 I'd like to thank everybody for coming, you know, all of our partners, and thanks for the opportunity from the Education Committee to visit with you, you know, and share part of the dream, because that's what this is about. I'm Representative Kevin Coach Christie from Hartford, been involved in education a while. I started coaching back in 1980, went into teaching and was a principal superintendent, certified, all kinds of fun stuff. But anyways, it's all been about kids, you know, and it's all been about our state, and trying to help move it forward. I spent six years, yeah six years on education in this committee, so I have a lot of strong feelings about your work, or I should say our work. And let's see, I think Coop was the only one here. So we get to the bill. The lead coalition sponsor, there is a coalition of folks who are looking at moving this bill forward, and the lead is Representative Coop Lee, Amanda Garsis, and the thinking, you know, behind this, you know, is looking at ethnic and social education in schools. And when we talk about that, you know, you say, well, don't we kind of do that, you know, on a day-to-day basis? Well, no, we don't. And I'll say that on a quick note. I've asked the question of folks, what happened in 1921 in Tulsa, Oklahoma? And 99% of the time, people can't answer that question. Yet, it was one of the most devastating actions that occurred in our country's history. 100 people of color were killed during a riot in Tulsa, where community members, white supremacists and clansmen, physically in planes bombed that black community. At the time, it was considered Black Wall Street. And if you get a chance to look at a colorized video of that particular community, it was vibrant. It was an exciting piece, you know, of the great migration from the South. But it was upsetting to a lot of Americans to see people of color making progress. So, when you think about those kinds of pieces of our historical background as a country, and, you know, as you look into research, you'll see that, you know, with indigenous people, you know, you'll see it with other ethnic groups that have come in. And so, when you think about the history piece, you know, and it's not just a shock, you know, and awe. You know, on a kind of a cool piece, I was in Denver and visiting one of my nephews. And it was really cool, I picked up this little brochure. And I didn't realize this myself. But a third of all the cowboys were Afro-American. A third. I didn't know that, did you know that? I mean, those are those pieces. You know, if you think about those kinds of things, and introducing those things in the curriculum in any form, and then look at the effect it can have socially on the climate of the building. You know, I know from teaching, you know, different classes, doing different workshops, that it's just fascinating to watch the change of people's affect, even. So, when you have this opportunity to work with the most vibrant minds being our children, and if we're not giving them everything, or as much of everything as we can, we're doing them a disservice. And we're doing ourselves a disservice. And so, that whole thing about climate, people say, you know, it's funny, I do a lot of little things too, and I drive spare school bus. Well, I have a CDL. Well, I wouldn't have. But the fun part is engaging with the kids. And I don't have discipline problems. And I didn't have discipline problems in my classroom. I didn't have any school. It's about climate. And how we create a better climate sometimes is how we introduce and how we create an atmosphere within a building, within a system that creates that environment. And so, what this bill is about is helping us, you know, as a state, you know, move the needle on making sure that our children understand what's going before us. So, that's kind of the tone of it. You know, I guess, let's see, next, Mr. Dillon. Sure. State Representative Dillon Jametista. I didn't think I'd be in the hot seat in the first days of the session here in my own committee, but here I am. And I'm happy to be here to speak about H3, why I've sponsored the bill and why I'm working with a group of representatives, but also stakeholders from across the state who have brought this issue to the forefront. We have a relatively new committee. So, assuming it pleases the sponsors, I'm going to give you a little bit of the background here so you know what we're talking about. This was a bill that was introduced in the previous biennium. I believe it was House Bill 794. These numbers don't stick with me, but I think it was. And we took significant testimony as the Education Committee on the proposal. We looked at it and explored some of the feedback we were getting from stakeholders from across the state, from our agency of education, educators, stakeholder groups who work in the field of education as well. Last year was a very complicated year. We ended up having a Senate bill come across from the Senate into which we put provisions that are contained now in H3. We attached them to the Senate bill. So the House amended Senate Bill 257 during the 2018 session, which has the provisions you now see before you in the form of H3. And the reason that these provisions are coming before you again in 2019 is because Senate Bill 257 did not succeed last session. It was an omnibus package of proposals and we ran out of time. It was a tough year. We ran out of time in the legislature. What the bill does to give you a little bit of background is it sets up a process here in which a 17-member working group would be formed, composed of various education stakeholders and it's eight members who will be appointed by this coalition of groups and individuals who have brought to us the idea that we do in fact need to evaluate how we teach the human experience of all citizens in this country. The lived experience of individuals who historically had not been represented in our at times textbooks, often times marginalized from our history. And we in creating a working group set up a process for certain research to be done and for reports to be provided to the General Assembly and to the State Board of Education to begin this important work. To take it back a little bit, I'm not going to walk you through page by page. I think we'll hear from our drafters shortly on