 meeting to order. Tonight's meeting, our purpose was or is to appoint a new board member from Brookfield and to also make some policy, have some policy discussions and some decisions. So we do have a candidate for the board who is at a required training and I told him we would be able to interview him around 6.15 so I'm trying to honor his time commitment and so what I'm what I may do is have us take some public comment and then at 6.15 we may move on and then if folks feel like they need more time to speak then we'll continue after that time period. Also if folks are interested in the flag policy discussion we will open up public comment for after the board has some discussion on that so so that if you want to hold off on comments regarding the flag policy just for the in order to allow the meeting to move forward as it needs to. So in public comment we allow speakers three minutes. We tonight again because we're on a little bit of a time crunch I'm not sure there's a large group here so I don't know if you have if there are certain people who are sort of going to be the spokesperson for your group. The other thing is is if if you're all speaking to the same issue if we if we if you don't have anything new to add if we can just sort of keep our comments fairly brief and and just adding new additional information that would be helpful and again we have a fair amount of work that the board needs to do tonight we do want to hear from the community but we also need to take care of our business and we also we can't respond so other than letting folks know our complaint procedure which is on our website if you haven't seen it already so we did not create a speakers list so I've got to figure out how we're gonna have the first person speak I guess you want to raise your hand and be the first person let's let's see who is interested in sharing their comments those online can also raise their hands I'll prompt you if I see any okay okay please state your name and where you're from John Heltant I'm on the Westbrook Field East Roxbury line I have a parent of three students at RUHS and RTCC I'll save my flag policy comments for later as you requested I want to talk about politics so I heard Superintendent Millington about three months ago say to this board that he was hoping to have politics out of the school and to just educate students and yet I see politics all throughout the school today what's worse is that leftist ideology politics is permitted and conservative ideology is punished the BLM flag is a good beginning for this commentary the flag has been permitted to fly for two years yet students with don't try it on me trump 2020 only two genders a hat with a gun and other conservative political ideology were made to turn their shirts inside out not return with them take their ball caps off or tape up the emblem etc let's go brandon a populist phrase which disparages the president of the united states as a rallying cry against covid policies and lockdown practices was chanted a basketball game those students were made to attend a restorative justice meeting prior to being allowed back at games no actual foul words were spoken but their populist outcry was admonished a ted talk video was provided at ninth graders about sexual violence a good topic you would think as sexual violence is unacceptable the video's host only spoke of us supreme court justice cabana president donald trump and white men in my profession the last time i checked black men hispanic men asian men pacific islander men all races and creeds of men and in fact women have engaged in sexual violence you know only white men were talked about in the video most recently the chick filet fundraiser the chick filet owners have made no excuses for their strong christian beliefs they believe in heterosexual marriage they are pro-life might this run counter to pro trans or pro homosexual culture culture indeed it does but that does not mean that they bash or demean people in those communities it means that this is america and if you don't like chick filet's religious or political beliefs then don't buy their product that's how america works the free market dictates what succeeds and what fails it is not for the os sd to pick winners and losers that is a form of discrimination by a government entity the fundraiser should have been allowed to continue if the community did not support the fundraiser and it flopped or if the community supported the fundraiser then the students would have received a good education on how the free market works what they were taught though is that a few loud voices and a superintendent single voice rules over them you taught them the unamerican doctrines of totalitarianism where a few outweigh the many these are all examples of leftism and subtle critical race theory in our os sd school district this type of teaching is not okay no race of americans should be targeted or demonized the os sd should not be picking political winners and losers um okay that's about time we gave you a little bit of extra there okay thank you very much if i could add to that my name is chris hurley i live in braintree the sergeants are here with us this evening they raised their son locally here he was a baseball star he was an athlete he went through this system graduated went on to become a franchisee owner at chick filet now we just canceled chad sergeant one of our own cancel culture is now in our school i would like the board and the administration didn't give us one last night as far as i'm concerned a good reason why now chad sergeant is on our canceled list this is the kind of person i want my son to be caught i want him to get through this school system i'm gonna graduate go on to school become a successful businessman business owner just successful period i've had a hard time trying to describe to him this week what has happened with this team and why now chad sergeant is the enemy of our school system and now our public community we have two businesses here one on the right one on the left this business is big it has tax documentation that shows who they donate to it donate to republican candidates and conservative ideology over here we have another business they are big they have tax documentation also that shows that they donate to liberal ideologies and democrat candidates you put the flagpole of one in the front yard and you canceled and banned the other one completely how is that not a double standard how do we explain that to kids thirdly before this is over with the test scores here are disgusting what we learned last night and i didn't know this here's a failure on my part for being a parent you have disasters in the bathrooms drugs no doors how are these kids using the bathrooms the sex that i've heard it's going on here what was said last night five or six different people have applied for school choice now kids are going home telling their parents they don't want to go to school here and now canceled culture is here you have according to last year's numbers 36 percent have taken at least one ap exam 15 percent have passed mathematics proficiency is at 21 percent reading proficiency is 48 percent are you kidding me where do you guys find the time to install the woke ideology when our scores are going down the tubes we're putting our kids here to go to school to learn something it isn't a social club all day long everybody's offended i'm offended now nobody cares that's fine i can handle it where are we going to go from here that's my question what are you folks going to do about these scores we're well beyond the fundraiser at this point because it's obvious we've got bigger problems please for the love of our children will we put them at the top of the list and think about them first i'm sorry to get loud i'm a little upset this is my son we all have children here there's more out in the community that are upset they can't make it here tonight hopefully they're online somebody needs to speak up for the kids i'm done thank you i'm wane towns and then i'm a parent with a child here at grand office school and i was a little bit disturbed when i learned of the shutting down these children that on the baseball team from having a fundraiser to get equipment that will better perform their game and their