Good afternoon, good evening to the, February 12 board meeting. Mister Rickstra, can we have a roll call to establish a quorum? Yes. On the attendance roll call, student director Simmons, student director Vasquez, director Latta? Present. Director Williams? Director Hutchinson? Director Berry? Present. Director Thompson? Present. Vice President Bachelor? Here. President Brohard? Here. Quorum present. And Mr. Seichau, can we have a translation check, please? Yes, President Brohard. Moving to interpretation announcement, we will start with Arabic.
I will lower all attendees hands. Please only raise your hand if you need Arabic interpretation. Ms. Abdi, if you can come off mute and make the interpretation announcement for Arabic please. Okay. Great. Thank you, Ms. Abdi. Check attendees to see if any hands are raised for Arabic interpretation. Ms. Vargas, if you can come off mute and make the interpretation announcement for Spanish, please. Of course. And just a quick question, do we have computers distributed on-site? It's not needed at the moment. There's no? There's none at the moment. Thank you. Okay, perfect. Thank you. Thank you.
The Spanish announcement is done. Great. Thank you, Ms. Vargas. Check attendees to see if any hands, that's raised for Spanish interpretation. Seeing no hands raised, we will now start with Spanish interpretation. That concludes interpretation announcement and we'll check again later in the meeting. Mister Richter? Madam president, the, interpretation announcements have been completed. Thank you. For tonight's meeting, we will have online speaking cards. I'm sorry. On on speaker card registration online speaker card registration, as well as, public speaking from the floor,
and there are cards that people can sign up for, just become the appropriate item on the table. Okay. And we will be, going into closed session. The items to be discussed in closed session are, D1, conference with legal counsel existing litigation, D2, conference with legal counsel existing litigation, D3, conference with legal counsel anticipated litigation, Conference with legal counsel anticipated litigation, d four. D five, public employees performance evaluation, and we will reconvene later after that. Right now, we have, public comment on closed session items.
Do we have any speakers? Madam president, we have one. It's Sheila Haynes, whom I don't see in the room and I do not see on Zoom. No. So there are no public speakers? There are no public commenters other than that. Okay. Thank you. With that, we will reconvene at we'll go into closed session and reconvene at 05:30. No. We don't have questions. Okay. Yeah. Your thoughts together? Hey. Welcome to the regular school board meeting, February twelfth nineteen 02/25. Thank you for joining us, for tonight's school board meeting. I'm going to turn it over to our actually,
at first, I'm gonna take a roll call to establish quorum. Yes. On the roll call to establish quorum. Mister Raichstra, can we have a roll call to establish quorum, please? Yes, madam president. Oh, yes. Yes. On the roll call to establish quorum, student director Simmons? Here. Student director Vasquez? Here. Director Latta? Present. Director Williams? Present, sir. Director Hutchinson? Present. Director Berry? Present. Director Thompson? Present. Vice president Bachelor? Here. And president Brohart? Here. Quorum present.
Thank you. I will now turn it over to mister Seichow to for a translation check, please. Yes. Moving to interpretation announcement. For tonight's meeting, we have two languages languages for live interpretation. They are Arabic and Spanish. For in person, we have laptops in the back of the room for interpretation. There is also translation closed caption feature available on Zoom that you can use by clicking the closed caption if you can come off mute and make the interpretation announcement for Arabic, please. Thank you, miss Soleil. So I do see two hands that that are raised.
So we will start with Arabic interpretation. We'll next go to Spanish. I will lower all attendees hands. Again, please do raise your hand if you need Spanish interpretation. Ms. Walker Marquez, if you can come off mute and make the interpretation announcement for Spanish, please. Yes, of course. Spanish. Spanish announcement is done. Great. Thank you, miss Walker Marquez. Ching attendees, this evening, hands are raised for Spanish interpretation. I seeing hands raised, we will also start Spanish interpretation. So we will activate Arabic and Spanish interpretation, and that include interpretation announcement,
and we'll check-in later in the meeting. Mr. Rick Shaw, turn to you. Madam President, the interpretation announcements, availability has been completed. Thank you. Before we begin, I'd like to emphasize the importance of respectful decorum, communication, and engagement at our Board and committee meetings. The work of the Board is serious business and impacts the everyday experiences of our students, staff, families, and broader community. It is critical that all of us, both up here on the dais and in the audience, model the respectful interactions that we would like to see our students have in their
classrooms, on the play yard, and in athletic competitions. As we open tonight's meeting, I urge everyone present and planning to attend to review and abide by the Board of Education protocols and meeting rules of engagement listed on pages eight and nine of tonight's agenda. We will address disruptions consistent with board policy and state law. Per board policy and government code, the board shall not permit any disturbance or willful interruption of board meetings. Persistent disruption by an individual or group shall be grounds for the termination of an
individual's privilege of addressing the board. Persistent disruption includes interrupting other members of the public when they are addressing the board at the podium. When there is persistent disruptive behavior by an individual or a group, the individual or group will be asked to discontinue the disruptive behavior, told that if the disruptive behavior persists, they will be asked to leave the meeting, and finally, if an individual refuses to leave upon request, they may be escorted from the room. Again, our goal is to conduct our meetings without taking these measures.
We appreciate all of you for honoring and our community norms of respect and decorum. The decorum safety and security of our meetings is the collective responsibility of all of us, and I am grateful for our shared commitment to ensuring that our meetings bring us closer to achieving our district's mission and vision. Meeting rules of engagement for board members, up to three minutes speaking limit for board members, no mingling with the audience, address comments to other board members, focus on agenda items, don't repeat what's been said,
and be respectful. No interruptions, enforce the norms, and model desired behavior. At tonight's meeting, there are several allotted times where you may make public comments, provided you pre register to speak online before the meeting started or if you fill out a comment card, which you can find on the table by the entrance, you can submit those cards at any time. There are the the times for public comment are closed session items completed earlier. Special orders of the day. I'm sorry. This is the agenda. The district's fiscal year of 02/2005, first interim negative certification,
fiscal intervention plan. All non agenda items with the subject matter jurisdiction of the district, adoption of the general consent report, adoption of the general consent report facilities, student board members' report, public hearing, sunshine and the OEA association via Oakland Education Association initial proposals to OUSD, collective bargaining, successor contract effective 07/01/2025, unfinished business, 02/2025, Oakland Unified School District California legislative platform, services agreement 02/2025 ignite reading,
services agreement 02/2025, Oakland Public Education Fund, Frick United Academy of Language, New business, three items. Application for provisional internship permit, California Commission on Teacher Credentialing. Application for variable term program waiver, see best and be glad. Amendment board bylaw ninety one thirty, board committees. The superintendent's report. I think there's oh, okay. Please be aware that in compliance with the Brown Act, board members may not respond to comments regarding issues that are not on our posted agenda for tonight. I ask all speakers to keep their comments to the scope of the item,
and if a speaker speaks to a different item, the chair will need to ask that the speaker either speak to the specific item or hold their comments until the appropriate public comment period. I would ask that my fellow board members help and support me in this regard. If you don't get a chance to speak during public comment, I want to encourage you to use the e comments feature via the legislative information center on the OUSD website. And of course, you can always email board members directly using this format, firstname.lastname@ousd.org. Report out of closed session February 12.
On item d one, number 25 dash 0202, conference with legal counsel existing litigation, the board approved a settlement in this matter with a vote of six zero, with, director Hutchinson absent. D two on number two five dash two zero zero two zero three, conference with legal counsel existing litigation. The board approved a settlement in this matter, with a vote of six zero with, Director Hutchinson absent. On item d three, number 25 dash zero three nine eight, conference with legal counsel anticipated litigation,
the board discussed this matter. On d four, number two five dash zero three nine nine, conference with legal counsel anticipated litigation, the board discussed this matter. Public employees' performance evaluation matters, on item d five, number two five four dash one nine two seven, public employee performance evaluation, superintendent of schools, the board discussed this matter. And this is the end of the, closed session report. Are there any modifications to the agenda? Director Hutchinson. Yes. Thank you. I'd like to pull L51,
25Dash0401 from the consent report. Can you read that number too forward? So L5125Dash0401. Thank you. Director Williams. Thank you, president Brohart. I'd like to pull L18, L 20 3, L 30 3, l 33, l 34, l 35, l 36, and l 44 has to do with spending. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. I would like to,
in the interest of I'm sorry. I would like to make some, modifications to the agenda. I would like to move agenda item n, the student report, after item I, which is the special orders of the day. I would like to move item o, the PSAC report, to follow, item n. And I would like to move item p, which is the, comments from our union, our labor partners, after the PSAC report item o, and then continue with public comments after that. Yeah. Alright. At this time, I would also like to pull item. Sorry,
it's taking a minute here, item w three. I'd like to pull that from the agenda. It needs some further work. But you classify that as a withdrawal? Yeah. Are there any other items to be pulled? Student directors? Alright. At this time, Alright. At this time, I'd like to go on to item I1, which is the district's fiscal year twenty twenty four-twenty five first interim negative certification, 12/11/2024, fiscal intervention plan by Alameda County Superintendent Of Schools, Elise Castro. At the first interim,
the district self certified negative, and the county confirmed that negative certification. This triggered intervention from the county superintendent, Elise Castro, who will discuss her proposed intervention plan for the board's implementation of the three r's. As we listen to this presentation, it is important to keep in mind that although we are still in receivership and the Alameda County Office Of Education And Trustee hold decision making authority over our budget, the OUSD board ultimately has the final say of any budget adjustments and how the three r's are implemented. In considering this plan tonight,
we must remember two key points. First, our students deserve a quality education that prepares them for career, college, and community readiness when they graduate from OUSD schools. Second, it is the board's responsibility to ensure not only that our students receive this quality education, but that we can also afford to provide it. To make the best decisions for our students, we must listen to the voices of our community, our students, educators, staff, and families. Their perspectives are crucial as we navigate this challenging financial situation and work to secure
a better future for our students, for every student. Thank you. Superintendent Casper? Is this okay. We got it. Thank you. Good evening, colleagues, And, thank you for, teeing that up, president Brohard. And I know we'd all rather talk about kids stuff all the time, but the bottom line is we don't get those glamorous jobs. The board's forced responsibility is managing the district's finances and to ensure that the district can meet its financial obligations, to set a vision, to ensure resources are aligned to it, and to hire a superintendent to make it happen.
Because of the negative certification, the county superintendent must take action. Must. I love y'all, and I believe in your leadership. I believe in this board. But the fact that I am here at this podium having this conversation is a sign that we have blown through the early warnings and have activated the legal fail safe. The fail safe is in the law, and there's a lot of words in the law, but you can read out the key sentence, which is that if the school district has a negative certification,
the county superintendent of schools shall take all actions that are necessary to ensure that the school district meets its financial obligations. Now the law, the ed code envisions that the county superintendent can take action on a short continuum from actions that are totally directive, totally taking over, to more collaborative. So on one end of the spectrum is imposing a budget and overriding board actions. The other end of the spectrum is more collaborative, developing budgets and plans in consultation with the board,
with the board making the lead decisions. The law does not envision that any of us will allow the district to fall into insolvency. Inaction is not one of our choices. California legislature provides over half a billion dollars to you OUSD, and and it has designed an education system where boards and superintendents need to work in partnership to operate a school district. They've also assigned the county superintendent to act as a check and balance or a fail safe for that partnership.
And I take that incredibly seriously. To borrow a phrase from Luz, who is the most equity oriented, the most actively anti racist CBO I have ever known or had the pleasure of working with, I believe in the democracy in which I live. That means that I take your elected authority very seriously, and I take my elected authority very seriously. And like everyone in this room, I am waking up every morning in a country where our fail safes are failing and where government officials whose job it is to act on checks and balances on
other parts of the system are laying down on the job. And I'm not gonna do that, and you're not gonna do that. Because like yourselves, we were elected by the people of this community to safeguard the interests of our children, and it's our vulnerable kids and our vulnerable families and our vulnerable staff who most need us to make an effective and equitable public school system. Because we have fascists and racists literally coming for our kids, literally coming to deport them and to scare them out of schools and out of our communities, And a school system that truly guarantees safe and supportive and effective learning environments is
life saving. It can't fail. And I know you believe that. I know you believe that too. And while this board and this superintendent and this superintendent might not always agree on what the best path is to a particular mess or how a particular mess got so messy, we are rock solid. We collectively are rock solid on being committed to making the most equitable and the most inclusive and the most anti racist and most protective school system for the kids of Oakland. We are values aligned.
That that is a thing I know in my heart, is that each and every one of you is values aligned. And those values matter because the law places a heavy burden on us to take all actions necessary to ensure that the school district can meet its financial obligations. And because I know we have those rock solid values, I can ask myself the question of not how can I take control in this situation, but how can I support this board to embody the shared values that I know
from conversation with every one of you, you have and you hold and you want to be what's guiding your leadership? Which brings us to the question that's hanging on the screen, is that the law requires us to act to ensure that the district can meet its fiscal obligations. But I believe, and I believe that you believe, that we can't separate our fiscal obligations from our educational obligations. So when I ask myself what would actually help this board in this moment to act on the values that we share, the answer is pretty clear. It's simply to help the board to have a conversation,
not just about what do we cut, what do we cut, what do we cut, because we are all tired of that conversation. Here we are exhausted by that conversation. But to have truly reenvision what we want to invest in for our students, and, yes, there will be cutting things, because one thing we all agree on is this system is not efficient. But we can cut towards things. We can cut towards our vision. And I think we've gotten ourselves into a lot of trouble decoupling the conversation about the bottom line from the bottom line of the the bottom line of the budget from the bottom line of teaching and learning.
And that's a lose lose cycle of perpetual fiscal distress, which breeds mistrust, which leads to deferred decision making and continued risk to local control. And I believe that if we change the conversation so the board is engaging deeply with each other and with the community to couple decisions for your vision for our kids in classrooms with decisions about how we resource them, you will be able to make tough but values based decisions. We've been talking about OUSD being at a fork in the road for a while. On one path, we got fiscal stability,
the exiting receivership, the regaining full local control. But with the negative certification, we just passed the fork, and now we're on the other path, which down runs downhill away from local control. But there is still a way. We are in serious Mount Everest territory here. It is a narrow, tortuous path up Mount Everest to get back to the other path. But people do some at Mount Everest. No one would say it is easy. The weather matters, the timing matters, the team matters, and you cannot be distracted from the path. But that's where we are.
That's where we are. This clicker has deserted me. K. I mean, the background, I think we all know it. That a proper history of OUSDE stretches back a century and stops at landmarks like redlining and state takeover. And all of that matters because it's part of the complex web of success and failure that got us here today. But if we narrow in on this moment, we have a negative certification at first interim that leads to a very narrow window of action for the board to take towards a sustainable long term plan by June
of twenty twenty five. And, you know, people ask me, and I'm sure they ask you, why is this such a big deal? What's a big deal about a negative certification? And, like, OUSD has had a reputation for being broke for so long that maybe that has lost its power to compel our attention. But a negative certification is a big deal because it means that the district is spending a lot more money every month than it's taking in, and a cash crisis means would mean there's no money to write paychecks.
That triggers an emergency loan. It would set the district up for loss of local control. And as the person whose signature is on the paycheck of every school employee in this country, I feel of every in this county, I feel really responsible to not let that happen, and I know you do too. This is the path we're on, and it feels really familiar to most of us because we've exactly. We say it every year. One more year to have scraping by to balance the budget,
repeating over and over, living paycheck to paycheck. Nobody believes it's good for kids. Nobody believes it's good for staff, but we haven't been able to break the cycle. We've been living paycheck to paycheck for many years, and now we're past paycheck to paycheck. It's like we're living on a payday loan. And one of the things I hear all the time is you always say it's a crisis and it never comes. But that depends on how you define crisis. Every time big decisions are deferred and staff has to come up with some way to balance the budget, it breaks a little bit of the infrastructure of the whole district.
It stretches things a little further. And every time we we have a conversation about budget balancing and not about teaching and learning, it stretches the tension a little further. And neither the county superintendent nor the state will truly let it come to a payroll crisis, but we are living in another crisis. We are living in a crisis of limited learning opportunities, a crisis of staffing, a crisis of trust. Those are not manufactured crises. Those are the conditions of this board's work. But you knew that. You we knew the job was dangerous when we took it.
This is what we signed up for, and this board is on a path. It's a steep, narrow path over the hill. This board calls it the three r's, and significant steps have been taken. Y'all did intensive work on restructuring this fall, and you made some important votes in December. And I know we'd all rather sit down and rest and think and learn more before we keep moving forward and I would like to do that too. But June ends the narrow window for this Board to complete the three R's reenvision,
redesign and restructuring process and I am among those of us who believe that the best path forward is for this board to lead those reenvisioning decisions. I truly believe that this is OUSD's moment. This is the team. This is the board. This is the path. This is going to be the day that the corner is turned because we do have an opportunity. OUSD does have the resources to create exceptional schools in every community, but only by making strategic choices today,
by aligning investments and fully funding and fully staffing our priorities. The path is steep, but it isn't actually complicated. We all know that our current service system isn't serving all of our students equitably. We know that this board and this community want to re envision what's possible. So that's all we're gonna do here is support to create the space and structures for this board to have the conversations it wants to have, not just about what we have to cut, but what we wanna commit to. To be clear about what promises we're gonna prioritize as we line up resources behind
them. My action here is not to impose a plan or a set of priorities, but just to lean in, bring a team to support the board's own decision making within the structure of the board's own plan, which is the three r's. Is this how we do business? So this board has a plan. The OUSC board has a plan. The three r's. In July, by unanimous vote of all the members present, the Board identified a shared need to engage in comprehensive re envisioning, redesign,
and restructuring during the 2425 school year and made a plan to do it. Plan has three parts, each with a different structure. Redesign and restructure work are being led in the typical way that a board and a superintendent work together, with the board directing the staff to act. But the redesign component, the re envision component, was structured differently. It was restructured differently by design for the Board to lead that work. And a board is seven individuals who can't talk to each other outside of a Brown active meeting. Leading work requires a team to support that work.
And so that's where we are. The reenvision component is structured I'm gonna read it. The reenvision component says that the school board, not the superintendent, will lead a citywide reenvisioning process in in 2425 to provide recommendations for OUSD's future footprint by June of twenty twenty five. That's the board's plan. I believe it's the right plan for this board to lead a true reenvisioning process that connects and leads to recommendations for OUSD's future footprint by June of twenty five, articulating clear values based priorities and using those to drive footprint and other resource decisions.
So it needs a team, and that's what we're gonna do. This is the the extent of the action plan is to replace the words with the support of the superintendent and staff to add really should be in addition to the superintendent staff. We're adding a whole advisory team of other folks who can help make that happen. And I think it needs a team because given the very real complexities of the Oakland context, it takes a lot of skills. It takes a lot of people to get the data, to facilitate the conversations,
to assemble them, and to let the board show up as learners and leaders the way that you want to do. So that's our plan to, provide the board to support its own reenvisioning process. Over the next couple of months, we're part this board we have partnered with this board, and this board is full of teachers, which is an amazing asset to have. A board full of teachers and community leaders that has powerful leadership to support in
engaging in a series of board workshops and community conversations about what priorities you want to see in a re envisioned OUSD so that when you get to June of twenty twenty five, you have recommendations for OUSD's future footprint based on a vision. Your community has put your faith in you. I'm putting my faith in you. I know that you can do this, and I know you want to do it. I had conversations with every one of you. But we're stuck in the status quo. We are stuck in the status quo of a system that is holding us back from making sure that our most vulnerable
kids get what they need. You we all know because we're living it that we are running too many schools to see them fully staffed. We have too many schools staffed by underprepared, under supported teachers with no seasoned colleagues to mentor them on their campus. We run too many buildings to maintain them all, so we put millions each year for what could be dollars into learning into stopping leaking. We stretch our resources so thin that it's killing us. Teachers are exhausted. Families are disappointed. Kids we care deeply about aren't getting what they need,
and nobody wants this. Nobody loves the status quo, but we're all scared to change it. And I know I'm speechifying, but I've been doing a lot of reflecting lately on the connection between the word scared and the word scarcity. The hate we are seeing coming out of our national government right now is rooted in scarcity. It's a narrative of a zero sum game based on the idea that we don't have enough for everyone and that caring for some means taking from others. Scarcity thinking produces fear.