that in legislative counsel. But to give you the landscape here, the State Board of Education, which we've heard a little bit about in the first days of session, is the body that adopts standards for the courses of study in the month. It's the State Board of Education and we should at some point hear from the agency about how that process works because it's really important to understand that relationship. We also know that in Vermont we have a local control education delivery system. When it comes to curriculum, a lot of decisions are made locally about what curriculum looks like. So understanding that nuance is going to be an important part of the discussion as we look into what this bill proposes to do. Now the bill itself has some findings at the front end and one of the findings I just want to draw attention to and one of the reasons that we're here today is Act 54 of 2017. That set up a report requirement where the Attorney General and the Human Rights Task Force provided some recommendations about what's going on in our state with regard to the experiences of people of different races, different ethnic groups, and different social groups. As we get into the bill with our draper you'll see that ethnic group is defined, you'll see that social group has been defined, and ethnic studies is defined as well. And it's important to know what we're talking about here. When we hear the word ethnic studies, this has been said a lot since the bill was introduced last biennium, we're talking about the K-12 instruction of historical contributions and perspectives of ethnic and social groups, which again I would draw your attention to the bill when we do walk through ethnic group and social group upon. This 17 member working group that I talked about would meet, there are members that would be appointed by the coalition which I've already said. It would meet from at the very latest, September 1st of 2019 as proposed in H3 through July 1st of 2022 and we'll want to dig into that a little bit. There is money appropriated or at least put into the bill for the per diem costs of getting members who want to serve on this working group. That's a standard procedure. It would involve our appropriations liaison going upstairs and explaining to the Appropriations Committee why the money needs to be appropriated and what the work is going toward. It's an appropriation in the amount of $13,420. We can talk about that as we get going. There would be reports. There are three reports described in the bill. March 1st, 2020, a report to the General Assembly and we'll go through that with our drafter. A second report on December 15th of 2020, again we would get some information as we go. And finally on July 1st, 2022 there would be a report to the General Assembly. The bill also adds a reporting requirement on hazing and harassment as defined ethnic groups and social groups. So that we're getting information about what is going on in our schools and the experience of our students and our learners. There is very little I can say to you here to describe the experience of individuals who have been harassed, who have been marginalized, who have not had historical representation in much of the history that we see that we understand that we acknowledge. No one, and I'm willing to put a bet that not even former Senator Branigan loves American history more than me. I learned to read, reading American history after I dropped out of high school and it changed my life. But I've always realized that there are pieces of history to go untold. And I think it's incumbent if we want to educate our students and prepare them for the world that we live in in the 21st century, that we ensure that the information they receive includes everyone, all of us. And this bill is the first step. I look forward to working with the committee as we get started and turning it over here to Representative Gonzalez. So for the record Representative Gonzalez, Dan Gonzalez from Winnieski, and this bill is very exciting to me in lots of ways. I have a degree in ethnic studies and I was a social studies teacher. So thinking about the good work that is being done in Vermont and the holes that are currently in Vermont around what the amazing accomplishments and success of Remanters and other Americans that get missed in different places. So I also represent Winnieski, which has more students of color than white students in our K through 12. And so I'm able to see the very inventive ways that our local responsive schools are able to attend to student needs and the really big challenges there are when that's done in isolation and when we don't have the larger support, larger connections across the states to be able to do things. I also am finishing a degree in education, a doctorate degree in education. And so in that looking at the myriad of resources that we have at the national level. So there are a ton of different resources available about different curriculum, different ways to approach things that individual schools, individual teachers are already able to use and that a working group could pull from and look at. So the Anti-Defamation League, which I know comes to Vermont and does workshops for folks. Southern Poverty Law Center, Rethinking Schools Council. But these are just a few national organizations that already have a lot of work that we could rely on to pick up. I also want to make sure folks know that when there's been research done on I think today's curriculum in K through 12, we see that it has these positive effects for all across the school. So Representative John Batista was talking about part of the bill has bullying rates. So we know that most instances of bullying are around protected classes in some way. And we also know that when students of whatever background are taught about the historical and present contributions of different groups, then they are less likely to pick up other people. They are less likely to try to attack someone because they know that that group has benefited us as a whole collective. We also know that dropout rates are significantly reduced for the populations of folks that are lifted up in a way that they haven't before. So Arizona has had Mexican American studies since the 1970s. And schools that were consistently implemented those had their dropout rates were so radically