dreams and because of woke all ideology that we're pushing on to our children because somebody disagreed with a brand of a company that they wanted to use as a fundraiser is uh when are we going to start putting our children first and let them live their dreams and stop pushing all this on to our kids all the time it's getting to the point where it's a little bit ridiculous there's a lot of brands that i disagree with but i'm not going to try to shut down children from their dreams and raising the money that they need for the equipment that they need and to be able to go to an event that they would like to go to it's just we need to stop pushing this on our kids and let our kids we as parents we do the best that we can teaching our children what we believe is right but we don't want our kids going to school and being pushed all this ideology non-stop it's getting to the point where it's a little bit ridiculous we are at six fifteen almost and we have a candidate who was uh willing to take time out of a required training so we've heard from folks we hear what you're saying um and i think we are going to move forward at this point there'll be time for uh on this issue can you hold on just one second so it can i just have a raise of hands of people who still want to speak with new information or a different point of view on this issue okay so we have two people and we have a couple online so what what i'm going to try and do out of respect for our candidate is i'm going to move into that part of the discussion because he's taking time out of a training that's required let me see if scott let her do her job please let her do her job sir thank you scott would you be would it as you can tell this was not something that i could foresee so i apologize for that um when will you be how is there a way that we can uh contact you to let you know when we're ready for the interview same with you jevon it's fine uh i have no problem doing this uh at a later time and i know mr millington does have my contact info and some of your board does as well if you want to try to shoot me a message and we can try to arrange that different time that's not a problem so it will probably be a little bit later tonight but um in order to have a little bit more time to hear folks um we'll we'll get back to you because i don't want to i don't i i realize that you're popping out of a training and i don't want you to miss it no please this is important and i have no problem taking that back seat okay and scott i'll i'll email you um internet not internet cell phone connection isn't the greatest here so i apologize for that okay no worries yeah and debon you're all you're okay just waiting okay thank you i appreciate it okay so um oh okay uh so there's nicky tab okay uh so uh does anybody did anybody see who was first here well we have john spoke up so um again can you just tell us your name and where you're from yes john claire k lbr workfield claire um and i don't i don't want to take a long time i've written about the subject then i've been writing about a long time but i'm an attorney i don't know how many attorneys are in the room but if there are any i'd like them to tell me why this is an impartial government body when you are as mr hurley has indicated embracing one political ideology whatever you might want to call that as a platitude it's very visibly a political ideology for one party in this country and now that's the issue because now that we're talking about chicken we're going to look at the past sins of a corporation to kids who do not politicize this event it's now been politicized by others because somebody spoke up and now we have a lot of people speaking up because these voices have not been heard about an ideology that does not belong at the school platform maga is a sentiment it's not a political organization if we put maga flags up would anyone complain would that be inclusive or divisive now mr millington i believe the name correct has violated the law you violated the first amendment saying oh i have the power under these regulations just not absolve you of compliance with us federal law and you have a problem with that you're gonna have a problem going forward and so now i think the real question is how you continue to maintain that flag i really think that the superintendent has a duty to remove an overtly partisan ideological flag i know there are two sides but that's why school has no business favoring one fundamental first amendment law does not get obviated by school regulations giving someone carte blanche power to decide whose chicken they like as far as i understand the kids chose this because there isn't one in vermont i've never had this but furthermore this also raises the issue of socio-emotional learning and conditioning children for race and gender based on theories i don't see the academic credentials in this gentleman or this school body to be making these kinds of decisions for children's emotional condition and there are a lot of experts out there in psychoanalysis who are saying this could be very damaging for children so before you experiment on them i think the point has been made about math and reading i think we were told that was going to be done with these kids and now under covid i don't even know that testing is being maintained so it's like oh look now we can help them stop being white supremacists it's highly offensive and that's another whole matter and so maybe that should be discussed with the children too both sides of that issue tomas soul would be a great resource if you haven't read disparities and discrimination before attributing every disparity to white supremacy maybe you should read his book he's a magna cum laude graduate of of harvard university and an economist not kendi uh ibram kendi who has no credentials so ultimately this board will be responsible this is an ongoing issue and the answer is for government entities legally to exclude both sides and not to engage in in the emotional reprogramming of the subconscious of children if you haven't you know heard of um brave new world or you know any of these things how about the clockwork garnish fundamentally bad idea when government tries to recondition people especially with anti-racism that is hateful agitating and angry and you see the evidence here and then we're told we're all racist because we like Martin Luther King you cannot have equity and inequality in the same room okay they don't coexist this is my background i'm done thank you i studied social justice for 30 years as a lawyer and i asked you to look at what you're doing it's unconstitutional for the record take the flag down take the flag down thank you okay uh we have folks in front of you uh so tev um my name is tev come and i teach english so studies at the high school um i'm also the vice president of the union and i wanted to abide by your original direction to save comments on the sort of issues surrounding the flag for a later date so i certainly have things to say to that effect but i'm gonna save them i just want to um simply kind of convey um a message really that norah had hoped to convey um which is it's getting to that time of year where there are certain positions which are grant funded and which in in past at least in the past couple of years it seems like because of the nature of the directives that have been given to lane um kind of necessitate ripping positions which are extremely likely to be refunded and so we just wanted to flag that as wondering if there if there is a way to re-examine that language to do a way that we could have that stability of folks who you know i think there's mutual interest in wanting everyone to have a predictable transition at the end of the year and you know have those folks come back and i realize there's a lot of detail so i just wanted to i know that's not the issue that most people are here tonight but i just wanted to get that on the record uh while i had the chance and again i'm hoping that i'll have a chance to speak to some of the other stuff later but i'm going to hold off unless you tell me that that was my only shot okay uh emily hi um my name is emily baker i graduated from r u h s in 2021 and i've been in bookfield vermont but i'm currently going to northern vermont university