Scarcity thinking feeds fear. And the myth of scarcity is incredibly dangerous. Even right here where I'm really confident that not only do we believe that diversity, equity, and inclusion are good things that we fight for, and where I know we are actively seeking how to make the most anti racist educational system we can find, and where I'm pretty sure I would have good company if I was to get arrested blocking some school doors to prevent uniform thugs from taking away our babies, even when our value where our values are rock solid and our values are rock
solid, we have been infected by scarcity thinking. And if we're gonna have a different conversation about what's possible for our babies, we need to ground it in getting away from the myth of scarcity. So everywhere I talk go, I hear people talking about Oakland being so broke. And it is true that we are consistently spending more money than we bring in, but we are not the broke of someone with no income. We are the broke of someone who spends more than we take in. When I started teaching, California was at the very bottom of this graph,
which was appalling. One of the most expensive states, one of the wealthiest states, spending the very least on public education. But over the course of the last few years, especially the pandemic years, California has really reinvested. It's not enough. We should be at the tip top. We should be right up there with New York and DC because it's just as expensive to live here, if not more, and our kids have just as big a resource, just as big a need. But this is California's reality that our scarcity story has shifted. But it's also really important that we recognize this is not actually just this is
not Oakland's reality. Oakland's reality is that Oakland's per pupil per pupil spending is above New York, above DC, Dollars Twenty Eight Thousand per kid this year. After the cuts, after the end of the pandemic money, 25,000, over $25,000 per year. If we could gild every one of our babies and every one of our buildings, it still wouldn't be enough. But this is a lot. We can move from scarcity thinking to thinking about what we want for kids because
we have real money to work with. Here in California, these are the 50 largest school districts in California. These are our peers, the other big urbans. And here in California, Oakland Unified, twenty five thousand dollars over $25,000 per pupil. This is Oakland's story. We have resources. We have assets. We have opportunities. We have a board that cares and values what happens for our the kids who need it most. And not one of us is happy with the status quo,
but we have resources to change it. We have an opportunity to change it, and we have an obligation to change it because the status quo is not living into our equity values. So in this moment, being a system leader means reckoning with competing definitions of equity. We gotta go deep. It means shouldering the responsibility and the possibility of designing the most anti racist education system we can make today. Yeah. Sometimes when people from other places ask me, what happened in Oakland? Hasn't it been, like, twenty years? I breathe it in,
and I ask, do you know about redlining? Because that's where this story starts. Physical schools are inevitably rooted in physical place, and an Oakland place was designed to embody unequal opportunity. And we all know this. And every attempt to untangle that, to bend the arc of geography towards justice, has created its own set of opportunities and unintended consequences and its own winners and its own losers and its own passionate constituents and its own disenfranchised cynics. And that so what I mean when I say competing definitions of equity,
maybe I should say competing strategies for equity, because that's the work of the board, Is that when we have conversations about small schools or charters or neighborhood schools or choice schools, that's the board's opportunity to have real conversations about our equity strategy and about how we link these resources to keeping promises to our kids. Real change means restructuring for the future, not just preserving the past when we know the past isn't getting where we want to go.
You have the power to break this crisis of trust. You have the power to break through it. But we don't when we don't trust each other, we have conversations about how we can't fix our schools until we fix our bureaucracy. We can't fix our bureaucracy until we fix our schools. We can't do this until we do this. We can't do that. There's no path forward because every path is blocked. In schools, in a faculty meeting, we call that adult business. That's adult business getting in the way of doing kid business. I trust you.
You got this. But it's not easy. It's not simple. If it was easy, I could have hired some appointed some retired superintendent to come in and just say do this, do this, do this, and go away. That's what the law envisions, really. But I don't think that's the right thing. I think the right thing to do is to help you get where I know you wanna go. And anybody who thinks that a problem around here is simple enough to be solved by one person I don't think anybody believes that. Nobody has the hubris to believe that Oakland doesn't need a team. So
brought a team, and I wanna introduce you to a few people in the team, but mostly you know them because no point in bringing in strangers to some place complicated. I'm part of your team. Luz is part of your team. Carmela's part of your team. Richard's part of your team. James is part of your team. Derek's part of your team? I can't see quite that far. I'm gonna introduce them. They're right here. Yes. Come up. So values matter. You've all known Luz for years. I'm not sure if you've ever had a conversation with her about values.
I don't know. I introduce you to Luis Casarez who has for many years been the fiscal oversight trustee for Oakland Unified. Hello, everyone. I've had the pleasure of working with most of you pretty closely. I thoroughly enjoy U. S. Thought partners doing the nudging and pushing that we need to do to get the work done. I want to just share a couple of things that really matter to me. One, I believe that my place in this world, my why,
is eliminating the racial predictability of success in our school systems. Systems. That's my why. That's why I do the work that I do. The how takes different forms, and one of those is the honor and privilege of supporting you as leaders in exiting receivership. I have said to you, I have written to you, telling you that no one wants you to exit receivership more than I do, and I mean it. I want you to exit receivership.
This position as trustee should not exist. You are the elected leaders, and I'm here to support you in doing the work that you need to exit receivership. I'd also like you to introduce you to Richard Barrera. Richard, I think you're probably doing this gonna do this better yourself. Well, I I'll just say, the one thing that felt like it was missing from all the folks you were already working with was an experienced urban board member. An experienced urban board member who was bringing that perspective and the experience of leading
a community through many very similar challenging conversations and I'm really grateful to Richard for joining us. Thank you, Elise. President Beaulard, director, superintendent, honored to be here before you tonight. I work for the California Department of Education. I'm the senior policy advisor to state superintendent Tony Thurman. Just wanna start by being clear about that because I think it's important. We're here to work with the county team, but mostly we're here to work with you,
the elected board of the Oakland Unified School District. And superintendent Thurman wants to make sure that we can be as helpful as we can to you, the board. That's that's why we're here tonight. That's why I'm here. Supernuddin Thurman thought that, I may be able to provide some support to you on the board because I'm in my seventeenth year as an elected trustee of the San Diego Unified School Board. And we
have a story that I think may be helpful, as you go through this this process. So I was elected in 02/2008 in San Diego right as the recession hit. And that was the worst, budget cuts in the history of California, in the history of our district. Overnight, I think it was my first board meeting, the superintendent came to us and said, you have to make $50,000,000 of cuts, not for next year, for this year, mid year. Our district,
to be honest with you, when we were elected, had been in an environment for over a decade where, again, I will be upfront, a group, a small group, frankly, of corporate leaders in San Diego decided that they have the best answers for the schools, and they impose an arrogant, top down, austere, vision on the school district with an argument that that somehow was gonna improve student outcomes. They didn't listen to the educators. They didn't listen to the parents.
They didn't listen to the community, and in fact, were often hostile to educators and parents and the community. And so when we entered as a pro educator, pro parent, pro community board. Our community was in a place where, we were not in it we we did not have a good foundation to deal with these budget cuts that were coming as a result of the recession. And we had a lot of people that were trying to tell us what we
needed to do. You've gotta, slash the people who work with our kids, both in terms of positions, but also in terms of salaries, in terms of benefits. You've got to acknowledge or accept that the schools and communities so the the part of the school district that I represent, I represent most of the first generation immigrant communities in San Diego, But our school district had for years been sending a message to parents in in our communities that if you wanted your kids to have a good education,
you need to put them on a bus and take them across town, because you weren't gonna get a good education at your neighborhood school. And that was a, a mentality that had been enforced for over a decade. And what we knew we had to do as a board is we had to stay strong and stick to our values, the reason that we ran, the arguments that we made to the voters when we were saying we want you to elect us,
and we had to say stay strong with our partnership, with our educators, with our parents, with our community leaders. That was how we were gonna find our way through those difficult years, and we had to always be thinking about I appreciate president, Brevard, the way that you talked about this from the beginning, which is where are we gonna be next year? Where are we gonna be three years from now? Where are we gonna be five years from now? Are we gonna get through this in a way that divides our community,
or are we gonna get through this in a way that together, we can create a vision for our students? And by sticking together through that process, we got ourselves through the budget crisis, but more importantly, we got to a vision of investing in our neighborhood schools. Voters in our district, in the time that I've been on the board, have passed four bond measures. We have an 11 and a half billion dollar bond program that voters have agreed, to invest in, and that's investment in our neighborhood schools.
Neighborhood schools that were being hollowed out and parents were choosing their kids out of the neighborhood now have waiting lists because we've got dual immersion programs. We've got arts and music. We've got steam programs. We've got the physical facilities that we can be proud of. That could only have happened if we had approached the budget crisis in a way that was bringing ourselves together with our educators and parents and community leaders.
So our story is, yes, it's possible to get through very difficult situations. But it's not just possible to get through difficult situations, It's possible to build a powerful alliance that's willing to take on people who are trying to tell you what you need to do and to say we are the elected board members here. We are the people who reflect our community's values. We're gonna manage through this process in a way that demonstrates our community values,
and we're gonna come out of this in a way that actually sees our students thriving. We we in our district, we've never been, all about test scores. We don't think that that's the bottom line way to measure, whether a young person is being prepared for their future. But I will tell you this, we have the best test scores of any large urban district in this country. In the last, NAEP, scores that just came out, San Diego Unified ranks number one among all large urban districts in this country.
In reading, we rank second in math, and we're not a test score district. What we are is a pro educator district, a pro family district, a pro community district. And because we believe in that and because that's the way that we govern our govern our district, we get to building confidence in the communities. The community is willing to invest in our schools, and our student outcomes are strong because of it. So to the extent that our story can be helpful to your story,
we're here to help, and we're here to support you in any way that we can. So I think everybody's had a chance to take a look at it. Simple very simple plan, some structured opportunities for the board to engage with itself, for the board to engage with community, to identify some priorities, and turn that into a footprint and a change management plan. I really appreciate, the suggestion of board leadership to create more opportunities for,
for the board to talk to itself, to board to talk to each other by repurposing some committee meetings into committee of the whole meetings, and that's coming up in February and March. So some opportunities there. We'll be we'll be looking forward to seeing the board adopt a plan based in some values. We're providing support, Richard's support to help the Board with its thinking and inspiration, some support professional facilitation to help engage community members in a constructive process that leads
to results and identifying priorities from many voices, some communication support to do the outreach, and some staff support to help add capacity for all of the technical, secretarial, and business, and data pulls that you need to make it happen. That's it. This is us. We're here to support you, and most of us, We believe. I believe this board is ready, willing, and able to reenvision and redefine how you achieve equitable outcomes for students, and I'm really glad to partner with you to do it.
Thank you. Stay here. At this time, we'll take, public comments. Are there any public comments? Yes, madam president. We have 15 speakers signed up for this item. How much time would you like to allot for public comment? We allotted ten minutes for it. I think we should allot, if the board doesn't mind to allow, a longer time for public comment. I'm gonna give people a minute and a half. Two minutes. We'll do two minutes. It's gonna give us it'll double it. Okay. First five speakers we have is Oliver Brennan,
Avi Ringer, Zach Struick, Myra Alvarado, and Nick Oh. Good evening, board. Wow. That was some lecture. I just wanna say we are OUSD. Elise Castro is not OUSD. Richard Barrera is not OUSD. They are the county and the state. You are our elected board, and you have to make tough decisions in one week to take control of our finances. You've been working hard for months towards adjusting our budget, yet tonight you're considering suspending the budget and finance committee.
If you fail and the county and state take control, we will be facing potentially much more severe cuts. We elected you to do that work for us. Please get it done. We're not broke. In fact, we would be further along on the three hour process if it was not for the huge distraction last year when the former president of the board and the county tried to introduce a list of schools to be closed in the fall. It set us back four months. So you have said what you're gonna do, and you're in the middle of the process of doing it and you have the
power. Don't let anybody else tell you what to do. Thank you. Zach Strike. I'm a parent of the district. President Broward, you were elected on a platform and with the message of of no school closures. And, then this you and this board, directed staff to, go and make a plan to hit the number to find reductions, and the staff painstakingly, tortuously went through and gave a bunch of options to hit that number. And I don't understand why we're not talking about that. I don't understand why we agendized what the lecture we just had,
the scolding, instead of talking about the options that we have that that you have is the is the message that that you, this board, is unable to make these decisions, that the expertise, that the the the knowledge, that the staff has about the specifics of all the things in the district, that that the board that the sorry. These outsiders are gonna parachute in and have a better answer than than staff. I I I can't imagine it. I we have what? Ten days to to come up with a plan, which will unfortunately, and I think lead to some layoffs so that to hit all the timelines so
that the unions can know and all these things. And I don't know why that's not being talked about here today. Thank you. Hi there, Avi Ringer, another pair in the district. I wanna just start out by thanking all of you. I know this is is really hard work and I I really believe you are all truly dedicated to the students in this district. I wanna thank Superintendent Castro, two and your team, that presentation was one of the first things that really gave me hope, in many nights of coming to these meetings that we may actually be able to move forward with a true re envisioning that will allow us to move sustainably into
the future. I want to talk about just one specific ask, that maybe could be added to what's going on, which is, just a process matter, and it just deals with the, sharing of information with the public. I come to a lot of these meetings and I'm struck by the fact that a lot of people, don't have, are not sharing the same information, let's just say that. And, you know, I don't I don't blame the the people for not having the right information. When I first came here, it was very hard to understand how to get the information. You know some of these things I'm talking about are extreme like the idea of having a couple hundred million dollar emergency fund that's somehow not being accessed and I
don't I don't know but some of the things are a lot simpler. Just simply the idea that you know, agenda items are published seventy two hours in advance, and and the attachments are made available. I I didn't I didn't know that for many, many weeks of coming here. The the dashboards that the district has published through the chief business officer's office have been enormously helpful, but at the meeting just last week Director Hutchinson you called attention to those, it seemed like many people were not aware of those dashboards. I think know, there's gonna be an issue of legitimacy and there are a lot a lot of
people that are gonna be upset with any decisions that are gonna be made. If we're not all sharing in the same information, then how would how is that lit legitimacy gonna be there? I'm struck by the fact there's no public information officer from the board, you know, within the district there's a communications office but it doesn't seem to be effective in communicating information that we can all use to agree on. I hope that we could build that. Thank you. Good evening, board, superintendent, and members of the community. My name is Mara Alvarado, and I'm a second grade teacher at Garfield Elementary School. I wanted to speak directly to the issue of,
centralizing STIPs of instead of allowing sites to have them, as a budget solution to that you all are considering, and just the impact that that has on, at schools, at sites on a day to day basis. SIP subs support with coverage for IEPs, which many of our students have IEPs at Garfield, covering emergency absences when nobody else picks up the job. At a site like mine, with a high level of trauma within our school community and with our students, consistency is key. Our students love our stiff subs because they know them.
They provide that consistency and that consistent face that they know that if I have to go to an IEP meeting, they're doing great with mister Hardy. At my site, we also have a high percentage of English language learners. Our SIFS supports with the inequities that ELPAC testing has addressing the equity issue that isn't felt by other schools that has that have to test ELPAC students, but don't have a high concentration like we do. Our staff support us with that. They also cover for teachers when we receive our weekly coaching sessions with the TSA.
That is an amazing thing that I have not had at a site yet, but they they support us with that. So in response to superintendent Elise Castro's comment about teachers being underprepared or overworked, getting rid of positions, getting rid of the people who work at these sites and support our admin, support our teachers and our educators is not gonna fix that problem. It'll just exacerbate it. So think about that and think about the sites when you're thinking about your budget solutions. Thank you. Good evening, Gordon, superintendent,
and everybody here who made it tonight. I wanna welcome, of course, all the community, our district community here. So president Castro, especially your presence here is important tonight to hear from the community and the board. I speak as a teacher, RSP teacher at McClimans High School. This is my fourth year now. Been teaching for about over ten years. And I'm also a former trustee of the high school district representing Daly City Pacific of Brisbane, Rob Marancoma, served two terms eight years, seen a lot of audited projections and audit actuals, I understand how the budget works.
Also behind me there are hundreds of people or dozens of people across the district who are also familiar with how budgets work. Whether they work in education or not we also know that budgets are serious like our state budget. We also know that our state budget was projected to be low, to be a deficit, however, is one of the largest state budgets in history for state of California. We're the fifth largest economy on planet Earth and the plan for education for governor Newsom is that they're gonna be a larger investment in education, maybe the largest ever. We know that numbers don't lie. We know that the advising of our CFOs and CBOs are always gonna lean backwards
in times like these and any times. But we also know that the conversations and narrative surrounding Oakland has always done injustice to our community here. Anybody in Berry knows that, sports teams, all these things, always leaning back so the role of a board here and our county and the role of the state of California is to understand that the narratives coming out of this district are going to impact districts across our area and state as district after district are beginning to say they are going to be in a position of state receivership. So I hear the worry, Superintendent Castro, but I'm going to tell you we got this.
Look behind you. Go ahead. Because there are people here, we're the network, this is your advisory council, and I would advise the board to take that into consideration moving forward. These conversations go way beyond these board meetings, and we are here to support, because if anybody's gonna find a solution, it's gonna be open and we can do together. Thank you. Madam president, next five speakers are James Barbuto, Chris Jackson, Michael Shane, Yuri Valenza, and Cynthia Molina. Can I start? Okay. Hi. Sorry. I'll just pull this up. My name is Jimmy Barbuto.
I am a proud teacher of newcomers at Skyline, a District 7 resident and a voter in District 7 and a member of the OUSD OEA joint newcomer committee. I am proud to work at a sanctuary district, as a grandson of refugees who fled fascism and Nazi occupation. My my my refugee grandparents, though, would be disappointed to hear anyone invoking the real fears our communities feel right now to justify school closures or cuts.
We are better than that. We are all better than that. So I know we know better and we can do better. That's all I'll say. I speak tonight to employ employ the district to keep cuts away from our newcomer students and families and the workers in programs who support them and educate them. OUSD newcomer and immigrant community students are watching to see if we put our values into action by maintaining both the funding, staffing, and programs during these challenging times.
These are what our sanctuary actually is, not the resolution passed by this board, which it bravely did in 02/2016. Please fund the sanctuary and keep the cuts away from the sanctuary. We can do better and we cannot wait. Good evening. I'm Sayuri Valenza, and I'm a I teach at Bret Hart Middle School. I teach the moderate self contained program. So a few years ago when there was a threat of school closures, the, committee community advisory committee for special education called on the board to protect students with
disabilities by rescinding the school closures. I'm going to read a statement of support from that time, that really, I think, captures why we cannot afford to close schools and what is the true cost of closing schools. So this is an example of what I mean when I talk about the death spiral of school closure. These schools slated for closure because they are underenrolled, which is itself a result of underinvestment that just leads to more underinvestment. Schools with empty space often wind up with more special education classes.