different and their long-term success rates were so radically different from Mexican American students in the schools that didn't have that. And so we can see that the long-term and short-term effects are really throughout that. Another piece that I just want to kind of also wrap in that sometimes we forget when we're talking about this is that students that come from poverty also are not always represented in our curriculum. So we can gloss over the historical poverty that individuals and groups are able to overcome. And so that's one piece kind of in the way. And another small thing also, not small thing at all, but just looking specifically at Indigenous studies and that when Indigenous Americans are taught Indigenous studies, their suicide rates go down. So it's also, I think that's a pretty big outcome that we're really looking for. And really reiterating what has been said already, but in terms of that this working group is positioned in the bill to look at what is currently happening, how to enhance that and connect that and see what is possible. So the bill is not a top-down in any way, but it's said how is it that we can enhance and connect and support the good work that is happening. Thank you. And Madam Chair, if we may. Thinking about what representative Jim Batista and what representative Gonzalez was just speaking of. I'd like to say, as has been said, there's a lot of good things going on in our state. So one of those other things that we would hope would come out of this working group is best practice. So taking the resources that have been noted and the relationships that have been noted within our educational community and looking at those schools and teachers that are already on the cutting edge and giving them even more tools to do this work is one of those expected and hopeful outcomes of the working group. And looking at all of those protected classes and it is such a myriad of students that we're talking about. It's amazing, but to take them and raise them up is what this is all about. Thank you. So just being a first generation American born to a Hispanic mother, I remember like when my mother would come into school with me and this was a long time ago and just how I really hated when she came to school because she spoke differently. You know she had this strong accent, she dressed differently. So I just had that experience of growing up with a mother from another country, another culture as well. So I'm really glad you're doing this. This is excellent. And I was just thinking for me as a teacher, one of the things I think in Vermont that children are denied is the kind of the art piece of ethnicity, the writers, the musicians, the artists. And I could just see how not easily but you know it would be really fun as a teacher I think to research. Who are the writers, how does that tie into my curriculum? Who are the musicians? I think that a lot of American kids in front of Vermont kids, you know, aren't hearing like some like Piazzolla or reading someone like La Gaguse or Marquez or Garcia, you know, great writers and not seeing their art. So I'm very excited about this. I think it not only will help the population what you're talking about but it will certainly enrich and expand you know the awareness of all children. Well, these kinds of things, you know, as an educator spark us all. I was talking to a woman who was an art teacher and she was sharing her experience because she was talking hard for a while and then a part third. She's setting the target. But she was talking about the excitement of being able to share as an artist. Because she started to do research on her own even though she's not in the classroom full time. Because it aroused her curiosity and she's just so excited about what's there and the opportunities that children can have, you know, as a result of looking at this broader umbrella of our culture. Thank you. I will say I've started reading Jill of course, These Truths, and I'm interested in that. It's an 800 page poem. It's really looking at American history. The history that I was unaware of is really disturbing. You had in one court in New York, they're arguing for human rights against England. And then down the road, and it was speaking for human rights in this court, which everybody understood. I mean, well, there's another court where people are, the African-Americans are fighting for the same thing and it wasn't happening. I did go to school with a turnip. Thank you. We are going to hear from much colleagues. Do I understand that this may not be the form that you wanted, the current issue? The one distinction here is that beyond Senate Bill 257, which passed the House, we call that Senate 257 as amended, when the session concluded and then a special session was called, there was another bill introduced by three members of the Education Committee at that time. That bill was House Bill 14, so you can find it on the legislative website in the 2018 special session. There was a House Bill 14, which incorporated some of the discussions that conferees in a conference committee had looked at relative to the proposal that is now before you. So there is another point of discussion there about what that H-14 of the special session looked like, and I'm sure this committee will look at that and compare it with this and work with legislative councils to understand those changes in full. But that's a point of discussion, and I've heard some conversation with the other chamber about that bill as well. Thank you. We appreciate it. This is a nice change for our committee to actually be working on some of the bills I think. I'm looking at a meeting with my son, and we will be looking at plans to move forward. Well, thank you all for your support. Like Madam Chair said, this is one of those opportunities that these legislators don't always have, where we can really make a super impact on 87,000 kids, the last count. We're in that range. Give or take a couple of kids, but it's in that range. That's a lot of folks, let alone their parents too, because there's an uptick. Kids bring some cool things home, and hopefully we can add to the cool things they bring home. So thank you. Thank you. I'm going to slide up and go in there. We can swap. No, no, it's fine. I'll just sit on the back. I'll stand up. What's your favorite era