as a childhood education major hoping to pursue an education as a future educator and i'm here to state my thoughts on the flag policy and just share my view as a student coming from this school education from randolph and my opinions on that but i'm in the same boat as mr pelman and i will hold my comments on the flag policies until a later date i just because i just wanted to make a quick comment i mean one of the things that chick filet stands out in my mind is associating with is the number of times that they were shown on the news being the ones that were there with the doors wide open taking care of the hurricane victims taking care of the tornado victims and being a general big help to the community so i just would like to leave that as a can you just speak your name martha your town martha right okay thank you there um cathleen mason so i'm here today because this isn't about chick filet there has been a long-standing underlying rumbling of homophobia and transphobia running through our community for a long while and this past week the chick filet fundraiser emboldened parents community members and children to outwardly express hatred disdain and just terrible things for anyone who either is gay or trans or aligns themselves with the gay or trans community and so i believe that the members of this board our superintendent our administrators our educators our coaches our volunteers our children want and intend to create a just safe and inclusive learning environment but unfortunately we are in a time where that is not fundamentally true we must have quick and thoughtful responses to challenging issues that come up in our community because when issues arise in the community is not just about the adults responses it is the message the adults send to our children and here is a little bit of what's happened in this past week alone two children wait on top of the stairs to pour water on the head of a child because she wore pride a pride shirt oh you're one of them they said at chick filet's fault she has the floor you need to keep your comments quiet for now oh he does speak after the chick filet fundraiser was canceled a student athlete leader wore a homemade shirt saying eye heart chick filet walking past other children and children would have that have two moms the message was the chick filet fundraiser was canceled because it was not inclusive of all identities and that response of a child who was considered and a leader in the community wore a homemade shirt expressing that disdain is that what we want to show our children that that's what a student leader does on facebook forum today a parent expressing dismay because two children yelling to another child hey you dirty and word that is the vitriolic hatred that has been rumbling through our community it is not politics it is bias it is discrimination and it is not okay and what i'm asking for from this board is we establish systems frameworks of education for all school associated coaches volunteers educators administrators that provide them with guidelines to ask questions like what is the goal of this committee is it to raise money for all our children will time i asked for a framework in education for all of our people in our community so we can do better because once we know better we do better we have how are we doing on the one one two two okay we'll move to the online folks uh pushy yes hello i'm a student at ruhs my name is stormy trombly um i'll keep my ideas on the flag for later but first off on the i would like to talk on the first comment that was made in this meeting so saying that you are pushing liberal ideology is interesting to me because you you listed one of the liberal ideologies that you can't perform in a school setting is you can't wear a shirt that says there's two genders well that's simply just social science there are not two genders and that's proven i think you need to look back on what made you say that and educate yourself because liberal ideology is not just something that makes you uncomfortable it is something that is it is something that can be proven and it's more than just Chick-fil-A you did not have to follow through with a fundraiser from a controversial food chain in the first place you could have found someone so much more credible and someone who could have brought good views to whatever you think that is i okay i'm done can i say something please state your name grace hellfant i go to r u i'm at r tcc i'm a student there um for the chick-fil-a thing you don't want to support it don't support it you don't have to buy it that's like you don't like a brand or something you don't buy it let the kids do their thing they're trying to raise money for their school they let them do their thing it's chick-fil-a you don't want to buy their chicken don't buy it if you're offended by it and i also wanted to comment on the kids that have been made to take off the let's go brandon t-shirts or there there is only two genders um they are allowed to speak their mind they allow to express themselves they can't go around being scared that somebody's going to get offended you're in a world where people are going to get offended you cannot go tiptoeing around scared to express yourself so i think that students should be allowed to express themselves at school and if you don't want to buy the chick-fil-a don't buy it if you're offended by it don't buy it but kids are going to want to raise money for their school and they wanted to do that and they were excited you should have seen them all they were so excited they're like ecstatic they're going to go buy chick-fil-a and raise money for their school and for the baseball team or whatever team it was and if you do not want to buy the chicken you're offended by their beliefs that's fine that's your opinion don't buy it but don't ruin their experience in high school emily's here but she's gone once and you've got a dog uh dog you're coming you're coming i'm coming um the thing that occurs to me is that we have a lacrosse team that's promoting little Caesars and a baseball team promoting chick-fil-a and these are athletes and we're promoting food establishments that base pretty much all of their attraction on fat calories and calories and so it's enormous amount of fat and calories and it seems like that it's incompatible with athletic teams so i'm not going to speak to the liberal conservative whatever issues about it it's i think we could find something that's more consistent with our athletes trying to become better athletes and connecting in with some kind of a business or perhaps creating their own uh businesses they do there are people in the community that would hire them to do work molons wrangling when i was a kid and when i wanted to play little baseball i had to go out in molons earn your stuff like that i didn't just connect in with some restaurant anyway but that's my opinion i think that we should be focusing on something that promotes health and athleticism and not something that promotes that we have an enormous enormous problem with obesity in this country and it's it'll make for a lot of very unhealthy and very unhappy adults okay uh i'm going to alternate back into the room do we have anyone else in the room and again if you can if you can just add new comments we've we've heard we are hearing sort of the same thing over and over again um except now we're offending the vegans now we're offending the vegans and the people who don't like fat it doesn't end you don't have the floor yet hold on here uh how about albie wood do you have something new yes hi my name is is al wood um business owner in randolph i graduated from randolph union high school and um i guess my concern was over the comment about all the hatred at the school i find that i mean i have other issues with the flag um six kids three bio three adopted the adopted ones are from africa so obviously black been dealing with with these kind of issues for 20 years now or so but that being said the the hatred comment before i find it really disconcerting that there's so much supposed hatred in the school i have kids come to my my um sugar house from time to time i have a nephew there this is the i've heard of a few rumblings but the kind of sentiment that that the woman i