So closing them doesn't just disproportionately impact black and brown kids, but also kids with special needs because we have concentrated them in schools where we don't invest. My school right now, 25% of our students have IEPs. As policymakers, we are responsible for disproportionate outcomes regardless of intent. This was Elise Castro in support of the Community Advisory Committee, and so I just wanted to remind her of her values,
and values do matter, and so please think about the true cost of school closures. Thank you board, thank you presenters. I'm Cynthia Molina. I support the district advisory committees of Oakland Unified. And there was a lot of talk of sacred responsibility, and I will speak to my sacred responsibility, which is to support district committee leaders in understanding our budget challenge and our district challenges. And I personally understand our budget challenge, but in doing so, in understanding that challenge, many of us have embraced the direction that we must fund our ongoing costs and
programs with ongoing dollars. That's been the consistent message. Yet there's a bar graph here that list OUSD as having the largest per pupil spending that does not distinguish between our ongoing dollars and the dollars that we cannot use to balance our budget. And my question is how does this information clarify our local challenge? And I'm wondering if the team support will include a focus on clearly explaining to stakeholders and committee leaders our challenge and on engaging them. And these committees have approached both board,
leaders and county leaders very early in the process asking for that support. And now the pace does not allow for it. So I'm I'm really making an appeal for not leaving our stakeholders and our committee leaders behind. Good evening. My name is Chris Jackson. I'm a special education teacher at Fremont High School, and I'm a proud native Oaklander. And my mama came here from Pine Bluff, Arkansas because she sought a better life, and she wanted the opportunities that Oakland could give her. And so for somebody to come up here and say that Oakland's broke,
I take great offense to that because we're rich in our spirit, we're rich in our culture, and I'm not gonna have anybody come up to my public school board and call us broke. We got pride. When we talk about what we need, our focus needs to be on building our enrollment, bringing our students back to Oakland Unified. And cutting supports for students only drives our families further and further away. I teach at Fremont High School, which also has a rich culture and a rich history,
but we're facing over $700,000 in cuts. These cuts will limit our learning opportunities. It will limit the future for our kids. The fact is we need to make sure that our school board has the power, that our school board feels empowered to make the decisions because they're the ones that are in our communities. They're the ones that answer to our communities. And so what I will say, folks, remember, y'all are elected. It's y'all power. Do not allow other folks to tell you what to do.
You do what's right, and you do what's right for the community because we're all all of our babies are dependent on that, and that's the values that we preach and that we are here for. Thank you. Good evening, community. Good evening, all the, teachers and SEIU staff in the crowd. I come here to, my name is Michael Shane. I'm a teacher and parent in the district. I come here on behalf of my colleagues at Sojourner Truth, the elementary division. We are a TK to 12 site, and, you are planning to chop our entire elementary school TK to five. Not sure why, but I don't support that that idea.
I don't support any of these cuts, by the way. The, the reasons. Okay. So, Sojourner Truth was created out of a violation of the contract back during COVID. And now you're trying to violate the contract again to close part of our school. That seems a little offensive. But, so some of the reasons why you should continue this program. So obviously with the charged atmosphere, with ice raised in this community, this program is is gonna be very valuable to undocumented families. That's, you know, there's no disputing that. The more families can avoid,
you know, having to deal with, you know, encounters with this, you know, just gestapo like ice, that's going to be way better. We also have a large community of Arab students. And as this country has stridently sided with a racist ideology like Zionism, that's even more important that we maintain this site for those students. And third, thirdly, we, you know, OEA campaign for many of you up here to fight these cuts, not accept them. So I, you know, it just boggles the mind. Like, I spent some times campaigning,
on weekends, and never would I have thought that this would be, you know, some of you all would be up there, you know, pleading to accept these cuts. So if anyone would like to sign the petition to save Sojourner Truths Elementary, you can see me in the back. You can sign the petition. I thank you for your time and, save SJT Elementary. Madam president speakers online? Currently, there are no speakers online. Oh, okay. Madam president. Last five speakers are Tamara Elster, Cassandra Walsh, Gabriel Kahn, Adoreen Hogue, and Craig Gordon. And these will be our last speakers.
Hi there, my name is Adrienne Hogue, I teach at La Esquilada. I'm a member of Eon Bancaucus and a former teacher at Sojourner Truth, Middle School. Making cuts to our classrooms to enforce the regimen of stripped down and deteriorating quality of education that politicians of both political parties have decided are to be imposed upon our youth is not a solution to any crisis that we face. The solution to the real crisis that we face,
a crisis of a fascist regime attempting to consolidate its power through a campaign of racist terror and kidnappings in our communities is to do whatever we can to provide the resources to students that they need now to fight in this critical moment for their futures, for this country, to give those resources to the students like the thousands that are walking out of their schools in Los Angeles and all over this state.
Whatever lip service anyone here pays to students or communities that supports a plan of cutting schools or cutting vital services for newcomers is aiding and abetting Trump's attacks on public education and immigrants. That is in reality what you are doing. And the current plan to close the SJT virtual elementary school is short sighted and it's just stupid. I worked at SGT for three years and we were critical at keeping students in
Oakland attending Oakland schools. I had students from immigrant families that were going to school in Yemen, going to school in Egypt, going to school in El Salvador. And as we are seeing our attendance rates impacted by these threats of ICE, the idea that you would close these schools, close these programs is insane. You should be promoting the virtual elementary program. You should be promoting the newcomer programs. Thank you. That is what you need to do.
That is the real crisis. Good evening. My name is Craig Gordon. I've been a substitute teacher currently. I've been a classroom teacher for many years and since 1990. And I've seen this over and over again. The only good thing about this manufactured fiscal crisis is that it makes clear that this fight that we have for the resources that our students and all school workers deserve must simultaneously take on the school district and that is using its manufactured crisis to justify outrageous cuts to vital programs and to
close schools. And at the same time, the county superintendent and the state of California when it's ever present threat to take away local control again if the district doesn't cut its vital programs and close schools. So locally, we have to continue to demand that this district stop overspending tens of millions of dollars on top administration and private contractors and that prioritize students and public schools and programs. And we have to fight the county and the state. And remember the state administrators running this district years ago tripled the debt that we're
still paying off. But the state that continues to demand that this district live within its means and make students and workers pay the price. OEA is one of 32 education unions in California saying that we can't wait for schools that are fully staffed, support our school students and pay a living wage to their workers. California is the fifth richest economy in the world with the highest concentration of corporate wealth and billionaires in the country. To these Democratic Party politicians at this district, county, and state level who pretend to be the resistance against Trumpian racists and authoritarians,
but who continue to cut, privatize, and close our public schools, we can't wait. No cuts, no closures, redistribute corporate wealth to fund public schools and services for black, brown, and all working class people in Oakland and every school district in California. Hi. I'm Tamara Elster. I'm a Stif sub at Global Family Elementary. I just wanna remind you to listen to the voices of the community, to the teachers, to the students and parents, and the people who work directly with the students. We need more people working directly with students, more people our students can trust, more people who can support our newcomers and their students with all the needs that
they have right now. We don't need fewer people in the classrooms, fewer people in the schools, and fewer people, providing services to our students. So please keep that in mind. Hello. My name is Cassandra Walsh. I'm a ten year OUSD kindergarten teacher, and I'm here with Catherine Gibson, a twenty year Oakland educator who started in OUSD as a STIP sub. I'm speaking to express my extreme disappointment in our county superintendent, Elise Castro, who is intervening in our school board. The residents of Oakland Elected School Board Members who they knew would support this district
to keep schools open and fully staffed in order to best support every community here in Oakland. By pressing our school board members to close schools, cut vital direct to student staff positions such as STIP subs, and drastically slashing school site budgets, you are not only undermining their power of as elected officials, but you are also silencing the voices of students and their families. While Elise may have many buzzwords to say, her actions are not aligned with the speech that we all just heard.
I urge the board to fight, to put the needs of our students at the center of your choices, and to be willing to push the boundaries of what a district budget can look like. This is the moment for OUSD to be a leader in rewriting just how student centered a district budget can truly be. It's not the moment for OUSD to lay down and allow themselves to be run over by others. Thank you. Good evening, board directors,
administration, county administration. My name is Gabriel Khan. I stand here, with the full endorsement and encouragement of my eighth graders at Life Academy who told me a couple months ago, mister Gabe, if you do not speak up for us eighth graders in forums where we are not, then who will? And I say that to ground myself and to also extend an open invite to anybody who loves Oakland Students to come visit a classroom if you need to be grounded in the decisions and priorities that we need to make. I say that, also directors Simmons and Vasquez, if you were confused by what we just saw by that county presentation, you are not the only ones even though you may be new at this youth
director role. It was wild to watch y'all sit up there looking like hostages to somebody trying to pedantically tell you what to do. And if I saw this phone policy from these advisors in my classroom, those phones would be on my desk until the end of class. They are not looking at their classmates and they are not watching the people around them trying to learn even though they say they're listening to community. And that is the first lesson we need to be learning, superintendent Castro, that if you say you wanna be listening to our community members, then we expect you to show that when you're listening to us. We listen to you for half an hour and forty minutes.
You've been on your phone. I came here with an open mind that maybe perhaps the county would be able to, in our best interest, solve this crisis, and I have lost all faith in that. But who I have not lost faith in is you and you and you and you and you and you and you. You two have the total right to re earn my trust, and I believe in you fully. But I need y'all to have a backbone when we come to these discussions because we are talking about no fail safe at the county level. We have no fail safe behind y'all. You are our fail safe. 10% of the cuts are to central office, but they make up 30% of our budget,
and that tells us that central will not cut itself. That is your job. Your job is to make sure that central cuts itself like it cuts the rest of the communities in our district. Because if they cut themselves if they cut themselves, we don't have a problem anymore. Right? They're not gonna cut themselves. We have executive assistants making a hundred and 80 thousand dollar investment packages. We have people getting paid to do just a penance amount of work. We're paying five one o media twice for this work. You're paying them and they're paying them. And for what? Look through the extended contracts. Look through every contract. Cut administrative budgets and cut administrative compensation that we don't need because no one else
is gonna do it but you. Right? Thank you. We need you to cut through central. Thank you. Madam president, there was a missing speaker for this item. This is Sara Olugbala. Well, I'm glad somebody believes in you because I don't. And I don't believe in the county either because I go to their meetings, and I see what they do. And in the area that I'm concerned about is diversity, equity, and inclusion, which doesn't exist for the African American students in this district. Now you're gonna talk about other groups, and you have a right to support any group that you wanna support,
but you have an obligation to support all children. And it's not happening for the African American students. So I see on this agenda things that y'all don't get along. Y'all don't get along. And you got on the agenda tonight to end the finance committee. How stupid is that? The finance committee gives you an opportunity to have transparency, inclusion. It it gives me and I go to the committees, an opportunity to understand the process and participate more openly in the process. So where that stupidity comes from?
So I don't I think you can eat to y'all can't get your act together. You want me to get my act together. You spot you spend a whole lot of time directing a whole lot of stuff to me about getting myself together in here. You need to get yourselves together so you can collaborate to work together and work with the superintendent. I saw another stupid thing that you got on there where you're not gonna have the superintendent able to do her job, gonna take all her abilities to make appointments for jobs away from her. So this is not gonna work until you respect each other
and respect the African American students in this district. Until that happens, we will not have the opportunity to have fairness and inclusion and equity. Y'all talking so much about money. When we gonna talk about that? That concludes public comment on this time. Board members each have three minutes to, ask questions, address comments, and we will start, start with you, and director Atkinson. Thank you. As I said on a Zoom meeting a few years ago, I'll never fall for the banana in the tailpipe. And for me, I've had to bite my tongue on a lot of things going on over the
last couple of years. But especially in February, as Malcolm taught us, chickens are coming home to roost. And before I start what I had prepared here, I gotta say, as a direct descendant of enslaved Africans and a proud lifelong resident in Oakland and graduate of OUSD, I found a lot of the tone highly offensive. And I will be going live on social media over the next few days to fill in all the gaps in the story. So let me just say I am very troubled by what's going on. President Brohard scheduled tonight's study session that was on the agenda and instead invited Alameda
County Superintendent Elise Castro here to make that presentation. We're eighteen months away from finally leaving receivership. We have to pass a $95,000,000 budget adjustment package or we will be pushed into bankruptcy. That vote is eight days away, and instead, we're talking about this today. Not a word about the budget adjustment package. Elise Castro doesn't have this authority, and what authority she does have is discretionary. So the question becomes, why is she choosing now to create this confusion on top of everything else?
It's nice to see the trustee here. First time we've ever seen her in person here. And I don't know what somebody from San Diego has to even offer. The budget and finance committee we had last week, neither county superintendent Elise Castro nor the trustee were there or even watched on Zoom. We know what's happening here, and we do have a plan. Our fiscal sustainability update that we passed last May and our three hours resolution passed in August had contained a commitment that we vote on recommendations in June. We're on track.
We haven't missed anything. And, again, this fiscal advisory team are not experts, especially not experts on finances and, more importantly, not experts on Oakland. I know for a fact the school board directors have been colluding with the trustee and county superintendent. I know the first for the first time, the county superintendent joined the board's agenda setting meeting two weeks ago to make this agenda. And I know that the board president has the authority to set, cancel any meeting, and has the sole authority to make the agenda. Board staff will not put something on the agenda unless the board president authorizes it.
I'M GOING TO FIGHT. I WAS BUILT FOR THIS FIGHT, AND MY COMMUNITY ELECTED ME TO FIGHT IN Just THIS KIND OF SITUATION. BUT PEOPLE NEED TO REMEMBER, MY CONSTITUENTS ARE ALSO THE COUNTY SUPERINTENDENT'S CONSTITUENTS. And for those of you who weren't around, this is the same mistake the former county superintendent made, and that's why she was not reelected. So I'm very curious to hear from my colleagues what they have to say, and I would really like to hear from president Brohard why she has done this. And, again, y'all, you're being bamboozled. I think for the moment, I don't have any questions,
with respect to the presentation that the county presented. I do think I want to be very clear that, you know, we, and I specifically take really seriously the challenge ahead with passing a balanced budget for next year. And I think it's think it is incumbent upon us and especially, you know, for myself and director Berry who were just elected, that asking questions and making changes that we think are in the best interest of our students, that are in the best interest of our staff and our future as a school
is not irresponsible. That actually part of why I ran for school board, why I'm up here, is because I take this very seriously, and I understand that the decisions we make have huge impacts for our students. You know, I'm on the SSC at Prescott Elementary and at West Oakland Middle where my kids go, and I have seen the site based cuts. And I just wanna say that I'm very confident that this board will pass a balanced budget in June. I do and I have I've told many people this.
We are gonna balance our budget. And just because we ask questions and we make resolutions and amendments doesn't mean that we're not serious and we don't understand what's at stake. And I think I will just say that for me, I I disagree a little bit that our number one priority as a school board is to pass a budget. Right? We could cut we could close every school in this district and and have a balanced budget. That's not our number one priority. Our number one priority is the students in our schools and that they are getting what they need. And I agree with this with the county superintendent that they're not getting what they
need right now. And I do think that we are on a path to doing something different and something better for our students and for our families and our communities, and that's where that's what I'm here for. That's what I think we're all here for is to do something better for our students. And, I'll just the only other thing I'll say is that the presentation mentioned that we're doing that that we need to be responsible for the next generation. And I think for me, if the changes we make aren't for this generation, for the for the kids and the students and the community that are in Oakland
and in our schools right now, then we that's that we have failed. So I think for me, the what I'm prioritizing is meaningful change in our lives now. Thank you, county superintendent for your presentation, and thank you for all of your team coming up. Appreciate it. So I have a few comments. You know, the thing that really bothers me is to make it seem like, the board is incapable. Of making decisions. What we've had over the last over the last term,
my last term and this term is we've had a financial oversight, individual who watched all and who watched our budget, being created each year. And at any time, that individual could have paused a decision. At any time, if we're serious about our kids, pause that decision. Let's see how y'all figure that out. Stop that right now. That was the power of the oversight person. So it's like being in a hen house. Right? You're in the middle of it.
You see the decisions going on, and then you let the decisions go out the door, and then you wait till the last moment to say, we need to take over the district. I'm not for that. Not for that at all. You have every right to say, I will I get paid to make this decision, and I'm gonna stop it. People gonna be upset, but I get paid because I think there's a better way. Don't let folks pass the budget pass the budget, send the Alameda County Superintendent a letter to say,
can you qualify us? We say, you're qualified. You're qualified. And now we're in a negative qualification. So it's not just the board here. There's been a partnership that's been running side by side for the last four years. Don't get it twisted. Don't get it twisted. So if we're really true about what we wanna see with our board and the decisions that we have to make, I'm happy with the board that I have right here today. This board is the first board in my five years that actually came with an
alternative plan. We actually have a plan. We submitted the plan. This is our plan. We're going to cut spending. This is our plan. We're going to cap spending. Our spending went from $180,000,000 1 hundred and 20 5 million dollars to $185,000,000 Let me put this in context. During COVID I've got fifteen seconds during COVID, we received $280,000,000 And they're expiring. The money is expiring this year. And then this year,
we pop up with a $95,000,000 deficit. There's way too much spending going on, and we should have planned that out. So let's not fall for this, that we don't know how to control ourselves. We partnered up with Alameda County, and I wanna continue to partner with you. But don't put it on us like we're incapable of having that. And if we were and you were in the hen house, you should have made the decision to stop those decisions that we made. So I'm saying here right now, check yourself before you check us.
Thank you. So I wrote down a few things while people were making public comments. So first, thank you to everyone who showed up and and spoke. That was very helpful, very grounding. I know I'm carrying it with me. I ran for school board because of what you just mentioned. I believe that this board is ready. I'm convinced that I can be effective in my role and that this board is ready to do what we need to do to care for Oakland, and I have every intent of retaining every piece of agency and power granted to
me as a school board member regardless of the oversight, the guidance, or the support coming from the county. Thank you all for stepping in and stepping up. Someone said earlier, we got this. I think we do. Right? The mandate is clear. And even with the support that we have, I just want everybody here to know, especially in response to some of the comments that have been made, that the things that I'm gonna be focused on I wanna be focused on continuing to make sure that our communities are co architects
of the change that we need to see, the changes that we have to make. We've already heard wisdom and brilliance from all the feedback sessions and town halls. We don't wanna lose that, and we need that more. So I intend to retain my power and agency, but I need everyone to continue to show up so that you also hold on to the agency that you have. I think that I also want to encourage the county to hear what the group has said tonight, which is that we know Oakland, and I appreciate and respect the stories from San Diego that we can benefit from.
And I think we need to make sure that we filter every decision through the experiences that people have here, the experiences that have been shared tonight. And in order to do that, there has to be transparency. There has to be time, and we have to collaborate as some of the people have shared in public comment too. And the last thing that I wanna say is something that director Latta said. I know that the urgency of this moment has been about the budget, the the fiscal crisis balancing balancing balancing, and that's important.
But our bottom line is students, and we have an opportunity today in this moment to think about what we are trying to build here in Oakland and to back ourselves into what we can afford. We do we cannot start with how much we can afford. And I don't want us to start with the budget adjustments that we have to make for 2526. So I encourage everyone to continue sending emails and text messages and showing up in spaces, and I encourage the board to continue to create spaces for real dialogue so that
we can continue to lift up what is it that exact what is it exactly that we need in every single classroom across the city? Student directors. One second. First, I wanna say, Mike, I do agree with you a lot, actually. I enjoyed the presentation. The wording for some for certain things did rub me the wrong way. I don't necessarily know what redlining something that prominently impact impacted the black community, a hundred years ago has to do with OUSD.
But I'm very glad that miss Assata brought up the board kind of being split apart because it is something that I noticed and it is very noticeable. And I brought it up to president Dave, former president Davis when I first got on the board. I sent him an email and I said that the board is very split apart. And I believe that this board needs restorative justice circles. Oh, like, sit on, like, like, honestly, restorative justice circles.
And I hope I could work with President Brohard to get these circles so we can so we can better work together as a board because we can't make change if we don't know each other. To work together as a board, we need to we need to be able to know each other, honestly. And if we can't even come to a consensus or listen to each other's ideas, how are we going to even factor in our community's ideas, our students' ideas, the parents' ideas, anybody else's ideas if we can only look at our own.