in the American history? I'm interested in talking. I'm very interested in this. I will take that point like that. Yeah, you know, it's a pretty bold statement. Trust me, not everyone has a Martin Van Guren answer. Really? That's a very sweet answer. And it was a cover-up. 19th century political... I mean, it's all really fast. He appears to be here. He probably was removed into multiple mediation. I will. I'm going to figure out how to get back up again. So it should take 15 minutes for it to do that again, but if so, this button is entered to use the numbers. And then what do you want to do upstairs? Do you need to help me out? I'm like, yes, that's fine. You don't want to be at anything else or something else. Okay, great, thanks. Okay, so for the record, Jim Damari with Wedge Console, we are walking through H3E, which is an act dealing with ethnic and social education in schools. So to go through the purpose of the bill first, the bill proposes to create the Ethic and Social Equity Standards Advisory Working Group to advise the State Board of Education on the adoption of ethnic and social equity standards into statewide educational standards. It also proposes to acquire the State Board of Education to publish, to the extent consistent with state and federal privacy laws and regulations, data on student performance and hazing, harassment, or bullying incidents desegregated by student groups, including ethnic and racial groups, poverty status, disability status, English language learner status, and agenda. The bill starts with a number of findings, and I won't go through them all. Rep. Jean Patissa highlighted one of the very sensitive findings, but just to take you through a few of them. So in 1999, there was a report that was published. And the key findings from that report, I'm going to lie in nine here, is that racial harassment appeared pervasive in and around the State's public schools and observed that the elimination of this harassment was not a priority among school administrators, school boards, elected officials, and state agencies charged with civil rights enforcement. That's 1999. In 2003, there was a follow-up report and that found that the problem persisted and one of the many problems highlighted was curriculum issues in the State's public schools. In some instances, teachers employed curriculum materials and lesson plans that promote racial stereotypes. And one of the conclusions was that there was a need for a bias-free curriculum. Then in December of 2017, as Rep. Jean Patissa mentioned, Act 54, there was a report and that report found that education is one of the five state systems in which racial disparities persist and need to be addressed. And we want to say that one of the main suggestions for accomplishing this was to teach children from an integrated curriculum that fairly represents both the contributions of people of color, as well as Indigenous people, women, people with disabilities, et cetera, while fairly and accurately representing our history of oppression of these groups. And then lastly, there's a finding, funding number four on line 17 that says the harassment of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, questioning, intersex, asexual, and non-binary communities, other students of color, and students with disabilities and lack of understanding of people and power about the magnitude of the systemic impacts of harassment and bias damaged the whole community. Okay, so then the next part of the drill goes into definitions. As mentioned, there is a definition of ethnic groups, of social groups, and ethnic studies. So let's start with ethnic studies on line five. That means the instruction of students in pre-K through grade 12 in the historical contributions of perspectives of ethnic groups and social groups. The definition of ethnic groups is just above. It means non-dominant racial and ethnic groups in the United States, including people who are Indigenous and people of African, Asian, Pacific Island, Tecanics, Latinx, or Middle Eastern descent. And then social groups on line eight is combined as females, people with disabilities, immigrants, refugees, and individuals who are lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, questioning, intersex, asexual, or non-binary. And the next section deals with the creation and composition of this advisory group. So it's comprised of 17 members. Eight members were members of and represent the interests of ethnic groups and social groups. A Vermont-based college-level faculty expert in ethnic studies, the Secretary of Education, the Executive Director of the Vermont NEA, the Assistant Attorney General in the office of the Vermont Attorney General who experienced working with the Agency of Education on racial and social justice issues in schools, the Executive Director of the Vermont School Board Association, a representative of the Vermont Principles Association with expertise in the development of school curriculum, a representative of the Vermont Curriculum Leaders Association, the Executive Director of the Vermont Superintendents Association, and the Executive Director of the Vermont Independent School Association for designees. The coalition, the Vermont Coalition for Ethnic and Social Equity in Schools, appoint the eight members who represent ethnic groups and social groups. And then the working group is required to represent the breadth of geographic areas within the state and to have the experience in the areas of ethnic standards or studies, social justice, inclusivity, and advocacy for the groups they represent. The first meeting is to be called by the Secretary on a report September 1, 2019, and the group ceases to exist on August 1, sorry, July 1, 2022. It's a three-year existence for this group. On line 15, the appropriation, as mentioned, is $13,420 per fiscal year 2020, and that is based on a formula. Basically, it's a per diem calculation and statute that drives that figure. And that money is paid to the members of the working group, or not otherwise, state employees, that get paid for their work on this group. The duties of the working group, the first duty is to review statewide curriculum standards adopted by the State Board of Education and on a report June 30, 2021, recommend to the State Board updates and additional standards to recognize