forgot her name spoke of i don't see that in the randolph community as being as adamant as she's described it and if it's happening at school then those people children obviously need to be um dealt with accordingly but when you're um when we as a community are focusing at school on sexual identity and that becomes the main focus versus actually doing school work that's a big issue that needs to be addressed and it has to be addressed as it was earlier in this meeting talking about the the school scores that needs to be the focus that this school and community needs to um be about and also being able to truly identify what different organizations obviously support blm has some big issues that need to be addressed that organization has and will be probably addressed over the next year or so with some of their financial dealings they're not the supreme organization to represent the black community by any means and putting a flag up there to to say that to people is foolishness so that's that's my comment um for this committee so far this evening okay uh joe vocey joe you're from you're from randolph right can you can you can you hear me can you hear me so i don't have a whole lot to comment on the chick play thing other than the fact that the school is just not being inclusive of all sides they're only inclusive of one side in the side of their choosing but and and and we can well see that but while you can't have chick play but maybe you can have burger king the the pieces i think that are that are more important to me is a the last five years my taxes have gone up 35 percent yet i don't have a child in their school that that being said i don't mind paying my paying the way but what i do notice is if you go on zillow and then look at a randolph property what we look at is is there's schools for greats or the scores for great schools summary so the score the test scores show us as below average yet up yet we're paying 35 percent more to fund these schools and they've actually gotten nowhere and the last i and our rating is a five out of ten so a five out of ten last i went to school in a space that i graduated my high school in 1977 but that was a miserable failure and and i truly believe that that that's what we are is a miserable failure in the 60s we can't we through the if we if we look at what happened in that era we had a revolution and woodstock and all of that and we and we took civics out of school and we brought in what we call social studies and this is this i think in part result everybody thinks they have a right but they don't know what's even written in their own constitution that that that's said i think what as we look at climate marches and and and BLM marches and stuff like that i think the schools need to more get out of this business of whether chick-fil-a wants to sponsor their baseball team and provide monies to our community which may reduce our taxes and maybe just maybe we could go back to teaching kids civics and get a greater greater score than five out of ten in academics you know it's it's it's interesting that that i i met this young lady at where i work in a cafeteria and i go to the cafeteria and i gave her a dollar 35 for for a coke she she turned then i realized i had some change and i gave her actually two dollars i gave her i gave her some gave her the 35 cents after the fact and she looked at me and said i don't know what to do i said well you owe me a dollar back because i've given you two 35 and she said are you sure joe i said absolutely i'm sure i'd never steal the dime from anybody i said and if your cash register's not right it's not it's not because of me i said either way where did you go to school randolph union high school that's where she went to school so while we focus on whether somebody has a different feeling than others we we fail to bring our kids up correctly and give them the education they need so mr millington i ask you why don't you reach out and start teaching our kids versus indoctrinating them ross evans hi my name is chloe evans i go to randolph union middle school and there was a comment made earlier about their like this person not seeing the hatred that goes on there i've been called a racial slur since the beginning of the school year and i am part of the lgbtq plus community and there are a lot of people that i've known for a while that have looked at me a lot differently and i hear all the time my friends and just random people telling me how there were kids yelling racial slurs down the hallway in saying terrible things in making fun at lgbtq plus kids and using the abstract and i don't understand how you couldn't see all the hatred that goes on there that's it not chandler anderson hi i'm kind of um building on what the last person said um there's been a lot of comments about um not seeing the hatred or not seeing the racism in the school and that's because those comments were coming from white people who do not experience discrimination and don't have the same do not see the school or the town through the same lens that um people of color or minorities do and about taking down the flag i think that that is a terrible idea because there's i just don't see any reason to take it down i understand that there are some issues with the black lives matter organization but i also think there's a key difference between the organization and the slogan the organization is not doing any sort of sponsorship with the school and it's just a message that's being displayed on the flagpole and i think taking down the flag would be one saying that black lives don't matter and two it would be implying that all the racism in the school has been solved which is definitely not the case and that's all i have to say at this point okay do we have um it's hard to know if the folks okay turn your mic off please there we go okay what he's done in life and as far as he's gotten Chick-fil-A has been very very supportive for him they've done there he just gave out last weekend over twenty thousand dollars as scholarships to his kids that work for him so i don't see how people in the school can degrade Chick-fil-A when they're doing all this stuff for our kids and i think Len could get a little info if he would return some of his phone calls when people call and want to talk to him instead of just blowing them off and not getting back to him such as myself um like was there last thursday and here it is wednesday and i still haven't heard from it so he's and that's why i'm standing up today is because he needs to hear from us and he needs to get good information my son found out today from from corporate that he should call in and talk to him about this problem and he refuses to call him back so maybe we need to get rid of him and get somebody in there that will listen to the public i'm a taxpayer i have no kids in school anymore and i've lived here all my life we were born here we graduated r u h s both of us and both of our children and we're proud of our kids and we're proud of what they're doing and you guys are just looking the opposite direction obviously i think i can't speak for everybody but i know there's one but the things he don't need to get any information from anybody else and Chick-fil-A hires all minorities blacks hispanics whites they help them out they do scholarships they do fundraisers they do all of this so it's not my son is married to uh jamaican so we are not racist and chick fil a is not racist i mean these people a lot of these people are judging the chick fil a from this boston episode well we have two men that are married that own the chick fil a in downtown boston and we have another one in maine so how can you guys hold that against them he's just wrong so i actually like this as a Randolph president and i think i probably earned the time um i spent a good deal of time at the open forum last night and that open forum was specifically designed for open discussion a board meeting and public comments are not so it's curious to me why folks didn't show up last night to have the discussion and actually hear from me and ask me questions when i actually invited people to ask me questions about my decisions last night no one did one person asked me a question last night and john that was you if i remember i have the