So I really want to take this time for all of, not just the board, but our district as a whole, to really sit back and reflect on a way to move forward and a way for our board to better come together and better work together. Max, director Simmons said mostly what I was gonna say, but I also have to agree that having a better relationship will definitely help this board move forward on making decisions. I feel like most of these decisions we could've figured a solution to,
months ago if it just what if we just put our differences to the side. I know something that I keep on hearing is I just don't hear a middle ground that you all have. I hear a different perspective, different opinions, but nothing similar. Nothing to actually be like, okay. Like, I can see something happening. So I just wanna say that student you know, we both represent students, and and we both speak for students that we we trust you guys. We elected you all, and we just hope to see change happening because so far, we're not seeing a lot.
We're just hearing a lot of words, but no actions. So, yeah, that's all I have to say. Thank you. Thank you. And I just will briefly say that I agree with many of my colleagues and the student board directors, and I remember director Simmons having that same conversation with director Brohar, director Williams, and I. But I do have some questions for, superintendent Elise Castro. So if you can come back up. These are constituent questions, and I just wanna make sure that we have them on public record and with clarity so that I can make sure that I can taking back information to my constituents that's correct. Can you confirm that we, the democratically elected school board of Oakland,
have the final decision making power around any and all budget adjustment decisions as well as any impossible school closures, mergers, or truncations? Yes. At the current time. Who are some of the other individuals that are part of your advisory team? What are their connections, if any, to OUSD, and what are their roles to be very specifically? You named some of the folks here, but can you talk about other people that maybe were not named specifically? So there was a slide, which is part of the public record. So there's myself. There's, filling the county superintendent role as put in law,
there's Luz Casares who is the fiscal oversight trustee and an experienced school finance leader, Richard Barrera, who's bringing his school board experience as a veteran. We also have, some communication support from five ten Media, which I believe this board has worked with before as well as from partners in school innovation, which I believe this board has also worked with before to facilitate community conversation. And then there's a couple of folks from my staff who provide staff support like scheduling note taking.
And so is mister Harris the only former school board director that is currently in your team? Currently, yes. But I am engaged in conversation with several other school board members who are supporting. Great. Have you instructed any OUSD staff to create or draft a plan to close, merge, or truncate schools, programs, or programs for the twenty twenty five, twenty twenty six school year? No, ma'am. Out of the '25 school districts I'm sorry. Out of the 50 school districts in, that you shared, how many of them have the same percentage of charters of students in charter schools
that we do? I don't know. That information would, I think, would be really helpful, especially within my budget engagement. That was really eye opening for a lot of parents. I also think someone also mentioned the number, the amount of dollars that are grants and other dollars that are not usual to other school districts, would be better to differentiate so that we can make sure that we're creating apples to apples comparisons, in the future presentation. Thank you. I want to address, director Hutchinson's criticisms towards me, and, I do take responsibility for inviting the county team to the the board meeting tonight
in the intent to, for the community to understand what Elise Castro's, plan was and how to make sure that the board, that we understand as a board and that the community understands that the board has the final say. As the board president, I am responsible for those decisions, and as the board president, I'm responsible for the outcomes, and I appreciate over the past few weeks the conversations with labor partners, with school principals, with teachers, not with students, and I need to take that up in the next round, but again, as the board president I do take responsibility for those decisions
and accept the criticism and accept that when people have something they need to say to me about my leadership I I want to hear that. It's a learning experience and, I am learning, I'm open to that. I think I know as a teacher, you can't be afraid of your mistakes, and you can't be afraid of that criticism that you hear from people. So again, I take responsibility for the invitation. I will take responsibility for the decision to cancel the, budget, session, and I will take responsibility for the future, for the,
board policy amendment that we're going to make later tonight, and we'll talk more about that. Thank you. I think Alright, next is the student board, the student board, directors report. Good evening, students, parents, board members, superintendent, and community members. Thank you all for speaking. Today in today's report, we will go over some some of student voices. We'll be covering, endless lack of gym and food access, student protesting. We'll then be, moving forward with student leadership, talking about our high school meeting and our middle school meeting, and then some upcoming student events.
So for student voice, for years, Midwest High School has faced significant challenges with access to school meals and physical education space. Until my junior year of high school, students had no access to school lunches, and even now, the system remains the same. Seniors Evan Du and Princess Dam highlighted issues with the La Escudita cafeteria, which often opens late, leaving students with little time to eat. Portions are are too small for high schoolers and must be shared with the elementary students, causing a lot of delays as high schoolers wait for the younger students to be
served first. Breakfast is rarely available for the high school students as it is now served exclusively deterring students from eating due to the inconvenience. Similarly, PE at Midwest has long been hindered by the lack of facilities. Unlike most high schools, Midwest does not have a gym, forcing students to rely on a small backyard for activities, which limits their ability to fully engage in sports or PE with many feeling this motivated. The absence of a gym also has prevented well-being success. After years of these ongoing challenges,
students hope to see meaningful changes. Moving forward, Life Academy middle schoolers walk out in solidarity with what is going on with, currently with the immigration rates. So these are some pictures. I know our student engagement specialists, help assist them and also just, be there and support as well, so they don't do this alone. So for student leadership, on January 30, we had our third high school meeting, which happened at the Oakland Tech Student Center. Here, high school students learn more about equitable grading, giving feedback about the system. We had our leadership workshop and discussing more in-depth about our priorities.
We'd like to thank Oakland Tech for allowing us to use their space. We would also like to shout out MetWest, Fremont, Oakland High, Oakland Tech, Skyline, and Ralph French for joining us in in our meeting. And we'd also like to thank doctor Lotta, doctor Williams, Katie Ouel, and Emily Zunola for joining us as well. And here's some more pictures of students engaging. So yesterday yesterday, Monday. Was it Monday? Tuesday? So Tuesday, we had our so Tuesday, we had yesterday. So yesterday, we had our fourth middle school meeting where we finalized our program for the middle
school ethnic studies conference. I'll go over what the Middle School Ethnic Studies Conference is in a little bit for anybody who might not know. We also introduced our MCs for this year. If you would like to know who the MCs are, you're gonna have to come and find out. I'm I'm sorry. We held our middle school meeting at Edna Brewer. It was a smaller group than usual. We had Claremont, Life Academy, Edna Brewer Middle School, and Westlake Middle. So yeah, we basically just finalized our program, made the made the little program booklet, what it's going to look like, because our student engagement specialist usually is just something like that looks like this,
what our program is, but this year our student engagement specialist wanted to make a little booklet, make it nice and and presentable. So what the Middle School Ethnic Studies Conference is, is basically a middle school event hosted for all middle schoolers. It's a place for middle school leaders to be involved and introduced to other leaders like them. All middle schools in OUSD are invited. Our theme for this year is fighting for equality means fighting for each other, which the middle schoolers came up with. I'm personally excited for this year's Middle School Ethic Studies Conference because I'm able to
see a whole new class of leaders kind of come and grow their rings and basically take flight. So that's it with our events and everything like that. No. That's false. We'll have a fourth high school meeting happening, happening on March 20 at Castlemont High. All OESD high schoolers are invited to come, and the link will be sent out to your leadership, teacher and principal as well. We encourage everybody to join, and we'll also be further talking about our youth action summit that is coming up
as well. So please, any high schoolers watching, you're more than welcome to come. And so far, that is So It's for a report, but, Derek Simmons, you'll take the lead. Furthermore, our middle if there are any middle school teachers in here, our middle specialties conference is happening on March 6. So please come out, bring your middle schoolers. It'll be a great day. But now I kinda wanna get into some more serious stuff. I would like to talk about some communication problems within OUSD. I just would like to be blunt that the communication in OUSD from our district
is terrible. The communication to our community, the communication to our staff, the communication to the student directors are terrible. It's happened repeatedly this year, well, since me and Michelle became student director that communication between staff to me and Michelle is it's terrible. We're not updated. We're left out of board updates. And I know I was told why we were left out of board updates. There are legal reasons, but in my eyes, that does not matter.
There is no reason that we should be left out of updates. And if there are legal reasons for why we can't be shared updates, then why haven't we been made our own special updates? Why haven't you guys sent us sent us our own special update booklet of what's happening, what's going on? Because if we're not updated, the students aren't updated. And if the students aren't updated, then your number one priority doesn't know what's going on. How are we your number one priority and we don't know what's going on in the district? We don't know what's hap we don't know what's happening outside our classrooms.
And maybe you guys don't think it's important for us to know, but that's not what we think. So we're working with essentially no information at all. Me and Michelle have to go back and report to our all city council to our all city council governing board, and we have nothing to report. There's no reason that we should have nothing to report. Furthermore, I feel like, well, I have a lot of feelings, but feelings aren't gonna get us anywhere. This district needs stronger values. This district needs integrity. This district, a lot of the times, isn't scared to come out and say it's their fault,
but they come out and say it's their fault and then they do it again. So like I said earlier, something needs to change, and change happens within. To change something correctly, we need to attack it at its core. We need to change the values OUSD has, and we need to create new values. And I'm not only coming here to tell you guys and update you guys about what's been going on, but I'm coming here and I'm telling you guys that and I'm a junior, and I plan on pursuing director again. And in my time, I promise I'm gonna attack that core,
and I'm gonna make sure that OUSD has some new values to sit upon. But on a positive note, I have been working on a resolution. So I would like to introduce that resolution to you guys. I'd like to give you guys some background first. My resolution is reallocating funds for restorative justice support. If some of you guys have been to Boermeus before, you know I'm a very big restorative justice advocate. Restorative justice is a very big part of my life. I've been doing restorative justice for about three to four years now, presenting at multiple multiple national restorative justice conferences.
And I've I really believe if it wasn't for restorative justice, I wouldn't be here today. In 02/2019, Oakland Unified School District took away eight completely took away the $850,000 restorative justice had in funding. When they did this, restorative justice was taken out of multiple almost every school in OUSD, making it so schools would have to pay for their restorative justice facilitator out of their pockets. A lot of schools didn't have the money to do that, and a lot of schools didn't wanna do that. We saw suspension rates go up.
We saw expansion expulsion rates go up. This negatively impacted our district in multiple ways. So I would like this resolution to be passed because even though restorative justice might seem stupid at first glance to stay in a circle and talk about your feelings with someone that you might have had a fight with or maybe just a friend, it truly does help, and we've seen that in the numbers. So I'll read you guys our resolution, reallocating funds to restorative justice. Whereas restorative justice, better known as RJ and OUSD,
began as a truly Oakland born, grassroots initiative at Cole Middle School in West Oakland in 02/2006, in three years, suspension at this school were reduced by 87%, while expulsions reduced to zero. And whereas, since OUSD, restorative justice resolution, was passed in 02/2009, thousands of youth have been trained and supported in engaging in restorative justice practices to build a stronger a stronger school community and respond to harm and conflict. And whereas, the district created a staff position and training to to support restorative justice,
and these positions and trainings were dedicated to restorative justice and the betterment of our students, staff, and families. And whereas, in 02/2012, Oakland Unified School District utilized restorative justice as a district wide strategy to eliminate racial disparities and discipline as part of an as as part of an agreement signed with the federal office for civil rights called the Voluntary Resolution Plan, better known as the VRP. And whereas, in a school that utilizes a restorative a restorative model,
not only are suspensions reduced, but students perform better academically, between 02/2012 and 02/2017, suspension rates in Oakland overall were almost halved, reducing from seven point zero 7.4% to 3.9%, which corresponds directly to the increase of restorative justice staffing across the district. And whereas the UC Berkeley Law School produced a report of Cole Middle School's restorative justice model and found that restorative justice reduced teacher teacher attention, reduced violence,
and improved academic performance, among other benefits, and whereas a school's quality and basic foundation is built upon the collective well-being of its students. Restorative justice is devoted to teaching the ideology of interdependence and that we all thrive on positive relations and each person holds the wisdom to solve their own issues. And whereas there is a commitment in the superintendent's there's a commitment in the superintendent's strategic plan under the joyful schools to utilize and take advantage of restorative justice practices.
And whereas, the OUSD RJ program in 02/2015 released an implementation and impact report on the positive effects of restorative justice of the restorative justice program, culture and climate, and student achievement. Whereas, in the larger in the larger social context, RJ has shown to reduce fear of crime and people who have been harmed, in particular, Umbre, in 1991, showed a 50% reduction in fear of revictimization by those harmed after after completing the restorative justice process.
In terms of reoffending, there have been low to moderate reductions in reoffending, three to 7%, by restorative justice programs in various states. And now for, there be it further resolved, the Board of Education will seek to prioritize finding $1,000,000 in funding for the betterment of students through restorative justice programs, the Board of Education reaffirms its commitment to promote a district wide culture of caring, serving the whole child, which promotes both social emotional and intellectual development,
meaningful inclusion of students, parents, teacher, administrators, and district leaderships, and efforts to create and sustain a safe and equitable learning environment where all students are cared for and can excel. Thank you. Thank you. That concludes our report. Thank you. That's an excellent resolution. There's public comment. We'll have ten minutes of public comment. Yes, madam president. We have two speakers. It's Nifa Akosua and Asata Olegbala. Two minutes, please. I think we have restorative justice coordinator at McClimans. Last night at the SSC meeting,
they announced that, in January, we had one suspension and no fights. So I I think you're going in the right direction. I just wanted to share with you guys that in 2023, there was passage of assembly bill two seven five. Assembly bill two seven five would have lie allowed school districts to vote to have board student members be paid by stipends. And so they are a couple of districts. West Contra Costa in January passed,
the ability for their school board, student members, board members to get paid stipends. It's also happening in San Diego. So if you really care so much about these wonderful representative, why don't y'all take that up for discussion? Because you deserve it. Good evening. How y'all doing? I'm Nifa Khoswa, Black Sanctuary, co manager for the Black Organizing Project. I just wanna take a moment to to really hold that this space is traumatizing. To be in a space where young people, community members are voicing the concerns, and you are saying things like,
we hear your concerns. We are listening to the community. But we are seeing time and time again that none of the voices, none of the concerns are being heard by the community. These young people here today literally just said that they don't feel connected to y'all. That's a shame. For a young person to be in this space, to hold going to school, showing up here, and at the same time, creating a resolution of hope, transformative justice and restorative justice is powerful. These babies aren't doing that like that in this community. And, you know, for Max and Michelle to literally put their hearts on the line to show and
write a letter to state that there's miscommunication in here and to show that they are left out of the hiring process of what's happening within the school district. They themselves are showing how we can show up. If you do not listen to the young people, how the hell are you gonna listen to the community? These young people are the voices that we should be listening to. Without their support, we cannot do this work. For us to show up for them is literally showing up for all of young people. And here they are, brave, speaking here on this panel,
sharing their concerns, and y'all are not listening. It's a shame. A shame. And I really voice that you listen to their concerns. You have their meetings. You give them the information that they're looking for so they can share this with their community. It's ridiculous, and I applaud them for how strong they are and brave a junior showing up at this board meeting with adults who can't even stand up. The last speaker for this item, madam president. So I just wanted to thank you all for the honest feedback, one around just the food at Midwest. So I definitely wanna have someone from my team communicate so we can address that.
And at this time, I'd like my chief of staff, doctor Dexter Moore junior, to address the issues because you guys should be getting the communication. So I wanna personally apologize as I do wanna make sure that's fixed. Every other week, our elected board officials get a written update to the board. You all should be getting that too. So I just wanna give, Dexter Moore junior an opportunity, so we can get that fixed moving on. So thank you so much for sharing that. Thank you, superintendent. Good evening, board, director Simmons, director Vasquez.
You know, as I've said, I I think a couple of times, she just appreciate you are modeling the communication that we aspire. Alright. I'll try that again. Thank you, director Simmons and director Vasquez. As I've shared with you a couple of times recently, just really appreciate you all modeling the communication that we all aspire to get to. And certainly, it's an area, where we can all improve. I know that we have some time scheduled for next Wednesday to talk about this very item specifically, and so looking forward to digging through some concrete action steps, and then reporting those back out,
to to the students and also the public. So just appreciate it and want to acknowledge it and looking forward to meeting with you on next Wednesday. Thank you. Madam madam president. A chance. I just wanted to, put in the record that you are the cosponsor of, directors, Simmons's, resolution as required by policy. That's fine. I just wanna make sure it is director Simmons' words. Sure. Thank you so much. I just also wanted to clarify for the public, that our student board directors are paid. We moved a resolution last year and folks are getting a stipend,
so that's really exciting and we wanna continue, to support our students in that way. So I just wanted to clarify that for our for the record. And are there any other comments? Director Thompson? Yes. I just wanna say, first of all, I really appreciate, the report, and I had to, write down what the middle school came up with. Fighting for equity means fighting for each other. And I really appreciate that because it really, puts us I think it puts us on a trajectory of success. But, now I'm going to switch and put on my administrator's hat for a moment,
because, you mentioned that there were food inequities and also, walkouts and stuff. But I wanna know because we have to all work together, to make this work. Have you had the opportunity to speak to the administrator at the school about those two issues? Because that's something that administrators will do. They will actually work with the students in order to see what's going on at their sites, and then they'll try to do whatever they can to mitigate whatever problem is happening at the site.
I'm I'm a senior at West High School, so I can actually, fully speak on my commute my community that we've sent out emails. We've been very vocal about our lack of accessibility to the La Escuelita gym. It is something that we've been struggling with since I was a freshman. And I was high school. We've always expressed that we've never had equal access to the gym. And especially since we wanna start our own sports team, students have always expressed that they wanted to have sports like basketball or even soccer.
But because we don't have such facility in this situation being the gym, it was never really possible. So we've our principal has sent out emails. We've always we've been trying to be in contact with something, but it just some it just never has worked out. So just so we we could be, like, on the same page, we have been communicative about this. And with the walkouts, it's something that has been it's more of a community thing that we've all agreed to. I don't know if you all have known this, but we collectively decided not to come to school on,
I believe it was last Monday, to show our solidarity. So it's something that we've always been communicative about. It's something that we never lacked in our community. We've always been very, sharing our information. So just to put that out there that we've been vocal about everything. Yeah. That that's that's really great. I'm glad that you guys have been vocal about that. But I just want you to always, if you will, follow-up with your administrator when something is happening at your campus, and then get it codified. I'll write it down so that, you know, you guys know, hey.
We talked to the administrator on this day about x, y, or z, and the administrator hasn't moved on it or the administrator has moved on it. And I'm sure, doctor Aguilera or the superintendent will then follow-up with that. So I'm just trying I'm just trying to give a solution to whatever some of the problems are. Just make sure you take it to your administrator and then codify it like I said. Write it down so you'll know. And then, one of them one of the staff persons, I'm sure, will address the issue.
Yes. Thank you so much. Director Latta? I'll just keep it short. I just wanna appreciate both, director Simmons and director Vasquez for your leadership, and I think always, modeling for us in the community, just responsibility and accountability. And I think also the other thing I'll just say is the vulnerability that sometimes it's, you know, in a situation like this where we're up on a dais and we're talking about difficult issues, we're talking about ways in which we've let our community or each other down, that it's, that I appreciate how you all continue to show up,
for the students and also for, for the whole board, and, excited to, you know, kind of continue to come to ACC events, and hopefully I can, make it to one of the middle school events. Excellent. Appreciate appreciate your report for sure. Thank you for, allowing me to sit in, on the middle school, workshop at Westlake. I appreciate it. I think we all need to be there, you know, at an event so we understand what type of work is going on. And I see that you know, I see the relationships that are being built with students from other schools.
And you're right. That's something that this board needs to take on as well. We definitely need to to learn how to, support one another. So I wanna thank you for that. Second, and I appreciate you bringing your concerns to the board. I'm really glad that you have because, you know, I've seen that a couple times, you know, from previous directors. I think I shared with you at the beginning. I was like, you know, you gotta get with these folks who actually are doing the communication. You got I remember telling you, because I've seen it over two different cycles, the frustration level that happens.
