes 5-0. >> Thank you. We will now go
into close session. >> Now that you will >> just