floor because i thought you were joking and and if uh i remember the question was is whether or not i asked the coach or told the coach um you know not to do chick play or not that was the one question with an hour and a half availability of folks last night so we're going to talk about a couple of other misconceptions that are being thrown around here tonight in terms of test scores and i'm happy to put it right up on the screen until covid hit our district's test scores for the first time in a decade were improving by four percent or more per year and then covid hit so there's number two in terms of the actual decision that was made around chick filet that no one asked me about last night and i was so surprised that that was the case i'm happy to talk about that a concern was brought to me by community members about the fact that chick filet was chosen i knew nothing about the controversy of chick filet so i did my research and i did some investigation just like all administrators do when we get concerns from community members and i want to read something to you really quick and then talk a little bit about the decision policy statement from the orange southwest school district the orange south school district is committed to providing all of its students with a safe and supportive school environment in which all members of the school community are treated with respect and i ask you which is less respectful asking the baseball team to change vendors for a fundraiser or asking the lgbtq community of which there's about seven to ten percent in our school district to support as part of the school collective a company that has actively tried to take away their civil rights for nearly a decade i don't think there's an equivalency here the active the act of seeking to take away a group civil rights rights that all other human beings share is an attempt to make them less human the decision that was made was the right one that sort of a conversation was for last night i still haven't spoken either i still have the floor yeah nobody gave you the floor we didn't say you just spoke up just like okay okay i think we're gonna call call it we have one more right here we have no i i think we we've heard loud and clear so now we're being silenced no you're not being silenced we've heard you i i think one week obviously he didn't hear he's going against us and he's made the right decision so there is a complaint procedure so and by then the fundraiser is done there is a complaint procedure if you move on it quickly we can always do a special meeting but you just like the other every other complaint that we have we we have a process you need to follow the process in order for it to come to the board and for us to even look at that issue so you're asking the board you're here to to express yourselves but we as a board can't look at the decision that he's made and assess whether or not it was an appropriate decision without you following our complaint procedure okay and they follow it the ones that complained about the Chick-fil-A fundraiser they followed it yes they went they went to they did they went to lane and they that's the process and what has happened is you have gone to lane and he and you are not happy with like you told us the coach was gracious about it okay it's not true okay so so there is the issue the issue is if you did not get that the the response that you wanted we got no response you got no response then that is your time to then write a letter to the board chair to say this is what's happened we want the board to look into it because at this point the board is just here listening to your public comment but we need to have the real process and if we get that letter to the board chair so if you look on our website you will see what our complaint procedure is but if you want the board to address it you have to follow that process I did that two months ago and I have heard nothing on the board I made a complaint about the superintendent and all three principals in writing any mail and I have not heard back it was one of the things I was going to talk about tonight but you cut me off so it must not have been clear yes I responded and I've heard nothing since the problem is right there with you said you look into it and you talk to Lane and that's what I got you'll have to email with me because I will send it back to you because I didn't if I had seen a clear complaint oh it was very clear okay then I just had two questions I'm about last night's forum was the whole board at last night's forum no that was for the was it worn okay and uh was it worn was it televised and so on was it no it was am I allowed to speak on yes since everybody's it's interesting I'm here I'm sitting right here and everybody is telling me what I've done and what I've thought and and most of it unfortunately so yes uh Dr. Starr at first people did respond to you you were asked to follow the conflict resolution protocol and that started out with talking with the coach then talking with the athletic director then talking with the principal and then talking with me follow the procedure I will be happy to get back to you but you were communicated with and you were asked to follow the procedure in terms of last night I sent out a broadband um can message to the community about the open forum and this would be a a place to talk about this and I even included the link to that forum um to folks prior to that meeting so that folks could attend so yes that right so we wouldn't be in front of the board it's the board we wanted to talk to it wasn't you that we wanted okay our problem is with you we want to talk to your employers okay so again you've got to follow our the the conflict so right away is that what you're saying yes yes so is their documentation is their documentation of the complaint that led to Mr. Millington cancelling the when we when the board looks at it we will be looking at how those should already know that you canceled it how could you cancel it if you don't look at it can I answer the question because you're asking you're asking an operational that's an operational decision we have we have given that to lane we have policies in place that guide what he is allowed to do for ethical and professional reasons and if he does not and if he does something that upsets the public or that the public feels crosses a boundary in terms of ethics and professionalism then there is a way for the members of the public to let us know in writing what's happened so that we can investigate it and that's what happened when they asked for Chick-fil-A to be canceled correct no because if it doesn't read it didn't reach the board they went they went they started he overrode the protocols what happened no no you're not understand it it just depends on who comes here we just need to write letters I just want to say I'm sad that this is the educational environment my kids would have to be if I chose to send them to school as a breakthrough resident but because it's so disturbing I am not sending my kids here at this time that's all that's not really just so we're ready to move to move on and I just say something really quickly I'm sorry just really quickly about the education not about Chick-fil-A anything like that which is I'll be quick I think we've heard I've missed two years of my math education because of the school they failed me I went two years without a math class and I am embarrassed to say that I struggle with basic math because RUHS failed me I've tried I email I talked to teachers and they kicked me out of a class I walked in I sat down because I was supposed to be in that class and he goes what's your name what's all that and I go I'm grace I'm here's be the math class because during quarantine I had no math class no math class no math education he kicked me out because I wasn't I wasn't allowed to be there I guess I had never been in that class I'd never met the teacher okay they kicked me out and I haven't had two years missed of my education where your school failed me we're understanding we're hearing you're not understand because I've missed two years this is not the times to talk about it is the time it's we're talking about our school we're talking about kids education why shouldn't we be putting be