And I wanted to make sure that you understood that as much as board members here tell you how great you are, there's very little work that goes on afterwards. So I'm glad that you called that out, and I think we need to be held accountable. The thing about it is, as I said before in our speech, in our commentate comment commentating for the, direct the Alameda County person, Elise. I don't know why I'm slipping. Elise. The fact is that, you know, as a board, we have this opportunity to really put students first,
and I feel that this particular board is really using that as a driving mechanism. So I just want you to know that, we would be here. You should use us. If you're sending out a email, please put the director on there. Put one of us on there so we can actually advocate for you. Or not for you, with you. Right? Put us on there because I think that is showing, you know, that's our responsibility also is to be a support, you know, support you in your particular challenges that you face. And lastly, I think that,
you know, one of the things that I sent you earlier was the California School Board Association, trainings for student directors. Like, there's a ton of trainings there, and I really want, you know, you to be informed of what your rights are as students. What we haven't had okay. Sure. Yeah. What what what our board members lack is a sense of orientation. What is really the job? Two, what is the training necessary? Having, like, individual trainings don't necessarily help you out as a whole board. Having, community,
communal trainings really give everybody an opportunity to be on the same mindset. So I just really want you to know that there are trainings there. We will pay for it so you can better understand. It talks about the budget. Director Williams. Thank you very much. Alright. Hi. Thank you for your presentation. I just have two things. One, thank you for the reminder about how important communication and transparency are. I feel like that's a theme. It keeps coming up, and I think it's worth us putting on the agenda for the conversations we'll have about the three r's to actually if we have the resources,
especially because those are dedicated to that assignment that we actually spend time thinking about how we're going to ensure communication and transparency, not just among ourselves, but with community. And then also thank you for the reminder of the importance board be aware of how we show up, and the role that RJ may play in helping us get to a better place. Like, it's a shame that you even have to say that, but just like other aspects of life, young people, you all are leading us to our better selves and I appreciate that and you
can consider me partner in that work. I just want to thank you for, moving the resolution forward. I also know, having taught at La Escuelita, that the lunch situation is, just as you described it, it is chaotic and it's not everybody is getting served at the right I mean, it is a mess, so I, would be willing to work with you guys on that. I also, as far as the PE space, again, it's at Las Bellita we also had we had our PE suite probably took your lunch, we had our PE classes in the cafeteria while the first and second graders ate
their lunch. And it's just not there just isn't the space, like you said, for the space. I think one thing we did kind of start to look at a few years ago was, partnering with Laney and that using the track and, the athletic spaces over there so maybe that's something we can also look into because even if you had this I mean it's just not the space here that's a little yard it's a little kid's yard, you know, it's, you know, plays boards, and I think the garden is lovely, but you can't really run your laps in the garden. So I think space really is an issue for both,
lunch and for, your physical activities, your PE classes. Yeah. I know, I believe our principal has tried getting in contact with Laney as well, but it's also some it's been a back and forth on whether they would allow us or not. So I know it's just something that we definitely have to be pushing for because it's something we've we're really interested in, something we also wanna grow our space in our community and our school spirit as well. So I really wanna, like, push forward with that as well. I I would just ask the superintendent who should, we'd be in contact with about negotiating that space or if you haven't made an
answer to that. Well, I will definitely get our network superintendent and assist you Fuentes. We're gonna have to get in contact with the chancellor. The our community colleges have their own challenges with attrition and different leadership, so that's definitely something where the principal would need some support with that. That concludes the student report. Moving on, we have the PSAC report coming up next. And if it's okay with the board, I know that we have ten minutes allocated for this, but I'd like to allocate fifteen. Is are there any objections to allocating fifteen minutes to p seconds?
Oh. Alright. We'll go for using my authority, we'll go for twenty minutes. Oh, Thank you. Good evening, directors. Good evening, community. My name is Michelle Lance Coker, and I am the proud parent of a ninth grader at Oakland High School. Before you is a list of the student and parent members of the LCAP PSAC committee, that's the Parent Student Advisory Committee and we are representative of these seven districts. On January 30, we held a special election for PSAC membership in Electoral District 2.
We had representatives especially from four schools, Oakland High, Cleveland Elementary, Garland Elementary, and Roosevelt Middle School. We will complete the elections on February 18 at 05:30PM. We held our most recent public meeting on January 15. At that meeting, everyone learned three things. One, what decisions the school board made in December to address the OUSD budget deficit for school year 2526 and beyond.
Two, discuss their questions with chief business officer Lisa Grant Dawson and President Bujard. Thank you for joining us. And three, identified which of the decisions were most confusing and which caused the most far reaching changes. These are a few of the budget decisions that participants chose for an in-depth discussion at Friday's general membership meeting. Eliminate management positions in senior leadership team departments, OUSD safety investments,
establish a funding methodology and practice for safety needs, review master schedules so that there is consistency and equity across schools, convert some eleven month and twelve month staffers to ten month terms, for example, the community school managers and case managers, increase average daily attendance by 3%, eliminate teachers on special assignment that are funded with ongoing dollars except as required by contracts and memorandums of of understanding,
revise how our full time equivalent positions and other allocations are assigned to schools. Develop a quality school models for signing them. On February 19, district leaders will gratefully join us to discuss how these and other changes will look and feel through the example of four schools. They will pay special attention to the specific budget decisions that everyone identified at our January meeting. We invite all to join the discussion on February.
Our meeting begins at 05:30PM. The information and Zoom links are available at ousd.org/lcap. Thank you. Good evening, everyone. My name is Melissa. I'm representing the district English language learners subcommittee. This is our membership, which has recently, significantly increased, so we're very excited about that. So these are a couple of highlights from our meeting in January. These were the main goals of our meeting. First, to understand language development programs are available in OUSD and how they differ from each
other, know how to apply for OUSD schools based on the language programs available in each of them, and to understand our rights to request these programs and to advise on the ones that are provided in our district. And you can find all meeting materials at 0usd.org/lcap. So, we are always listening to families. So we ask that all families of English language learner students fill out our needs assessment survey. The survey is available in Spanish, Arabic, Chinese, Vietnamese,
Khmer, and English. There's also a video to help mom speaking families fill out the survey. So if you're, watching this presentation, there's a QR code you can scan, or, this particular slide also has a link to the survey flyer. For, any of you board members, if you do, like, newsletters, things like that, we'd love it if you'd also, you know, float this survey, in your newsletters if you do anything like that and spread the word. We also wanna continue to share, very important resource, resources on OUSD as a sanctuary district. So this slide has a link to the family page of the sanctuary web page,
which includes an overview of the protocols that OUSD will use in case of any ICE activity and know your rights information in multiple languages. And, again, if you are watching this presentation, there's a multiple languages. And, again, if you are watching this presentation, there's a QR code that you can scan. Also encourage you, all board members to include this. In any newsletters or kind of publications that you distribute. So we'll be holding our next public meeting on Thursday, February 27. So you can see our meeting details at 0usd.org/calendar.
Thank you so much. Hello. I am Jady Woloshen. I am one of the co chairs for the community advisory committee, special education. And these are our members, and we just expanded by two in our January meeting. And, at that January meeting, our focus was to review the, suspension data for disabled black students in middle school and learn about the impact of actions to reduce suspension. And the working group for that had originally chosen to focus on the middle schools
because the suspensions were so high, for, black disabled students. And, the twenty eighteen, twenty nineteen school year, one in four every one in every four disabled black students, were suspended, and it was nice to see that we've had a 5% decrease in that, but that, does mean that's still 20%, of those students, were suspended. And so the disproportionality, has remained largely the same. And at the same time, the other takeaway was that, the disabled black students in high school,
the their suspension rates actually went up, and those are the students that were, sixth graders at the time of, the COVID lockout. So there needs to be some, you know, thinking about about that. And, on on not last night's meeting, but on Monday's meeting, we had a detailed report on the progress to recruit, hire, and retain special education support staff. And we heard lots of good news, actually, on how the human resources division is succeeding at filling those positions.
And having those positions filled will allow us to shift the discussion towards training and increasing the quality of service that the students receive, from that staff. And we would like to invite everybody to join us on March 10 when we will discuss access to visual and performing arts, athletics, and summer programming for disabled students. And our meeting information and links are at ousd.org/calendar, and all meeting presentations and materials at ousd.org/lcap.
Good evening. I'm Raquel Johnson, one of the founding members of the Foster Youth Advisory Committee. I came to OUSD many years ago with two girls and no support. And so foster youth are very near and dear to my heart. At this current time, we have an issue. First of all, I want to acknowledge, Mr. Steven Raizer from Special Education who has created an alarm to notify our foster youth services and special ed of suspension rates for our foster youth, especially centered around IEPs.
Our young people are being suspended at an increasingly alarming rate, as we know, and that forty percent of foster youth with IEP, almost sixty percent in middle school, that's unacceptable. And I'm saying that those students who happen to look like me and most of you on that board are African American. So with that being said, we need to find a way by which we can support our young people. I've always been about supporting young people, and so I'm asking you to please come out to our meetings. Our meetings are online so you can use that from your home. You don't have to necessarily come in person like we used to.
And, I want to make sure that we know that this rate will continue to rise as long as we do not put in the right resources and understand the importance of having those students to learn and provide space to advocate for themselves. And, the last thing I will say is no young person, within any school district should be without a voice. And so the importance of understanding these two young people here is critical. The fact of the matter is redlining isn't is impacts us daily today. So if things happen fifty years ago,
those still policies are still in place. Those policies that affect our health, our education, our where we live, the unsheltered. And so we have to be mindful that providing safe spaces for young people is at our top priority. And so I ask that you come out and definitely support our foster youth as well well as any other student, but we are having, our meeting on the twenty seventh. And, again, it is by Zoom, and I hope to see faces there that normally don't show up. So thank you. Good to see you. Is there any public comment on this,
on this item? There is no public comment on the PSAC report. And are is there any board comment? Go ahead. Thank you for giving us the information and the data, particularly around suspensions. I think that's the kind of thing that we miss when we don't monitor it closely. And so consider me on alert. I look forward to joining you all at an upcoming meeting, and I would love to figure out how we can stay on top of that and track it. Not do more than just track it, but respond to what we're seeing in the data. Director Hutchinson. Thank you. You know, I I was a little disappointed that there wasn't,
more from, the PSAC committees weighing in on both what we saw here tonight, especially given the statement that was read when there was a possible merger plan and also that we haven't really gotten any direct feedback from the PSAC committees about the budget adjustment packages. You know, to be explicit, a lot of this goes against what the LCAP plan was supposed to be. And I know I've been extending an offer to the PSAC committees for months to invite you to the budget and finance committees, but I'm just really worried that we haven't had enough engagement or weighing in.
So I heard that you all are having your next meeting next week on Wednesday for the PSAC committees. Also, to let you know and to make sure everyone watching knows, next week on Thursday on the twentieth, the board is scheduled to have their final vote on the budget adjustments package and the accompanying change in workforce. That's eight days from now. There's also now been a special meeting scheduled for Tuesday, the eighteenth, to talk about fiscal solutions, but that's gonna be the first meeting that now president Brohard has scheduled with this county team that we saw today.
And so things are moving in some very chaotic directions here. I really wanna make sure the PSAC committees especially have this information, and we really need people to get involved because it's gone off the tracks really, really quickly here. So please weigh in and, and please, PSAC defend the LCAP that everyone worked so hard to develop in the first place. Thank you. I just wanna thank the, representative from foster youth. I know last month at the teaching and learning, we also had a presentation from the foster youth and the, person from the district, and I think this is something that also you're right.
It needs to be on our radar in many ways and and something we we have not, talked about more in our committees. So I appreciate that. I will be there on the twenty seventh, and we will continue to do that work in the teaching and learning committee as well. Thank you. Director Williams. Yes. Pisac, to all the parents who are doing the work, thank you very much for coming up. I I do wanna be really, really clear. This new board cycle, this is our third meeting, and we've actually moved further in our third meeting than boards in the past.
So I just want you to know that we are listening, and we're incorporating. And, actually, we're at a place now that we're directing, what needs to be done. So I can assure you that we are hearing you, and we are incorporating that. So, let's not put FUD, fear, uncertainty, and doubt in your mind. I think it's a clear communication that we should have and that is open with all of us here, that we are listening to you. I think in three meetings, we've moved further than past board meetings. So, many of us look forward to having a regular relationship.
Actually, at our teacher and learning, we had, foster youth and, McKinney Vento presentations. We're making those relationships right there, and we're continuing to build on the supports that are needed. We're supposed to be getting investments and, budgets in regards to both of those. Thank you. And are there any other board comments? Alright. Thank you for your presentation tonight. Next up is the, reports back from the collective bargaining units, item p. And you have five minutes each. Good evening,
board. My name is Kerry Kaufman. I'm president of United Administrators of Oakland Schools. I'm here to talk about many issues and concerns our members have been hearing and, the impacts to our members around the proposed budget cuts. First, and what's on top of, the mind of many of our members is the proposal to cut CSMs from twelve months to eleven months. We have mentioned this before, but this proposal has significant negative impacts to our members, our communities, our students, and our district's budget. The impact to our members are serious from missing a full month's paycheck, losing 9% of their salary to possible bumping,
and removing them from their community. I have also talked about some of what our CSMs do over the summer months, including, supporting families with food insecurity, supporting families with housing insecurity, mental health needs, and other activities. Our CSMs also support schools getting ready from in on day one with board configuration, supporting new staff, family engagement, and other activities to get schools ready for day one. However, what I wanna underscore today is the revenue work that will be lost. Over the summer months, our CSMs review the data that is completed by the district, like the CHICS survey, and,
engage with, families around, who are truant and who are chronically absent to improve attendance outcomes for the following school year. This work directly increases attendance and brings in revenue. Some of our CSMs also engage in increased revenue streams through grant writing and bringing in money to their sites. This work cannot happen during the school year when all of our students and families are present, when they really have to that has to be their focus. The proposal to decrease CSMs work from twelve months to eleven months seems short sighted and will lead to decrease in revenue beyond the proposed savings,
which seems to be around the $700,000 range. Finally, in this area, this proposed cut violates multiple areas of our UAOS contract. This is not up for debate. Our contract specifies that all classified employees in our unit are twelve month employees. It says that. It also clarifies the number of vacation days and other aspects of the job that is not being that that is currently being violated with with this recommended move. I also wanna talk about some other proposed cuts that that many of my members
are bringing up. Our union works closely with our other union siblings, and, the work that they do is vital to keeping our schools running. Principles, on average, engage in supervision for over an hour a day. By cutting noon supervisors and disallowing the sites to purchase time for noon supervisors, this will only increase. It is not an appropriate use of funding for principals to be engaging in new supervision all the time and nor does it help a school run successfully. The cuts to stiff subs is also a huge concern for our members. Our principals are required to develop plans for our students,
in their in their site plans around multi multi tier systems of support. Many of our principals rely on their stiff subs to support execution of these plans. How can we provide intervention to our students who need it without staff to support this intervention? Finally, our STIP subs are necessary in order to meet legally required meetings. Our STIP subs are usually one of the first people that that support our teachers in co in getting coverage for IEP meetings. And these teachers are mandated to be at at these IEP meetings. I know we're in a budget crisis. Tough decisions must be made.
The consequences of an invalid budget are severe, from not paying our contracts, to not paying our utility bills, to possibly not paying our salaries. These are very serious. The county identified the concerns, and they said, possibly, in nine months, if no action were to happen, we would not be able to meet our our responsibilities. However, decisions must be student focused, as well as ensure they are not clear violations of agreements that all of us have with the district. UAWS did settle our contract last year, and we appreciate that. Our contract doesn't expire until after next year.
Part of our contract was the right to reopen on salaries for next year right now. Not to sunshine a full contract, which OEA should be doing and is doing. UAWS does not seem like that this is a proper time to reopen solely on salaries, so we are not doing that right now. However, we are engaging in a joint study with the district to examine the pays of many of our members. We anxiously await the settled contract of our SEIU siblings and our AFSCME siblings, and that is extremely vital to the health of our district.
Finally, I know I'm out of time, I just wanna say briefly, the district, came to the UAOS to talk about a side letter and an agreement to pay our members for work that they're doing outside of their contract. They came to us, we signed it. The district signed it, the school board approved it. We were then informed that it is gonna be rescinded. We hope that this is addressed promptly by the school district. Thank you. Alright. Good evening, directors and the Oakland community. My name is Chris Jackson, second vice president of OEA. We are concerned about what we are seeing regarding the Alameda County Superintendent Elise Castro's
direct intervention in our district, which such as canceling the February 5 board study session. This meeting would have provided an opportunity for stakeholders and the community to discuss the budget, the district's proposed cuts, and explore alternative budget cuts that would have been less harmful to children. Good evening. Carrie Anderson, first vice president. We have a democratically elected school board, you all, elected by the voters such as those sitting behind us, many of whom used to be sitting behind us,
but they went home because it's getting late. Superintendent Castro is trying to undermine the will of the voters privately and publicly, and we will not stand for it. We urge you all as our board to resist the pressure superintendent Castro is putting on you to comply, to go along, and to put your name on these budget cuts and closures by voting in favor of them. We urge you to stand united with students, families, labor, and community. We urge the board to lead with your values and stay strong. Good evening, board.
My name is Vilma Serrano, OEA treasurer and elementary teacher as well. OEA stands against the district's proposed cuts, including the the cuts to our programs such as the Sojourner Truth Elementary. We are the the people who teach the children of OUSD. We teach and support students every day, both in and out of the classroom. We stand united against the district's sorry. I guess the district's proposed cuts. These cuts would devastate our school communities and harm our students. Not just harm our our bargaining unit, but these cuts would devastate
the entire school communities with the cuts to stiff subs, paraeducators, office workers, cafeteria staff, community school managers, delivery drivers, custodians, buildings buildings and grounds experts, and many other workers who serve all of our students. And that is a shame, especially while central office management and their salaries continue to balloon. The budget for outside contract remains bloated, and the district hides money in books and supplies and the excessive reserves. Good evening, board. Kompolites Rancifer, president of the Oakland Education Association. To our elected board,
we need you to hold strong. Our students and families are counting on you. We are counting on you to do the right thing. We are counting on you to stand with us, stand with OEA, stand with labor, stand with the community who elected you, and to show up, show us all that you will govern with your values rather than governing out of fear. Thank you. Good evening, Moore. Trish Bellinson, library technician, SEIU president. I'm here with the rest of our wonderful SEIU leadership team.
The district will continue to struggle retaining quality workers if OUSD keeps repeating the same patterns. Contracting out work is a dangerous practice that threatens the well-being of our students and our workers. We should be focused on the classified professional position positions that build lasting relationships with students, such as restorative justice facilitators and administrative assistants. Other positions, such as payroll specialists, tech specialists, and translators are necessary to the operations and contribute to the vitality of our school
district. The following consent items are contracts that our SEIU bargaining unit work. It's no wonder OUSD faces budget issues when we allow consent items to be passed without recognizing that these are jobs we already have in house. Many of these services were initiated back in August, November, and December of twenty twenty four. L 18 to provide literacy development and tutoring support for low performing students, including meeting with students in groups and one on one to provide supplemental reading support. This is the work of early literacy reading tutors.
L thirty three will supervise and teach students physical education skills during recess and lunch periods, including the rainy day schedule. This is the work of noon supervisors. L thirty four, to work with principal, site staff, and community partners to create and support the implementation of a plan for family engagement. This is the work of family engagement specialist. L 35 to provide a family liaison who will serve as a bridge between families and the school. This is the work of family parent liaisons. L 36, to provide a full time literacy support,
supervising morning and lunch recess and support with attendance needs. This is the work of early literacy reading tutors, noon supervisors, and attendance clerks. L forty four, to provide support staff to fill high needs assignments and special education programs. This is the work of instructional support specialists and paraprofessionals. It is not a matter of OUSD not having these positions available. It's a matter of disconnect between school sites and departments not understanding we have this labor in house and requires a fair and livable wage.