fully the history, contributions, and perspectives of ethnic groups and social groups. The recommended additional standards are required to be designed to increase cultural competency of students in pre-K through grade 12, increase attention to the history, contribution, and perspectives of ethnic groups and social groups, promote critical thinking regarding the history, contribution, and perspectives of ethnic groups and social groups, commit the school to eradicating any racial bias in its curriculum, provide across its curriculum content and methods that enable students to explore safely questions of identity, race equality, and racism, and ensure that the basic curriculum and extracurricular programs are welcoming to all students and taking into account parental concerns about religion or culture. In addition to that work on curriculum standards, the second duty of the group is to review all existing state statutes regarding school policies and recommend to the general assembly to put in statutory changes with following goals. I don't propose to read through all of this because it's very similar to what we've just went through for the curriculum standards, the same principles that are involved here, unless Michelle would like me to. I wasn't going to go through all of this language line by line. It's very similar to what we went through with the goals for the curriculum, but I'm happy to read through it. So, first task is to look at curriculum standards. Second is to review statutes around these principles. In the line 16, the third is it has to issue a report to the general assembly and include in this report any statute, state board rule or school discipline policy that has identifiers, name, review, or amendment in order to, again, it's a long list here of things to be looking at, along the same lines we talked about. And then line 19 reports the working group show on and before March 1, 2020, submit report to the general assembly that includes the membership of the group, its schedule, its plan for accomplishing the work, including the timeline for reviewing all state curriculum standards and force recommendations to the state board of additional standards. Its plan to accomplish the work which includes the review of state statutes. The first report coming back to you is basically who's on the group, its schedule, and its plan for accomplishing all this work it's doing. The work content. And then on line 10, there's a second report due that is on report December 15, 2020 which includes, again, the membership and its schedule. Now recommended statute changes and that's coming back with recommendations and recommendations for training and appropriations to support implementation of the recommended statutory changes. And then there's a third report due July 1, 2022 which includes any further recommended statutory changes. And again, recommendations for training and appropriations to support implementation of the recommended changes. These are all the dates that were in the written review. The date's been updated. And then lastly, the section due to the state board. So the coalition or the advisory group is giving them this recommendation on curriculum. So the state board shall on report June 30, 2022 consider that report. So consider adopting ethnic and social equity study standards into existing statewide curriculum standards for students in pre-K through 12 and shall consider the report sent by the working group when determining the standards to adopt. So this does not mandate the adoption of new standards. It's requiring the state board to consider. So the word consider. And then the second section of this bill deals with the dues of the state board and this has to do with reporting on education statewide. And with this report we're due looking at page 12 as it says on line 5 to the extent consistent with state and federal privacy laws and regulations data on student performance and hazing harassment or bullying incidents shall be disaggregated by student groups including ethnic and racial groups property status, disability status English language learner status and gender. And the effective date is on passage. Questions? Who are we going to want to hear from? We'll talk with the other folks soon but are there groups that you would like to hear from as we move forward? Who are we going to want to hear from? The agency. The coalition. The state board there. The students and guidance from the coalition. The school board. And as we call them the bees. The bees. The school board association You know, maybe a committee or group come from another state that has already done this or that new research has done a really good job of developing a program like this and have them talk about how they did that what process they needed. I think some of this was based on Oregon. I don't remember actually. Yes. Okay. And we have somebody that can speak. Madam Chair. Yes. I don't know who would hear from on this but I am curious how the reality of the new position of executive director of racial equity and racial advisory panel I know that's more looking at state government and this is specifically the schools but of course I would hope that there would be some I see that they're not named as one of the 17 and so I'm just curious whether the plan interface is maybe from the response Maybe some students are there student organizations I'm sure the coalition will be helping us with that. They will. Yeah. I think it is helpful for us to hear the experiences. So I was going to mention Rep. Matisse mentioned H14 which is the bill that was in the special session and there are too many differences what you have here. It's just the first slimmed down the findings a bit and second it took away the responsibility of the working group sorry the advisory group to reduce their statutes. Excuse me. It took away the responsibility of the working group to reduce their statutes. Yeah. There's a senate. Okay. Well and just that I was just reading and I believe that that responsibility does lie with the racial advisory council and the executive I'm pretty sure that's part of their responsibilities that review the statutes. So I don't know the reason it came out of one of those is because it speaks to that connection. Yeah. Folks ready to take this one up? Yes. Next week we're on.