putting our education first we're talking about all this politics and everything why can't we like you say no politics in school yet you still fly that flag why can't we put the kids first we're I struggle with basic math because the school couldn't provide me what I needed and I think it's really the black box by the flag is not we're not going to raise this issue it absolutely you don't need let's go we're done with public comments if you'd like to stay for the rest of the meeting you're welcome to we're talking about we're going to you're failing your failing grace I'm sorry right now we need to move on to the rest of our meeting okay um so do we have our concerns got it you know okay so we're going to be interviewing our two candidates from Brookfield so we'll see if Scott pops back in hopefully so that went a little bit longer than we allotted I asked him to come back and he was planning on 650 anyway for is that's where we should it should be all right okay so but we don't we don't mean for this section of the okay um and were you able to get Scott I emailed him a look in the city policy okay if not we've got Devon okay and we could start with Devon so hopefully um so um just well I'm going to wait just a few more minutes okay yeah he's he's in he's in a training so so the folks can just get organized remember we're going to have about 20 minutes where we're going to um ask them to speak a little bit about why they want to be on the board maybe after public comment and like want to be on the board ten minute beach um yeah um and uh so we're going to give them a couple of minutes to to ask to explain why they'd like to be on the board and then um then we can ask questions um asking that uh the board have that we're going to ask both candidates to um answer the same question so whatever question um we'll have both of them answer that question and then um we're going to deliberate in executive session okay we could do that have you heard anything no I haven't okay so we'll table until we hear from Scott we'll just put we'll bring that back to the to um the floor once once he arrives so the next up is the date for the policy government's um training and um I think most of us have put in the dates dates that work for us for the training I think we're reading on Rachel and Hacha and Hannah there was one Monday that worked for like almost every single person who has every single person who had responded not so far I bet that'll be the day but it was June 1st okay okay so we're looking maybe toward June 1st but it's a Wednesday you said it's a front you said Monday to Wednesday June 1st is a Wednesday what time does it start is it just one time uh it's it's an initial consultation and then and then we'll we'll go from there in terms of um additional training my calendar's clear okay so are you getting that Linda so it's looking like Wednesday June 1st will work and I think we were looking at 5 30 to yeah I don't remember exactly what was on there um so uh Linda will you you'll be in touch with Jackie okay okay awesome uh so next up is the um COVID operating plan just any updates Lane yeah so it looks like it looks like there was an older copy in the board packets would make sense because we've revised the thing so many times um COVID operating plan for folks to know is always available and it's most updated form right on the OSSD website last time it was updated was on March 14th um some basic things changed then that that folks should be well aware of at this point in time um agency of education rescinded all guidance in terms of COVID and has asked districts to follow the general guidance of the Vermont Department of Health instead because there is no more schools with specific guidance at this point in time masking became recommended but optional and that includes on district buses all restrictions on extracurricular activities and field trips have been lifted there are no COVID related restrictions on volunteers or visitors in terms of entering the school buildings the nurses with parental consent will still test symptomatic students as long as the parents have obviously consented for COVID and the district will still provide at home test kits as necessary and as available I think that's going to probably switch over at some point in time that folks will be getting it through their insurance companies the district will still send out general notifications of potential exposure when we identify a positive case within our schools and that athletic events masking is optional but highly recommended and our teams must follow the rules of any school they visit so if you're the visiting team you follow the home team rules and so those are the basic changes um from the last time that we know are there any concerns among board members they like he's keeping our staff and students all safe okay uh next up is uh the second uh reading on the ADA grievance protocol for students and staff this is a required policy from the state um and we looked at it at the last meeting so uh we're just looking to for any discussion and a motion to adopt the policy so are there any last questions on that policy do we have a second second seconded by rachel uh any discussion all those in flight fit in favor please say hi hi i i think we just have sarah online i think she's speak up sarah if you if you have any any um any concerns okay uh next up and this may lead to uh another long discussion any sign of scott he i just had sex with him he's caught up at the moment but i told him he's gonna jump on as soon as he can okay pho is here okay um the financial report okay oh i skipped over that where where hounder two under three oh yeah sorry about that so the financial reports and again this is in relation to just monitoring the financial conditions um of the district yep they're they are in the packet uh march financial statement represents about nine months of the um 2021-22 fiscal school year meaning that we should have spent about 75 percent of our overall budget at this point in time because we're 75 percent uh the way through the fiscal year um because of federal reimbursements and the inability to hire some staff um staffing shortages have been nationwide this year some of the folks that we wanted were well in the black in terms of the budget only about 59 percent of it has been expended at this point in time um the one thing that did stick out a little bit as i did the review um in fact the business manager was that uh under technology expenditures the supply line shows us being over spent by about 116 thousand dollars um this is due to the cost of software subscriptions that were put in the place to support uh remote learning we had decided at the beginning of the year we weren't quite sure you know what the year was going to hold for us but it will all be reimbursed um and so the reimbursements will come in and cover that um other than that everything actually looked very very good okay any questions for my picture okay uh next up uh legislative uh no not not in this section um uh legislative update the lot of parts and pieces um i had intended to actually put this in as part of the superintendents report um as the summary um there's not much that's changed i'm happy to go through though and remind folks of the parts and pieces um there's been some some minor changes um s 162 that dealt with collective bargaining rights for teachers um one of the concerns that came up was that it would have allowed teachers to sign contracts with the district to then break their contracts to accept employment elsewhere um at the last round of information i got provision from that bill it sounds like has been removed um s 287 that deals with education funding it looks like folks have settled on adjusting the current weights to determine district allocations they were having some discussions about a sort of a block system went through it the language is pretty dense and the mathematics are a little unclear the way that it was worded um but based upon what i can tell um our district should see a significant increase in ed fund allocations just because of the the number of students that we have that are disadvantaged economically um so it should be a benefit to this district um s 286 um attempts to make the teachers