Outsourcing harms student learning outcomes. As we know, students need familiarity year after year, and outside contractors can't provide this stability. We encourage the board to take necessary action to end the practice of outsourcing. SEIU supports item w four and the modifications the re the resolution proposes. Our members and students depend on your leadership, not Elise Castro's. Thank you. Madam president, that was the last speaker for collective bargaining units.
And are there any public comments? Okay. You're right. Sorry about that. Alright. We'll resume the, original, agenda, and we will move back to, item j, which is public comments on non agenda items. Are there any speakers? Yes, madam president. We have 24 speakers for public comments. I will start with the first five. Okay. And they have, two minutes each. Yes. First five speakers are Ronan Gillespie, Mark Airgood, Ryan Smith, Terilyn Ran Terilyn Van Rossum,
and Myrna Barrera. Currently, I do see Myrna Barrera online. Want me to allow them to speak? Yes. Marina, if you can unmute yourself to speak. Hello. Good evening. Thank you, board of educator members. My name is Myrna Barrera, and I'm a fourth grade teacher at SJT. I have been in Oakland for six years. I'm speaking to respectfully urge the board to keep our virtual school program open at SJT as it is the only option available for many families in our district.
AJ SJT is an essential resource for families who depend on virtual learning due to factors such as immunocompromised health, scheduling conflicts with appointments, bullying concerns, and ADA accommodations. I am also here to speak on behalf of families who were not able to attend here in person or they weren't able to sign up to speak tonight here via Zoom. I have heard directly from many of our students and parents. Several students have expressed, need to tell a board to please don't close their schools.
Additionally, another parent shared that they have children at SJT, one in high school and a younger one in fourth grade. Their child has been at SJT since second grade, and they have witnessed tremendous growth in their English proficiency and academics. They prefer online schooling because it allows the qual it gives them more quality family time. They have fewer interruptions in their learning while they're going to doctor's appointments, and it gives them peace of mind knowing that their child is safe from bullying, school shootings, or any other uninvited disruptions.
The child is also able to receive more on one on one time with teachers and extra support after school, and they said that they will have a hard time transitioning back to in person learning. These families at Edge is, SJT is not just an alternative but is a lifeline that offers personalized uninterrupted learning that in person schooling currently may not have. With today's political climate and ongoing outbreaks, an alternative to in person education is not only beneficial, but necessary. And over my six years at OUSD,
I have witnessed many cuts from the bilingual school immersion programs that I was taught in, to the consolidation of schools now in SJT. These cuts are not retaining our families. In fact, they are driving them away. To raise their enrollment, we must continue to support our diverse programs and advocate for our students and families. Thank you for considering, the profound impact that SGT has in our community and families. Thank you. Are there any other speakers, mister, Alhaz? There is Tanya Kapner online. Can unmute them to speak. Two minutes. Yes.
I'm I'm Tanya Kathner. I've been a teacher in Oakland Public Schools about thirty years now. I teach at SJT and I work with Equal Opportunity Now by any means necessary teachers caucus. And we are here today to demand that you stop the closure of Sojourner Truth Elementary School online. This is a completely illegal school closure against the wishes of the community. We have a petition with over 300 signatures that we just started about a week ago. We our our our union, the Oakland Education Association, has issued a cease and desist.
This is absolutely against our contract. We were just told about this two weeks ago. We found out about it. Our community has not even been notified. Our parents do not have another option in in in reality. It will mean they go to charter schools because we are the only online elementary school. Our students go to Sojourner Truth for many reasons. Extreme health needs, special education needs. We have many immigrant families that prefer and find this to be the safest way for their students' education. This district is a scandal to be cutting our program when in fact we are
really a part of the sanctuary program for this district, especially now with the threats from ICE. This is the safe way for families to avoid, many of the fears of of having to take children to school. We have parents that cannot take their children physically to school. There are many reasons why parents choose Sojourner Truth, and this district needs to keep our program. There is not even a financial reason. You're not even paying for barely any facilities for us. We work from home. Our students are at home, and we are providing a quality public education.
And if you cut this program, all you're doing is losing enrollment, forcing people out to the charters. This is not acceptable. We will continue to organize and build our movement for our school. This school board should be defending democracy and the demands of this community. There is no equivalent. This is a unique program that should not be cut. Keith Sojourner Truth Elementary School, we demand that. We will we will continue to organize. We will not let this gem of a program go away. Thank you. Let's see. So there's Terilyn Van Rossum,
Ryan Smith, Mark Ergood, and Ronan Gillespie are online. I will, allow them to speak. Terilyn Van Rossum. Hi. Good evening. My name is Terrilyn Van Rossum. I've taught kindergarten, first grade, and now second grade for Sojourner Truth Elementary. I'd like to speak to the potential closure of our school. Sojourner Truth Elementary accommodates diverse needs while providing full day instruction. A one size fits all in person education doesn't work for all students.
Here are some challenges my students are facing. Chronic severe asthma, endocrine disorders, hip dysplasia with mobility issues, being witness to a double murder inside of a home, loss of a sibling to violence, students living in a motor home with many siblings. I have single parents that work the night shift and can't transport their children to school, parents with severe heart disease who can't leave home, grandparents and caretakers that can't walk very far,
and also caretakers that do not drive. The sudden disappearance of our program will effectively expel 107 elementary students. How will all 107 students continue to receive a full day instruction if our school is closed. Please consider these unique challenges when you make your decision to keep Sojourner Truth Elementary open. Retaining our exceptional program will have a profound and positive impact. Our students,
staff, and families urge you to carefully consider the consequences before casting your vote. Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Next speaker is Mark Aergood. Yes. Yes. So this is Mark Aragood. I'm, part of the equal opportunity now by any means necessary civil rights caucus. I'm a teacher at Sojourner Truth virtual school and I'm speaking to oppose the closure of Sojourner Truth Elementary next year. Families have chosen the program for many reasons,
many of which the previous speakers have already spoken to, but especially at this time, we have many families who have chosen Sojourner Truth because they're concerned with Donald Trump's threats to use ICE at school, to be going after students and families. We cannot allow the district to betray the trust of parents and students by putting SJT Elementary and the newcomer program both on the block for potential cuts.
Closing those programs would be a signal if the district is caving in to the racist program of Donald Trump even before it's being fully enacted in Oakland. We must defend real sanctuary policies, not just talk about sanctuary. We must defend these programs. I urge board members to vote against any closure and to stand with our immigrant families in all of Oakland against these attacks. Thank you. Next speaker,
please. Next speaker, Ryan Smith. Good evening, school board. I am the first grade teacher at Sojourner Truth, and I am speaking out in opposition of the closure of our elementary program. We have our own school site code. You are, you are violating the school board closure policy. I explained last week that many of my students' families have already told me they will not continue with the OUSD if you close our program. They know that there are other public virtual schools that are out there, and they're looking at them. Losing 107 students at the school site, which has the lowest operational cost,
would be fiscally irresponsible. We are saving the district money. Please think about how our families are feeling. There has been no notice, no explanation, and you have created panic and fear. Daily, my students have been crying, worried about their school. You need to give them clarity instead of leaving them in the dark. Please respect these families enough to speak to them now and respond to us. Other districts like LAUSD and San Diego are expanding their virtual programs. They advertise and they are reaping the benefits. We are missing out on an entire group of students by not advertising to the
homeschooling community of Oakland. One of my families explained to me that they tried homeschooling last year, but she wanted more support. Think about how many families are out there that don't know there is a free public virtual program that exists and they would benefit by joining OUSD. Spranking our most inclusive school not only undermines OUSD's competitiveness, but also shows that the district is out of touch with the growing demand for flexible innovative education options. Our petition has three eighteen signatures and is growing. Please honor your responsibility to serve the public and keep this program open.
Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Next speaker is Ronen Gillespie online. Hello? Yes. Okay. Thank you. Good evening. This is Ronan Gillespie Montez. I'm a middle school teacher at Sojourner Truth. Three weeks ago, the executive leadership of OUSD stated plainly to us their intention to close our school's elementary program, and they preemptively took the elementary school off of the enrollment website. Is this body aware that OUSD is breaking several laws by trying to close our
school without first consulting the community and the board? This district spends millions of dollars to produce these television commercials that you play before the board meetings. You give thirty minutes to the county trustee to speechify about how we're all in this together and we have tough choices to make together. And time and again, OUSD claims to prioritize students. And at the same time, some of you all have forwarded this offensive RRR plan, which directly deprioritizes resources from our classrooms and our teachers.
Sojourner Truth is not an inefficient program. It is a school that is essential for our most vulnerable populations, for our students whose IEPs require distance learning, for our students whose families have disabilities, for students who need independent study and an online learning option as a part of that. And while citing the declining enrollment by closing SJT, OUSD, as the previous speaker said, is literally forcing a hundred students out of our district because there is no plan to provide for these students' medical and different learning needs.
Some people on this board claim that we need to prioritize students by making cuts from our teachers and programs. Well, we agree that there should be cuts, but those need to come directly from the ridiculous number of executive administrators and outside contractors that OUSC spends our tax dollars on. We need to chop from the top because our schools are not for sale. We're here to keep Sojourner Truth Elementary and all public schools in Oakland Unified open. Thank you. Thank you.
Next speaker, please. Yes. Next five speakers are Rochelle Lely, Theresa Mendoza, Kim Alizani, Millian Cal Calati, and Dominique Wake. I do see Teresa Mendoza online. These will be the last, speakers, mister Collins. Hello. Good evening. My name is Theresa. I have a fourth grader and a second grader at Sojourner Truth. And I'm here hoping that, the school doesn't close because I have one son that has tics, and he's, very comfortable being with me.
And I think, my other son, he's a fourth grader. He's never been in school in person at all because of COVID. He's been with The Journal of Truth since then. And I'm just wishing that you guys would listen to us and, you know, not close the school because I think that it's best for our kids. Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Okay. I see Rochelle Lacy online. Call names and order as they were received. Good evening, students, parents, teachers, and board members. My name is Rochelle Lacy,
and I am in my fourth year teaching at SJT, Sojourner Truth Independent Study Program. I teach the moderate to extensive needs program for the K-five and six-eight students. My students in the K-five program have never been to in person school because of their age, their, specific needs, and, many of them have health problems. The students in my program are at the very extensive needs point of the full
continuum that Sojourner Truth offers to the community. We have all areas of education housed at SJT for all students at this moment, from kindergarten all the way to twelfth grade. General education, resource, we have mild moderate, classes and moderate to extensive needs support classes. The students in my class alone, save the district, I'm not even sure of the number. I have students that would need a health aide,
another aide to help them with their independent living, skills and their needs for independent living, as well as instructional support. I run a self contained program with no paraeducator support. It is just me and my 11 students on my caseload. I am saving your district a lot of money by housing these students in my classroom. The other thing is, is if SJT Elementary School closes,
my students would have to go on to home hospital. They would lose half of their instructional minutes per week and they would be segregated in education. They would be one on one with a teacher. They would not have access to same age peers, and they would be put in a more restrictive environment. Thank you. In special education, we always look to put students in the least restrictive environment. I've been teaching at SJT for four years, and SJT has a huge retention of teachers.
There have been your time. Teachers that have left. Please keep SJT open. If you would like to see what's happening at SJT Okay. Next speaker, please. Next six speakers are Emiliano Ortega, Assata Olugbala, Lee Thomas, Avi Ringer, Michael Shane, and Natalie Gallegos. Good evening, board, madam superintendent Lee Thomas, Markham Elementary School, community school manager, and former president of United Administrators of Oakland Schools. I ask you tonight, do you believe in community school managers? Do you believe OUSD families need support year round?
Do you believe that OUSD families deserve to have people available to them in the summer to help them when they need vital resources? Community school managers do. This is what we do all year round. But now you wanna dismantle us and make us go from twelve months to eleven months. You're not dismantling a program that you have helped so many people with, but you are also affecting the lives of your employees as well. Let's not forget that on your own website in a study that was done by the Stanford Gartner Center that states Oakland Community School Managers,
the community school managers play a critical role in integrating partnerships, work at schools, and academic mission to serve as high level administrators, leading leading the court leading the coordination of community work to support schools and student needs. This is on your website. This is a study that has been done. It has been proven. Books have been written about community school managers, about what we do for Oakland. So dismantling us and making us go from twelve months to eleven months, you're not also impacting your own employees,
making them potentially struggle this summer without being able to have a paycheck in July and not being able to have a paycheck until August 30. But you are putting them in financial crisis just like many of our own families are. Do better, be better, support community school managers, and support the very same people that makes this district run and support the people who you expect to come out with good educations. Your families, your students, support everyone. Keep Oakland a community school. Don't dismantle it.
What I know about McClymon's remodeling, a lot of it is based on your documents. This is your document. The money allocated, from a report 11/07/2023 states that the project is, budgeted for $91,250,000. Then the next statement is there's a $34,000,000 deficit given the scope of work required. A deficit even with the 91. That's your document. Your document related to the field.
It says that you're gonna do the bleachers and the restroom replacement, not the field, not the scoreboard. You're gonna remodel the bleachers in the restroom, in that raggedy tore up field is gonna stay the way it is. Your document on the exploring of potential shift in the spending plan that was made available on November fourteenth of twenty twenty four, you says that because of unforeseen circumstances, projects like soil contamination at McClimans, Roosevelt,
MLA, Garfield and a couple other schools, you're not gonna be able to deal with spending any money to to deal with the soil contamination. So this is my concern. You're supposed to start the work from a climate in the summer of twenty twenty five. Are you gonna start that work with soil contamination in place? Or are you gonna and it says here, you you possibly may have to delay the projects because of the soil contamination. So are you gonna delay it? I've we I've come to you over and over again about the issues at McClymonds, and nothing has been said.
You say, oh, we work together. We respond. Mister Williams, do something to make sure that that project is done correctly with the funding, the soil contamination eliminated, and we need that field replaced. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Good evening. Sorry. Good evening, board members, superintendent, community, and students. My name is Natalie Gallegos Chavez. I am a current student at UC Berkeley and the previous twenty twenty one to twenty twenty three student director. As many of you know, the school district is currently in the process of hiring for the executive safety director.
Our district passed the meaningful student engagement resolution and the all city council student union recommendation, which gave the voice for students to be a part of the hiring committee. This allows for students to participate in the process and decide who they believe will best align with what is important for our students and their district. We have seen this approach in action before, including with our current superintendent who has students involved in her interview process. So why is it that now the district has decided to exclude students from the hiring process for such an important position?
Our students have worked hard, including with Bob, on the George Floyd resolution, which calls for the removal of police from our schools. It is deeply concerning to hear that there's a possibility of hiring someone with a background in law enforcement for this position. Someone who may contribute to making our schools feel life less safe for our students. It is crucial that we put this application process on hold. This decision reflects how the district continues to fail in leading an inclusive, community driven process. One that should involve parents, students, teachers, and community members in the hiring of someone who is a key role that directly
impacts their safety and well-being. And it's unacceptable for you to continue to tokenize our students when it benefits the school district and then exclude them from the crucial decision making processes that directly affects their education and well-being. As a former student director and someone who has worked closely with many of you, I am asking you to put this application process on hold. Thank you. Thank you. Next week, is there is that the last speaker? Yep. I called those last speakers. I had Avi and, Michael Schnee. I'm sorry. I did not hear what was stated.
Correct. I'd if they're not at the mic, I don't see them online. Okay. Thank you. We will move oops. Sorry. We'll move on to item l. I'm past the thirty minutes. Okay. Point point of order. So then what we should have done is we knew how many people signed up, 23 or 24. Then we should have done the math for thirty minutes to ensure that everyone can speak. So this is amazing to me that we're at 10:00 and we've done no business, but then I would definitely like to move to make sure that the people who waited four or five hours to speak their public comments have that opportunity now.
And we haven't exhausted everyone that signed up yet. We have a a plan. Thank you. Thank you. I'd like to make a motion. How many people we have that have not yet spoken? Three? Two? Two. Excellent. I'd like to make a motion for us to extend this, for five minutes. Second. K. I just have a a question from board staff. How many more names do we have to be called that haven't been called yet to speak? I'll ask you a free to answer. Seven. Online, are they present? That's fine. I'll amend the motion to, fourteen minutes. Second. Q can we take a roll call,
please? On the motion to extend, the public comment on non agenda items, for fourteen minutes. Student directors are absent. Director Lauter? Yes. Director, Williams? Yes, sir. Director Hutchinson? Yes. Director Berry? Yes. Rekha Thompson? Yes. Ezra? Yes. Yes. Adopted. Last seven speakers are Tanesa Harris, Holly Wilson, Leslie Salinas, Adereen Hogue, Gabrielle Khan, Shannon Walker, Malekia Parker. Go ahead and come to the podium. Thanks. Sure. Alright. Okay. Thank you for this.
My name is Holly Wilson, behavior specialist, black organizing project member, George Floyd Resolution design team member, and SEIU chapter secretary. I'm busy. I must commend this institution for its undeniable skill in keeping its community busy. Busy keeping its workers underpaid so we're forced to work multiple jobs. Busy keeping community members in meetings and committees so we can feel heard, and ultimately busy keeping us in situations in which we must fight back against this very institution. In creating yet another solid 6 figure director position with questionable candidates and qualifications that
are in direct conflict with the George Floyd Resolution, the district has failed to lead an inclusive community driven process for its creation and hiring process of the executive director of safety. There need be no further touting of buzzwords like equity, engagement, inclusion, community, and anti racism as dark continues to come to light, and we see what this institution stands for through its actions. Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Hello. Good evening. Thank You because it's been a long wait. My name is Malaika Parker. I'm the executive director of the Black Organizing Project.
We are the organization along with community, educators, young people, union members, and folks all across the nation who pushed for the George Floyd resolution to pass four years ago, a policy which is now owned by this district. And, I wanted to speak to you all because in some ways, our friends Dexter and Kyla have given us a gift. They have let us know where they stand in relation to this policy. And I think now, as a board, you get to decide how you act. They are pushing to put someone in a position that that would be responsible for
safety in a district that has said that is moving towards police free schools that has a background in policing. That person or anyone of the kind is highly unqualified for such a position. The fact that they would have made it this far in the in the process means that the process is broken. It is broken. This is a nationwide example of what it means to not put safety on the backs of black children and disregard the school to prison pipeline.
You have an opportunity here to continue that trajectory or fully undermine it. As a board, you have a responsibility to hold your staff accountable. As the superintendent, you have a responsibility to protect children that look like you. You have a responsibility to make sure that when we think about safety, we center black children, that we center their future, that we center their ability for belonging. And to put to even consider someone who has a background such as that means
that you're not doing your job. None of y'all. By undermining GFR, you're also undermining the community and the will of the community. Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Madam president, there is one speaker online who was called Million Khelati. Hi. Allow them to speak. Hello. Thank you so much. My name is Millian Kalati, and I'm a third grade teacher at Sojourner Truth Elementary. Sojourner Truth Elementary should stay open. Our school is critical for families who have health concerns, especially circumstances where being in person can compromise the health of a student or of
a family member or someone in the household. Too many families in California and OUSD have a real fear of ICE, and our virtual elementary program offers more safety, from that threat. Some of our families want virtual because in person doesn't work for their child. Their child got pushed out of traditional schools for different reasons. So it allows for a safe learning environment for their child. And also some parents get to really be a part of their child's education. Some of our, so the correct process for closing our school was not taken.
This is unjust and our families deserve more. So yes, please keep SJT Elementary open. Thank you. And that concludes, public speaking on non agenda items. Item up is, item l, which is the consent agreement or, consent, agreement, sorry, minus l 18, l 33, l 34, l 35, l 36, l 44, and l 51. Is there a motion? I move the adoption of the general consent report minus the items that were pulled
that you actually announced. Second. And is there any board discussion? K. Can we take a roll call, please, mister Braekstra? Sorry. Public comment on items, l in the general consent report minus l eighteen, thirty three, 30 four, 30 five, 30 six, 40 four, and 51. Yes. Those that's three speakers, Susana Olobala, Carrie Kaufman, and Catherine Joseph. K. We have two minutes each. So l one through l seven is relative to our nutrition programs.
And I do wanna remind you, we do not have a director of nutrition, and we need to have that person in place so things can be put in order. Have a substantial amount of schools including McClimans who are not getting the kind of program related to their lunching. So we need a director. L eleven, the grant agreement with the city of Oakland is for our newcomer wellness and pure restoration. I wanna remind you, when it comes to your newcomer students, you got a director of newcomers, you got a newcomer wellness program,
You got a newcomer, counseling program. You have after school programs and summer programs for newcomers. You have, newcomer, just just everything that you have for newcomers. I want that for black kids too. It's great that you have all those things. I want everything that you're doing. I want a director of African American students. I don't wanna go into details. But if you can do it for the newcomer students, which is 3,000, that's what you have online, 3,700, and there's over 7,000 black kids in this district,
do the same for them. L 12 is for gender based violence. I'm not sure that you need to monitor what's going on with the Department of, Violence Protection Prevention in Oakland whether or not they're doing a good job. I doubt it. L 33 support for soccer after school. Y'all how many times we didn't had soccer, without borders? Can we have basketball without hoops or something for the black kids? I don't care what you call it, but we, they they,
they were voting to take the cold basketball courts away. Is my time up? Thank you, miss Assata. Next speaker, please. My name is Catherine Joseph. I am an occupational therapist out of the special education department, and I am the chief steward for with SEIU. In the event that you're going to take these items up in the future, I'm here today to express my deep concerns over the district's continued practice of contracting out positions that could and should be filled by in house staff. OUSD takes pride in hiring talented and qualified employees who are more than capable of
meeting these needs. Yet instead of investing in them, the district continues to divert valuable resources to external contracts. This approach is neither physically responsible nor in the best interest of student and staff. Months ago, we were told that OUSD faces a 95,000,000 deficit. And how did we get there? Well, one of them is outsourcing. On today's agenda alone, there are six proposed contracts that directly undermine the jobs of classified employees. Why are we outsourcing fifteen minute online literacy tutoring services when we already have early
literacy tutors in the district? How can we improve student literacy rates when the staff hired to do this work aren't supported or worse are being threatened with the loss of their medical benefits? If OUSD wants to truly serve students, the solution is clear. Invest in in house classified employees, improve working conditions, increase pay, and support the dedicated employees already in place. Maybe then the district wouldn't have to scramble to outsource these services. I urge the board to prioritize in house jobs over outsourcing. Please make it make sense for the students,
for the staff, and for the Oakland community. Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Hi, everyone. My name is Kerry Kaufman. I am the director of special education for middle schools as well as legal supports. I am here to speak on, luckily, I appreciate being called. I I wanna speak on l 44, which, director, Williams pulled. It is a special education contract. I just wanna speak to that briefly. I understand, my union siblings as well as other people's opposition to it. This contract is a contract to get support staff that will lead to them being direct hire union employees.
This is a change in some practice and is us trying to, it is that it is the special ed department listening to to the concerns. I do understand that there's still concerns around that, but this is in response to a lot of the concerns that have been brought up. This is a contract to get support staff in classrooms that are direly needed, and it ends a process with this agency to get them direct hire employees and the union con employees. The plan is by the end of the year from my understanding. Thank you. That was the last speaker for this item, madam president.
Alright. Thank you. Are there any, I'm sorry. This we just there's a motion to, prove all the Yeah. We have it. Right. Right. Let's just repeat it. Can we take a roll call on the vote, please? I had a comment before that, please. Go ahead, doctor. Director Atkinson. I have a real issue being able to vote for the consent report tonight. Beyond the fact that, I'm very disturbed about what I know happened at the agenda setting meeting and the participation of the county superintendent, I didn't receive any agenda ahead of time. I saw the agenda for the first time when it was posted on Sunday because
there had been one posted on Saturday that I hadn't seen before, but then that was even edited again. And so I didn't have enough time to go through everything and prepare. I'm very disappointed that somehow the practice of the president making sure we're notified of what's on the agenda ten days ahead of time didn't seem to apply this time. So there's no way that I can vote for this with what's gone on the the last couple of days, and we have to be able to do better. Are there any other board comments? Okay. Mr. Raikstra, can we take a vote please? The adoption to
motion to adopt the general consent report minus the items named. Director Latta. Yes. Director Williams. Yes, sir. Director Thompson. Yes. Terry? Yes. Director Hutchinson? Abstain. And vice president, Bachelor? Yes. President Pearlhart? Yes. Motion is adopted. Okay. We will now have discussion on or actually, I need a motion to approve item l 18. I will make a motion to approve it. K. I'll second it. I'm a actually, president Breaux Hart, I wanna package them all together.
Okay. I wanna package this. Yes. Just to be clear, you wanna package eighteen, thirty three, 30 four, 30 five, 30 six, and 44. Yes. They all, address the same issue. Okay. I'll second that motion. And public comment. Yes. Yeah. Actually, so we're pulling this because there's been a long practice in regards to our district actually using outside contractors for work that, our labor partners can do, or we can actually invest in house. So we actually need to I wasn't gonna speak on it until she gives me
the the okay to speak on it, but I'm a give that to you. What we really need to do is actually start to create new practices that focus on, uplifting and investing in our particular members who are doing the work, first. And so what I'm saying is I'm bringing a resolution that's gonna say we need in house contracting first. We need to look first before we go outside. So that's part of what I was gonna say. You may, but I do wanna just reiterate just checking with our parliamentarian that public comment did come first. So but continue.
Is there any public comment on this? I checked with is there any public comment, please? Okay. Thank you. Thank you. So we're at a time that I I wanna say this is a, warning shot. This is time that we need to change our habits, as a district. We're in this place where we are spending way too much outside of the district. That money needs to be spent here on our workers, on those who know the students that can do the job. Every contra every, board meeting that we have,
we have consent items, and the money actually goes out the door. And our particular, labor partners, the workers who are doing it, are actually getting underpaid. They're getting their health care benefits cut. They're actually not getting any opportunities to have any additional work put on there, and they're not bring being brought to the table. When they bring bought to the table, it's all about respect. So the point being here on this particular motion is our district needs to respect our labor partners, and we need to come to the table and see what work can be done
by those labor partners who are actually already doing the work and trying to contract out and sub subplant that work that's needed to be done, which puts our members put our own employees at risk of not getting paid or actually not surviving in their particular, way of life is a challenge. As the Alameda County Superintendent has said earlier, we have actually been overspending way too much. And one of the things that this board is is wanna do is actually direct
the superintendent to actually look at ways to save money by using in house labor. That should be a priority in our district at a time that we have budget crisis, and that shouldn't even be anything questioned. So this is the first warning shot is that we're pulling it. We're calling notice on it. Next time it comes around, gonna start moving in another direction. So I urge our district staff to actually have a conversation with our labor partners about the issues that we have here present today. Thank you.
Superintendent. Thank you. So I hear the concern. I think my response is then the next step is for the board to do the work. It's not a resolution. It's a policy change. It means you're saying you want to move away from some decentralized practices, and you want to have some guidance and guardrails around contracts. So that's the first step. Who's going to be on the committee talking to labor, talking to school staff, understanding all of that? It's not a cost savings. It's going to be an increased cost,
which would be a good thing. But let's separate. It's not a cost savings. But it's policy. It's not a resolution. So if that is something that the board desires, that's work that needs to be done so that you actually have a policy that makes sense and you can understand what the impacts are. The last thing that I wanna say is I just wanna make sure people are looking at the funding source. All the ones that you pulled are the community school grant. That's a one time grant. You're not going to have that money in 'twenty seven, 'twenty eight by the time the majority of the cohorts roll around.
So I think it's important to pay attention to when there are certain contracts, if that is what the board needs wants to move away from, then really looking at when we're talking about solving the budget issue, right, we're talking about decreasing if that's the desire, the contract spending and ongoing sources. Because that is a grant that it has a specific purpose. But the first steps would be the groundwork to change policy, not a resolution. Thank you. Director Salter Aguilara has requested that we postpone the vote on these so that she
can come back and make a presentation to the board on the twenty sixth. Sorry. I didn't hear that in the motion. And that's because she got the questions at 06:45 and did not have time to answer. That's the rationale. Is that a friendly amendment to your Yes. I did send it out at 01:30 in the afternoon. Alright, sir. So she may not have gotten it, but, several folks gonna just move us on the motion here. I I I just need clear clearly on the record, what is the motion? The motion is to postpone the vote on l eighteen,
thirty three, 30 four, 30 five, 30 six, and 44 until February 26 when doctor Arguellara can make a presentation to the board on those contracts. And I'll second that. The clarification of the record. Okay. We are ready for the question. No. No. No. I'm waiting to ask my question. But we already took board comments. No. We didn't already take board comment. One director commented, then there was another motion made. DIRECTOR HUTCHINSON. SO I DON'T WANT TO LET WHAT SUPERINTENDENT JOHNSON TOMEL SAID GO, ESPECIALLY WITH WHAT'S HAPPENING HERE.
PERSONALLY, I'M TIRED OF A LOT OF PEOPLE FLAPPING THEIR GUMNS A LOT OF THE TIME. So as a school board, as a director, if you want to do something, then like the superintendent said, you do the work, you introduce a policy change, and then it'll come before the board. But I've been hearing people talk, in some cases, for years about what they think, what they think, and we haven't seen anything introduced. And so this is serious business. And as we've seen tonight, there's been some real confusion with board leadership on what their responsibility is and who
even sets the agenda. So I hope everyone heard before that president Brohar did say she was the one who canceled the study sessions and invited Elise Castro. So just going forward director Castro. Director Castro. Excuse me. No. You are off topic. Excuse me. We are just speaking to the motion. So you're not gonna be you're not gonna be able to take over me. Director of the incident is not Everyone was silent the whole night until I started to speak here. So I'm allowed to continue speaking on the motion no matter how it's set here. Not taken off the top of the head.
Why I will be abstaining from these things tonight. And if this is the way I'm gonna be treated, you can say no all you want. Thank you. Yeah. Move it to the +1 01. 11 40 5. That's so we're gonna do Gotcha. Oh, no. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. Can we do a roll call to establish quorum? Yes. On the roll call to, reestablish quorum, student director, student directors are absent. Director Latta? Present. Director Williams? Present. Director Hutchinson? Present. Director Berry? Present. Director Thompson? Present. Vice president Bachelor?
Here. And president Brohart? Here. Quorum is present. Alright. If we go to can we have a translation check, please? Yes. Moving to interpretation announcement. We'll start with Arabic. Again, please only raise your hand if you need Arabic interpretation. Ms. Ebdi, if you can come off mute and make the interpretation announcement for Arabic, please. Arabic is done. Thank you, Ms. Abdi. Checking attendees to see if any hands are raised for Arabic interpretation. Seeing no hands raised, we will now start with Arabic interpretation. We will next go to Spanish. Again, our lower attendees' hands,
please only raise your hand if you need Spanish interpretation. Ms. Vargas, if you can come off mute and make the interpretation announcement for Spanish please. Thank you, Ms. Vargas. Checking 10 of these to see if any hands are raised for Spanish interpretation. Seeing no hands raised, we will not start Spanish interpretation. And that concludes interpretation announcement and we'll check again later in the meeting. Mr. Richter, turn it to you. All right. Let me call the question on Yes. On the motion to post Wait. Wait. Wait. Wait. Wait. I I still have a comment that I wasn't allowed to finish on the there's no there's no word done.
You can't tell me that I'm not allowed to comment. You can't. And I understand that. I You don't get to determine this You are not talking on the agenda. Is point of clarification. The process is if you think somebody is speaking out of order, then you check with the parliamentarian and then they make a ruling. There is no place in the bylaws or in parliamentary procedures that states the president has that unilateral authority. I will do that. I ask the parliamentarian for ruling on whether or not director Hutchinson On whether or not I can speak to have my comments on this item, which I wasn't allowed to do.
This thing. No. I'm not It it it appeared to me that in terms of the prior to the recess, there was a breach of adequate. And so, madam president, I would I mean, the shouting back and forth between the two different board members is not something you wanna do in parliamentary procedure. However, I would, ask and suggest to allow him to make his comments on the merits of whatever it is he was speaking. Can I clarify please that's on the merits of the proposal to, vote on items l 18 through 44?
Okay. So you may continue on the motion to postpone. Thank you. And, just so we're clear, the president yelled at me and interrupted me. So these items like what I was speaking on before, it's problematic when we don't receive the materials and enough time to review them. If these items were to be postponed to a date certain, then it would have been nice if we got that notification before so everyone involved would have known that that's what the plan is. And again, I don't feel comfortable voting for anything tonight and I'll be abstaining again because we didn't get the materials in a timely manner and I think the display that's been
shown to the community highlights what I'm really troubled about. Thank you. Director Hutchins, can we call are there any other board comments on this topic? Thank you. Can we call for the vote, please? Yes. Now on the motion to postpone the items as named, which is l eighteen, thirty four, 30 six, 30 three, 30 five, and 44 to 02/26/2025. Student directors are absent. Director Berry? Yes. Director Latta? Yes. Director Williams? Yes, sir. Director Hutchinson? Abstain.
Director Thompson? Yes. Vice president Bachelor? Yes. And president Brohart? Yes. Motions adopted. Matters are postponed. Thank you. Can we have a motion to approve, item l 51? I move that we postpone till February 26, date certain. And is there a second? I'll second it. K. On the motion? Can can I please just explain why I pulled this? I am sorry. He does have the right to speak to his motion. Well, the process is I wait to be acknowledged from a president. You may speak, director. Thank you. So again,
this was an item where I only received it Sunday night and I had some questions about accounting documents that I've never seen before from this contract. So, thankfully, mister Siriki sent it to me late last night, but I didn't have time to review them yet. So I just wanted to have a postponement for two weeks, so I have time to review the documents that I requested for. And that's why I suggest that we postpone it two weeks to the twenty sixth. Thank you. Thank you. Is there any public comment on this? Seeing no public comment, are there any other board comments? Mister Raikstra, can we take a vote on this?
Two of board members are absent. Director, Thompson. Yes. Director Barry? No. Director Hutchinson? Yes. Director Williams? Yes. Director Latta? Yes. Vice President Bachelor? Yes. President Brochart? Yes. Postponed is adopted. Alright. In the interest of time, we are gonna adjust the agenda again. So we're going to go through OEA. We'll go to item q, which is the OEA sunshine. We'll go next after that to item m, which is consent items. Then we'll go to r one, which is our legislative platform. I am going to withdraw item s three.
Yeah. I'm gonna withdraw item s three. Do you need it from the beginning, missus Sato? Then we'll go to the item w. Point of clarification. Mhmm. What are we doing now? Because we we did adjustments to the agenda at the start of the meeting. So what's happening now? So we're adjusting the meetings so that we can finish our business by 11:45, and we'll ask in a moment to extend the clock. So I thought I just heard you say you're pulling s three. Yes. In the interest of time, I am going So you can't just take it off the agenda now unilaterally in
the middle of the meeting. What are we doing? Just a second. Let me ask for the parliamentarian. Can I withdraw that motion? No. Item. Sorry. Yes. If you are the sponsor, you can withdraw it. However, yes. You can you can yes. You can withdraw. K. I am the sponsor. Then we go to the w, and we'll go to the which is introduction introduction of new legislative matters. We should record your t. Right? We'll go to the, superintendent's report, which I believe is t. Yep. T. You wanna skip that one? Okay. We are also gonna cut the superintendent's report.
Sorry. And m is, facilities. In order for you to do any of those things that you desire to do, we need a we need a motion to extend the meeting until 11:45 I will make a motion. Or some other time. I would like to make a motion to extend the meeting until 11:45. Second. You. And is there any board comment? Director Hutchinson. Yes. It's very disappointing that, you know, we came down an hour late from closed session. We had a presentation from the county superintendent that was extremely long. We had an unnecessary fifteen to twenty minute recess. And now here we are at 11:00 trying to do business with no community here
anymore, and you're just putting it together as you wish. And so this shouldn't happen this way and this meeting did not have so much material on it that we shouldn't have been able to get through it. So it's just very disappointing and this comes down to how meetings are managed. Thank you. Thank you, director Hutchinson. Are there any other board comments? Motion. Anything. Alright. Is there any public comment on this motion? Seeing no anyway. But yeah. Yes. On the roll call to extend the meeting to 11:45PM, student directors are absent. Director, Thompson. No.
Director, Williams? Yes, sir. Director Latta? Yes. Director Hutchinson? No. Director Barry? Yes. Vice President Bachelor? Yes. President Brohar? Yes. The meeting is extended to eleven time is extended to 11:45. Item on the agenda is the OEA Sunshine, agreement. My name is Kompala Tej Rancifer. One moment, madam president. One moment. I'm sorry. I need to open the public hearing. So you may continue. Open? Yeah. It's open. K. Well, thank you. My name is Kampala Taze Ransifer. I am the president of the Oakland Education Association,
and this is our sunshine. We'd really like to, share with you our vision for fully staffed, stable, resourced public schools. Our vision for the Oakland Unified School District is one where all of our schools are joyful, are safe, are stable, and a district that attracts students and families across Oakland with rich programming and services as well as one that recruits and retains high quality educators and essential support staff.
Our bargaining campaign aims to win this for all of our students and workers and to achieve a contract that supports meaningful improvements for our schools. I'd like to share the stage with our next our bargaining chair. Good evening, superintendent and directors. My name is Samia Khattab. I'm a teacher librarian at Franklin Elementary School, and, our vision also includes fully staffed schools. So OUSD has the resources to fully staff our schools and keep them open as
the beating hearts of our neighborhoods and our community. Oakland Unified must change their budget priorities in order to fully staff school sites with experienced educators and essential support staff. It must create a budget that invests in science, literacy, math, art, sports, music, libraries, rather than prioritizing a bloated central office administration. We need real solutions to the challenges our students face every day, not corporate education programs or more consultants who don't understand the everyday realities of our
students here in Oakland. Good evening. My name is David McKay. I am a second grade teacher at Glenview Elementary. Improving educator pay is also critical to our bargaining campaign here. It is investing in highly trained and experienced staff is critical for our students education. Oakland Unified must provide fair compensation for the dedicated educators and essential support staff who have the most impact on students. Oakland Unified upper management have consistently resisted increasing educator pay to keep up with the rising cost of living,
while at the same time, spending on central office management and outside contracts has skyrocketed. Oakland Unified Educator Pay lags behind neighboring districts. So when educators cannot afford the rising costs of living, they leave for other districts, making Oakland Unified a training ground for elsewhere. Every day, our students pay the price for this high staff turnover. Good evening. My name is Vilma Serrano, and I'm an elementary teacher in Melrose Leadership Academy. Our students need stability, and they need it now. As educators, we see students' needs going unmet every day.
The time is now. The school board must transform its budget to better support school sites, students, and staff. The board can do this by reducing managerial bloat and outside contracting. Oakland Unified's top administration is standing in the way, manufacturing a budget crisis to provoke intervention from the Alameda County Superintendent Of Schools, undermining the will of our elected school board and the open voters who put them in office. While we push forward with our vision for stability, the district and county are driving cuts to staff and student supports along with school closures that have and will continue to push families out of our district.
This county intervention is timed exactly when Oakland is set to be free of the state takeover process that has forced twenty years of instability and austerity. The same pattern of takeovers that have targeted socioeconomically disadvantaged districts with large communities of colors of color across California. Our students have been punished with austerity during this time. Rather than invest resources in Oakland, the takeover has forced Oakland to pay $20,000,000 in interest on state loans and pay the salary of a trustee who aims to slash the very supports that create stability for our students.