pension system solvent um somewhat by adjusting pension benefits and using what they're calling a blended contribution rate um so it sounds like everyone in the system would have their own unique rate of what they need to contribute uh to into the pension system that's based upon their income um act 173 um and this was the big one that's been discussed for a number of years now and i believe was put on hold a little bit when covid hit um but this was changing over uh special education funding from reimbursement to a block grant model um i think after some good discussions um the legislature wanted to try to make sure that people were held harmless there were some districts that were going to benefit immensely from it and some that were going to be be heard a little bit in terms of what their expected allocations were going to be and so they set up a system where um you know districts are going to be provided with the average amount they received over a three-year period there's actually two three-year periods that they could choose from but and how will that impact us uh right now based upon the information that we were given um to be able to calculate the budget at budget time um we took a $200,000 ahead um whether or not this changes when this is fully passed uh we'll find out so my guess is it will it will help us recoup that that 200,000 um s100 um universal school meals um as i think folks know that during the pandemic the federal government gave um lots of funding to make sure that folks were getting fed and so we were able to provide you know breakfasts and lunches um to all students regardless of economic status and so there's an effort to keep that going across the state of vermont i think it's primarily focused on breakfast right now um but the question question is is um that was unclear in the readings that i was able to do was you know which which fund is it going to impact where where where will the money come from for this after the federal grant funding tries out we've kept it uh with lunch as well that bill and uh the yield bill is where we would source that money as of now about 36 million dollars carved out from the ed surplus as a member of the house education committee and say that everything they just told you is accurate i just try and get you to come to tell me and before i leave i'd just like to say thank you all for your service to our communities um this is clearly not easy stuff now i'm just gonna applaud oh on a good note um i'm plotting now yeah no i know on a high note too uh it's true we might even see a three and a half or four cent property tax relief uh impact from s 287 so we should have told that to all those folks which we really left yeah no we get we get we get updates they come in come in sporadically so it changes it quite a bit so yeah it's hard to try to decide when it's best to report out because things are aren't quite finished true no it's all right this is good stuff so um again thank you all for your for your work and lame well done i appreciate you take care be safe yeah any sign of scott yeah okay um so so we'll we'll move on to the the flag policy so this is um the first reading of the flag policy so this is an opportunity um for the board to ask some questions and um just uh hopefully folks have taken a look at it um and we have pietro to um uh go over it a little bit if if folks would like that um okay so pietro are you hearing kaca would is is um asking if he might just go over the rationale for what's what uh the the way the policy is written and and why yeah so um what what you will recall is we had a conversation some time ago where i suggested that the board needed to have a policy around flags it's an issue of great interest and some controversy presently um decisions had to be made about what was the best policy for the district it's not something that ought to be decided in the individual buildings it really is a question for the board to decide at a policy level the the issues that you all grappled with at the time was the concept that um if if we allow some flags to fly on our flagpole at the request of groups within the district then our ability to decline um from other groups would be diminished and the challenge was going to be for the board um do we want to find ourselves in a position where um we have to say yes to some views that are in our view antithetical to the values of the district or would we prefer to have a policy where no flags fly and therefore you would never be in that position there was an alternative that the the other alternative was for the board not to take requests to make decisions on its own and to have the flag be what it would be called government speech meaning that this is not a place where the public gets to express its feelings it's a place where the board can make decisions about what ought to fly in terms of flags and what ought not fly and ultimately the consensus of the board was that it would be best to avoid any potential litigation um around which flags would fly and which ones would not by saying that we would only have the american and vermont flags fly on school flagpoles we've all read the policy we've discussed it um are there are there comments that board members like to make or do we have any concerns given what the policy is now and if none um i will open it up to uh some public comment again we're going to keep it to three minutes per person and um there's a little typo on the flag policy oh thank you so is this a time when the public can ask questions and the board responds or does the public just comment it's yeah just we're not voting on anything we're not voting on anything it's a second reading yeah it's just it's well it's the first reading right but it needs a second reading before we vote should we read it so everyone can hear it or does everyone know it does everyone know have you heard linda did you give a little copy of the story pretty much say about the policy i'll read it the flag policy under vermont law the orange southwest school district is a municipality and a government body this the district school board supports the exercise of protected free speech by students and staff the board does not believe however that flagpoles at school buildings in the district should be public forums for free speech public forums are places where all protected speech must be allowed under vermont law each school must have a flagpole on the premises and while school is in session the school the school must fly the united states flag vermont law also permits the district to display a vermont state flag it is the policy of the district that only the vermont and united states flags may be flown on the school flag poles it is the policy of the district to encourage free speech in other appropriate locations and circumstances so um i'm gonna open open it up for again some public comment again if we can refrain from saying the same thing if someone's already said what you believe um then i would ask out of time consideration that you seed your time somebody else uh so and i would like to speak but i would also ask that we could defer to our students who are here in person and remotely and hear from them first since this is their school and their work and this decision is going to impact them so so do we have some students here who would like to speak or shall i move to the online so uh go ahead i'm joseph i'm a senior at randolph human preschool and this means a lot to me the flag represents a lot more than people might think at first it represents their support for the never-ending fight for racial equality the racial justice pbl has done some amazing things including fundraising and raising awareness the flag is a representation of how we strive for anti-racism and how the school is supposed to be a place where anyone can belong feel safer than their old skin it reminds us of also the long journey we've found on in trying to confront racial biases not only in our school but within our country work that we're still doing today by flying the as a school community we feel the need to speak up for the people who feel like they don't have a voice or not represented in our school and raising the flag we can show support for students of color so i'm a senior at randolph um and