We need to be free from these outside interventions that punish students continually punish our students and our staff. For the state's failure to fund education at the levels we need, Our democratically elected school board leaders can and should work with families, communities, and our union coalition coalitions to focus on what our schools need. We're committed to fighting for stability in our schools in partnership with you and the Oakland community. We're prepared to bring real solutions to the bargaining table and work in partnership with
our elected school board and our community. And we want to end up with a contract that is fair for all of our members and that supports our students here in Oakland. Thank you. Yeah. There's public comment. Is there any public comment on this item? Yes, madam president. We have one speaker. That's Cassandra Kuril. Two minutes. Hello. Hi, everybody. My name is Cassandra Curiel. I'm the president of United Educators of San Francisco representing 6,000 classified and certificated educators in San Francisco Unified. This conversation sounds very,
very similar. Not only are we also headed into bargaining, a big bargaining campaign district, the state of California's budget, CDE advisors, so so so familiar. Board. There are things that can be done. Right? As the union comes forward and the multiple unions that have other contracts open come forward with proposals for improving working conditions, improving student learning conditions. Those things should be considered very seriously. And it sounds like you're in the same position that we are in in San Francisco with needing to review and look at how budget expenditures are matching what you
desire to have happen at your school sites. Now teachers learning conditions are students learning conditions, working conditions. Whether that is having a class size count or support staff, mental health wellness that, RJ support, which your amazing student delegates spoke about. Those are all really important aspects. And analyzing a budget for the priorities of those expenditures requires a lot of in-depth study. We know. We've done a lot of work. We've done a lot of work in partnering with our staff as well and partnering
with superintendents. In the last four years, we've had three of them. They've taken different approaches, different strategies and they all have the same challenge. How do we make cuts that don't undercut what students education and what families expect to happen at the schools? That's an important distinction because it requires us to analyze what other expenditures are occurring. Right? If we're making cuts to the tune of in San Francisco over a hundred million dollars, we wanna ensure that students and families don't think that that hundred million dollars is coming out of taxpayer money that's supposed to be spent in our schools.
So that is imperative to do in conjunction with your contract negotiations. Looking forward to fighting alongside and just over the bridge. Thank you. Are there any other speakers? No madam president. Okay. Alright. The hearing is closed. The next item on the agenda is item m, which is the consent items for facilities, I believe. And nothing is pulled. Is there a motion to adopt the items in consent in, item m? So moved. And is there a second? And is there any public comment?
Yes, madam president. It's Asada Olugbala. She's not here. That was the only speaker for this item, madam president. K. Are there any board comments? K. Can we take a roll call, please? It's on the roll call to adopt item m, which is the adoption of the general consent report for general obligation bonds. Director, Hutchinson? Yes. Director Thompson? Yes. Director Latta? Yes. Director Berry? Yes. Director Williams? Yes, sir. Vice president Bachelor? Yes. Yes. President Brohart. Yes. I said yes. Yeah.
Thank you. Okay. And I'll just note for the record that the student, board members are absent. Notions adopted. President Beauhart, disappointment clarification before we move on. When you were listing off what you were withdrawing from the agenda, I heard s three, and then I heard you say w, but I wasn't sure if you added a number to that. So if we could just restate what's been withdrawn altogether, please? It's s three. And so nothing else from w, just s three was the latest one. That's already been. Okay. Alright. The next item is, r one, which is our legislative platform,
and I believe doctor Moore is gonna introduce that. Good evening, board, superintendent, community. We have, Patty and Leilani from school services online. Oh, you can't hear me? How about now? Is that better? I'll try that again. Is that better? Okay. Thank you. Good evening, board, superintendent, community. This next item is a first read of the legislative platform. As you all know, this is an annual, adoption process for you all which guides, legislative advocacy, in Sacramento. And so, in terms of context,
we had, our, lobbyist from school services come at our last board meeting, to do some retrospecting of, last year's budget, and legislative cycle, and sharing some wins and progress. Had an opportunity to hear from any board directors at that board meeting, and also during one on one conversations, to get your feedback and thoughts on the upcoming legislative platform. And tonight is an opportunity for the board to have a a single discussion about your feedback for the first read, and then it'll come back to you all for, a second reading and hopeful adoption at the end the month.
So, we have, Patty, Herrera and Leilani Aguilaro, from school services online. They're available to answer any questions and hear any feedback, and then we'll go back, to incorporate that and bring back the platform for, a second reading, and hopeful adoption at the end of the month. So with that, President Breaux Hart, I'll kick it back to you. So again, many of these things are from, are similar to what was in our last legislative platform. Looking at again school finance, ensuring strong readers by third grade, there were some additional things included this time in terms of
looking at funding perhaps for, long term funding for more stable funding for community schools grant. Also looking at expanding our CTE funds and then, looking again some at at look the legislation that may be coming up, for sanctuary for newcomer students. So again, I'm Just gonna open it up. This is the platform that guides us for the year. These are what we'll be talking to our legislators about. This is what Patty and Leilani will help us as far as, any new legislation, and as far as the trends, bills, and things like that that we may be, asked to support,
but this is the the document that will guide that. So I don't know if there are any board, comments, questions? Go ahead. I know, doctor Moore, that you already heard some feedback from the community advisory committee for, disabled students. So I just wanted to, just lift up for the board that, I think they're gonna have some suggestions for additional advocacy to add to the platform. And then I think the other thing is, it came up in Charter Matters that there may be some not that we're proposing anything as the district, obviously, but that there might be other,
LEAs that are suggesting changes to Charter oversight at the state, and so I would just, ask that our, lobbyists in Sacramento keep us updated on those for possible, support. Thank you. Director Berry? I just wanted to lift up the potential impact of sort of the current state of, like, the threat to our students in our communities, coming from the federal administration and the impact that it may have on attendance. I'm wondering if the state is thinking about that,
what the district might also do proactively to make sure that our students aren't inadvertently penalized if, for instance, they fear coming to school. And then in addition to that, the flip is, you know, how we might ensure that they can keep up with learning if they can't actually be in the buildings. Thank you. Any other, director Hutchinson? Yes. Thank you. Like what, director Barry said, I I actually think we should be actively asking and pushing for a lot more than that. So any extra resources,
we need them now especially in these times. And, not just for help with attendance or potential attendance loss, but we really need the state to develop a defense fund. $50,000,000 isn't gonna do it. So when we're getting, lawsuits or as, you know, these threats from the feds come, how can the state help provide more supports for us? Because as a local district, we can't really defend ourselves, against the fed, and it would be really, it would be really powerful for California if we could have more defense for our laws and our way of life.
And then just the second thing is and I think we saw some of that play out tonight. As we are leaving receivership, we do have some special protections under receivers in re while we're in receivership, like assembly bill 15 o five. And so I'm worried about how it might be if we lose those protections as we're leaving receivership. And I know there was talk in the past. It would be, really helpful helpful for us as a district if we could have an extension to 15 o five for districts transitioning out of receivership.
Because the last thing we want is the day we leave receivership then all of a sudden 20 charter schools turn in applications to be here when we do have these added protections right now. Thank you. Go ahead, director. Yeah. I would just like to echo similar sentiment to, director Barry around, how to support our students who may not be comfortable, for whatever reason, coming to our school sites, during this political climate. And so thinking about not only how we can strengthen our virtual, programs, but also get, again, any additional funding for those programs so that we can ensure,
the k through 12 spectrum and also support those services. The only other thing I would like to add is, in conversations with both, assembly member Wicks and our new state senator Jesse Aragon, both their legislative directors mentioned that they are interested in supporting, districts in educator housing. And so I just want want to bring that to the attention of not only the public, but also our, our legislative team in Sacramento. And I think we can follow-up with those offices to see specifically what their plans are to see how they can support, our off,
our need, to build, not only affordable housing, for our staff, but also or I'm sorry, staff housing, but also housing for our, families. I was just wondering too along, for Patty and Leilani, if you could kind of describe the whole, bill cycle. So where we are with that with new introduction of, legislation. Sure. This is Leilani. Can you hear me okay? Yes. Okay. Great. So we are early in the process still. The bill introduction deadline is not until February 21, next Friday. So there are a few hundred bills that have been introduced already up until now,
but next week there will be, I don't think it's an exaggeration to say a few more thousand bills, that will be introduced next week. So it'll be a flurry of activity. Thank you. I I I really wanna uplift, again, the Pregnancy Leave Act. I think that is just really important for our women educators and classifieds. We know that 75% of California educators are women and that honoring the work that they do is most important, and honoring that work, especially in our classrooms. And establishing pregnancy leave act,
for educators up to fourteen weeks full pay, you know, would act and not be deducted from sick leave, would improve working conditions and help and retain our talented educators. So if we continue to keep that as the forefront, making sure that, any educator who works in any woman educator man man as well or anyone, person who is on pregnancy leave, have the opportunity. What we know, research says they lose over a hundred thousand dollars towards their pension,
and that could be possibly compounded over the life they're working. So I just really want us as a district to make sure we do the right thing and continue to support, the educators here who may need to take pregnancy leave. Thank you. Mister Thompson? No? Okay. I think that's there are no other comments? We have a comment. Okay. That's it. So just a couple things. One, just advocacy around trying to push the cola as high as possible.
That's it's gonna be a priority for all districts across the state is trying to keep up with the cost of living and increasing salaries. We all know that comes from the base. That's where every district is struggling. Super cola that tended to just be one time. I think that's one of the highest priorities because without staff, we can't implement all the programs. Definitely pieces around fifteen o five. I'm really concerned around the one time funds with the community school grant and the
learning recovery. That is how many districts are trying to sustain. We're blessed in California. It's been a much harder cut in other states once ESSER ran out. And so that's for us, up to another hundred million dollars. And so, really, and we can absorb all of that through expanded learning, or then that then requires more adjustments to try to absorb some of the things that we're doing with our community school grant and those dollars. So any advocacy to figure out ways of trying to extend and have a longer
lifeline, given we're all still mitigating the impact of COVID, would be great. So those would just be some other things I'd add. And as always, the more we can triage with our advocacy partners in San Diego, LA, Santa Ana, we'll be doing another advocacy day in Sacramento probably, I think, Patty and Leilani closer to April. So the more we're all aligned, it just makes the advocacy more powerful when we're meeting with legislators. So thank you. Thank you. Is there anything else anyone wants to add? Or is there anything else,
Patty and Leilani, you wanna share with us? Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Any public comment on this side? We have one speaker, Asada Olobala, who's currently not present. She's gone. Alright. This is not a voting item. So the next item on the agenda is r two, which is the service agreement. This is from last time. R2, which is the service agreement twenty twenty four twenty five with Ignite Reading, Community Schools, and Student Services department. Is there a motion to, adopt this or approve this motion?
So moved. Second. Is there any board any public comment? Yes. Posada Olegbala. He is not here. Any board comments on this? If not, are we ready to take can we take the roll call on the on the, Motion to adopt RDotDash2243163. The directors are absent. Director Berry? Yes. Director Hutchinson? Yes. Director Latta? Yes. Director Williams? Yes, sir. Yes. Abstain? Yes. Services agreement twenty twenty four twenty five, Oakland Public Education Fund,
Frick United Academy of Language. Is there a motion to adopt this? I move that we adopt the service agreement twenty four five, Oakland Public Education Fund, Frick United Academy of Language. K. Second. K. And is there public comment? Asada Olubala. And she is not present. So is there any board comment? Mister Raikstor, can we take the vote, please? Board of directors are absent. End of the roll call, director Thompson. Yes. Ladder. Yes. Director Williams. Yes, sir. Yes. Barry. Yes. Yes. Yes. Thank you.
And on the next item, we have s one, which is application for provisional internship permit California Commission on Teacher Credentialing named employees for school year 2024. Is there a motion to adopt this? A motion to approve s one and s two as one item, please. Is there a second? Second. Okay. And is there public comment? There are no public comments just for this Thank you. Item, madam president. Alright. Thank you, mister Hollis. Are there is there any board comment? Seeing no board comment, can we take the roll call on the vote, please, mister Raikstra?
Motion to concurrently approve or separately record s dot dash one and s dot dash two. Unit directors are absent. Director Williams? Yes, sir. Director Hutchinson? Yes. Director Platter? Yes. Director Terry? Yes. Thompson? Yes. Vice president Heschel? Yes. President Brolhard? Yes. And on the introduction of new legislative matters, item w, w one, which is the reallocation of reallocating funds for restorative justice support. Is there a motion to move this to teaching and learning?
Things are not moved. And so are we skipping to w, but new legislative items aren't moved. There's no discussion. They're just introduced and maybe read in reports now and going straight to this? Because we just jumped around again. No. That's what we're doing. The, parliamentarian, can I ask you a question? There is no referral to meetings on this one. Okay. You do it in your yes. Okay. Do it in your capacity as president of the board. Thank you. So on reallocating funds for restorative justice support, we're gonna re send that to the teaching and learning committee for a recommendation. W two, amendment reaffirming district facility programs or sanctuary for all students will also go to teaching and learning. And item w four, delegation of teaching and learning.
And item w four, delegation of authority, superintendent of schools, personnel appointments. This will also go to budget and finance. Are there any comments? Parliamentarian, do we not, as people that are introducing these items, can say a few words about these Oh, yeah. If you're if you're the proposed proponent, you you can say why you're introducing and what the legislation is, and that's to the about to the extent. K. Point of clarification. If that's fine. If we do it that way, then the board president should enter one item at a time and not lump all
three together because then we can't have board comment on all three together or the person introducing it. And so, you know, we need to get this back together. This process is clearly established. It's written in the agenda, and it's the same every board meeting. So if we're on w one, if the person who's introducing it wants to say something, that's usually appropriate, but we don't just open it up to board comments. Comments on the reallocating funds? Would you like to make a comment on the sanctuary? That will be either bachelor or Williams. Yes. I'd like to make a brief comment.
As a bisexual immigrant woman of color, I know firsthand the power of safe welcoming community spaces where a student, family, and educators feel valued, protected, empowered, and to succeed. Today, we bring forward this resolution not as a policy statement, but as an affirmation to our students and families who trust who trust us to stand with them in the face of injustice. Across the country, we are seeing waves of harmful, laws targeting immigrants and LGBTQ communities, laws designated to silence, erase, and intimidate. We cannot allow fear to dictate how how who feels safe in our schools.
Every child regardless of immigration status, gender identity, and family background has the right to an education free of discrimination and harassment. This resolution affirms what we have always stood for, that schools are sanctuaries for learning, not places of fear. And no matter who you are, no matter where you come from, you belong here. You are we are protecting our students by ensuring that no personal information is ensure is used to harm them and equipping our staff with trainings and resources they need for this for our students. Most importantly, it sends a clear message that we,
as the Oakland Unified School District, will not waver in our commitment to equity, dignity, and justice for all students, staff, and community. Thank you. Thank you, president. So basically reaffirming that our district facilities and programs are sanctuaries for all of our students and adults is a crucial step in fostering an inclusive and supportive community, really, by ensuring that every student, staff member, regardless of their background, gender identity, feel safe and welcome, that we create an environment where everyone can thrive and feel,
a sense of belonging. This commitment to sanctuary means providing information, resources, support, services, and protection to those who need it the most and standing against any form of fear, discrimination, exclusion, and and that through these efforts that we can build a stronger and more compassionate district where every student and staff has an opportunity to succeed and feel valued. I really thank, director, Bachelor for allowing me to be, cosponsor of this resolution.
I see your passion. I feel your passion, and I'm glad that, I'm able to stand on the side with you and be a partner. I know your, your love for your community, for our community, for our students, for our staff, goes unquestioned. Your activism in housing, and just really, fighting to make our society be a better place for all folks. And so I just I can't thank you enough for the work that you do, your leadership, your passion. I'm so glad to be a part of this resolution with you.
Thank you. The next item is item w four, delegation of authority of superintendent of schools, and the authors are Bachelor and Williams. Would either of you or both like to make a comment? So as we prepare to hire a new superintendent, it is essential that we as the board have oversight of key personnel decisions that affect our students and schools. This resolution ensures that while the superintendent can make, decisions on appointments and transfers, those decisions would be subject to board approval. By doing so, we can uphold accountability, transparency, and align with our district's goals and policies.
Strong school district leadership requires collaborative governance, strategic thinking, and shared responsibility in decision making. By working together, board members and and the superintendent, we can ensure that personnel decisions reflect the needs of our students, staff, and community while maintaining assistance checks and balances. This resolution is about ensuring responsible governance while allowing the superintendent to build an effective team, with our oversight. Doctor Williams? Ditto. I am not going to give a president's report tonight. I don't know if there are other,
board members who would like to make regular board member reports tonight. Director Hutchinson. Oh, I don't think you said director Hutchinson. Okay. I couldn't hear you. Thank you. Man, what a way for us as an Oakland School Board to start off Black History Month. And let me just say I am I'm very proud to be a direct descendant of an enslaved African, the great great great grandson of James Hutchinson, who was assassinated for his political activity in front of his family at a July 4 picnic after fighting and earning his own freedom. And it's like real.
The struggle continues, y'all. I'm very disappointed by what's happened today. I'm not allowed to speak on closed session, but I was furious at the way I was spoken to. Tonight we went to a recess because instead of asking the parliamentarian for a ruling, the board president got flustered and didn't want Mike to speak. So I can bite my tongue on a lot of things, but I was elected to represent over 50,000 people like everyone else up here. And, I would be doing my constituents a disservice if I didn't fight to make sure
that my seat was respected and honored the same way everyone else's was. And what we've had now for the last two weeks is, board leadership instead of leaning on experience and people who actually know how things work, thought they knew better and they messed up. And they didn't clearly come here tonight and say we invited the county here. We didn't realize that we're not supposed to be friends with our overseers. But that's kind of the connection to black history month. Some of us know what a colonizer looks like.
Some of us know what an overseer looks like. And a lot of us born here definitely know what it feels like when a racial context has been injected into our school district. So this fight has become very serious in a very short amount of time. Like in seven days, it's gone to Defcon five, y'all. And if there's not a vote made in eight days, we're pushed over the brink. TONIGHT ON THE AGENDA, THINGS WERE PULLED OFF. THINGS WERE MOVED AROUND AT THE LAST MINUTE. THE COMMUNITY WHO WANTED TO ENGAGE FOR CERTAIN ITEMS ALL WENT HOME BEFORE WE GOT TO A BUSINESS ITEM.
And then some of the business items they wanted to comment on were pulled anyway at the end of the night. We're the forty fifth largest city in the country, and everyone should demand a whole lot better than what we've seen here. So if this is how it's gonna go, like, you know, I understand people might not know how I get down anymore. But if my city and my school district is ever under threat, I don't really care who you are. I'm gonna fight. And people can cross their arms and dislike me all they want. But there's rules. There's rules. And when you don't obey the rules, there's gonna be a cost.
And I just have to say I apologize to district staff who had to deal with the beratement this weekend that they faced. Thank you. Excited this is the last item. You know, I've been on the board not very long. This is my second term, or beginning the second term. And I I just really want to, thank you for your leadership as well, at the third meeting of this year of this board cycle. It's not easy being the president. There's a lot of decisions that come at you. There's a lot of folks who are pressuring and trying to get in your space
and, really disrupt the program that you wanna move forward. But I think that as we have, come to understand as adults in our lives that, you know, at times, we do take a step back. We look at the big picture and look at the work that we're doing. And and I see where your vision is, which is really putting students first and, really looking for opportunities for us to, be the best district that we can be. It it's not gonna be easy,
but I think you have a lot of support on this board, that knows that you're trying to move us in the right direction. My my few years, I think we've actually done more than we have accomplished in the last four years. So I just wanna wanna continue to lift you up. We all are not perfect, and we're learning the job. And one of the things I learned in my job that I have now is really being professional, trying to really understand, you know, how to facilitate, which you're doing a good job. You're giving everybody an opportunity to talk.
You are listening, and and I'm gonna get off the microphone right now. Madam President, we have five minutes left. Board comment, board, reports? We are adjourned.