i just wanted to say that the flag the blm flag gives an ethnic minority in a largely white and historically racist student population a visible and proud reminder that the school supports those minorities i want to clarify that the whites are not a minority as some members here at the at the forum seem to think and yeah i think that being told that your life as an ethnic minority in the town still matters despite what students peers and adults may say is not a political message and it's not assaulting any community members with liberal induction ideas it is a reinsurance that the school does not stand by the direct or indirect racism that white students and their parents display in the school setting i think many of our taxpaying community members are afraid of these anti-racist beliefs because they're a signal of change but it's actually not that scary it's it's just love and it's learning to love the people who are hurt most in our communities thank you Emily Baker um so i have some very strong opinions on the flag and my beliefs in why it should be flown at OUHS as one of the founding members of the racial justice pbl in my sophomore year of high school i dedicated hours and many weeks of my life to doing research and educating students and faculty members and even having really tough conversations with family members about why flying this flag is so important and how it makes people feel included and welcome in a space that throughout my education and many of my fellow peers' educations have felt very violent and unwelcoming and very unsafe for queer and bi-pox students who are in a primarily white school that has had a history of not showing support and kindness and love towards its students and how are we supposed to better ourselves and better our community and our education if we feel unsafe entering into a building where we are supposed to feel safe we are supposed to have these rights to an education to a safe environment where we feel included and loved but our school is failing our community is failing and by taking down this symbol of inclusivity and love at this school and saying it's politicized when it's a basic human right it is saying that this human life matters there is nothing wrong with that there is nothing political about that and the fact that it is being politicized is disgusting and I I know I don't go to school there anymore but I'm still young I'm still in the process of getting my education I want to be an educator and I want to look at Randolph as a future option for me educating and I don't think I can do that if these policies continue to negatively affect students at this school thank you I see Amaline Caswell there but I don't see a hand up so Chandler I don't know if Chandler and Albie were from the other Vicki is new I know that and Albie is not a student I don't believe oh maybe Albie does have a student who wants to speak can't remember who Albie is now now I do not have a student okay okay sorry it doesn't work it doesn't want to comment uh yeah so uh Chandler no he doesn't have his hand up anymore he does he does swear oh oh sorry I didn't see all right Chandler I believe that Chandler is um no longer at the meeting this is um he's still logged into it but I think he's at a track meeting now okay okay and and I'll be lower no he still has his up and Emily you wanted to speak I will give the students so I'm going to start with you my name is Emily Therian I'm the director of targeted supports at Randolph Union I also taught English and social studies and partnered with Jena and students informing the racial justice PBL this board has heard us speak on this topic before so um I won't belabor the point you've heard the process that we went through in our rationale for raising that flag and y'all are going to make the decision that you're going to make what I would ask of you is that you consider how that will impact our students and the message that that is sending to them and if you decide to take down that flag based on the legal advice and the information that you have what will you do instead to hold our district and our schools and our school leaders accountable to ensure that all students in our building are safe and have access to an education and feel valued because as someone who spends hours in that building every single day five days a week I have an hour and 15 minute commute one way I've made that commute for seven years and I can tell you it's not for the money it is because of these students who are here in front of us right now it is because of my students who are scared to come to school because of the hate that they experience and I would challenge anyone who voices that there isn't hate or bigotry or homophobia or racism in our school to actually come and spend some time in our building because I can tell you with confidence I have first person experience I've witnessed that I've been part of investigations I've had those painful conversations with students and again I would ask of the board if you make the decision to take down this flag then I respectfully invite you to come in to those schools and to have those conversations with students like the racial justice PBL did with each advisory in our school building over the course of weeks I would invite you to do the same to have that conversation and do the work that we've done if you're going to make this decision thank you I'm going to move back to the online folks let's see Albie I think you are ahead of Vicki I remember yep hi there yeah so I've been listening quite a bit to what's been said again not a parent there but a graduate from there and part of the community as a business owner and like you said before father of six children three of whom are African-American so I've been dealing with with some of these issues for sure as a parent I guess I'm again concerned about the number of times I've heard tonight how much hate is in our school in our community school and so I mean I'd kind of like a number like are there 10 kids that are like this 20 kids that are like this 100 kids that are like this I mean to have that much hate being going on in our school that obviously is a huge problem and obviously needs to be addressed for sure I mean racism obviously exists and it goes both ways I've dealt with that you know when that's all part of of growing up in this culture is dealing with a race issue there's no doubt about that and we as adults have to continue to lead and guide our kids in a loving manner towards each other bottom line I don't even the color issue in our house it comes down to do you bleed red that's my biggest color issue in my house that is it other than that you are loved and I try to love you as best I can throughout your growing years and forever as a parent so a lot of concern there about that for sure a lot of concern about supporting a flag that's been up there for two years when other flags don't I personally have issues with with the organization and what it represents on some levels not every level I think it started out great and over time like a lot of things money and power overtook it and there's some issues there that need to be addressed and if we can't even say that without feeling condemned that's scary and being as one student said I am a white privileged person well I'll tell you my mom grew up in this community she had an outhouse I didn't grow up all that privileged I understand the white thing gives us some privilege but there are also this is where the whole race thing is not addressed equally there are some very privileged black black people in the society too maybe not in Vermont but if we start to engage in this whole thing about well your privilege I'm not privileged and we go back and forth about that what are we talking in terms of humanity where are we and as teachers some of the teachers I talked to are great I'm not again sure if we have some teachers that are being hateful why are they still there I'll be your time is coming to a close so I will close with I appreciate the views of everybody there and I think we need to be able to do that as a community without being obviously hateful and just because someone doesn't practice another type of living style doesn't mean they're hateful towards another person we just may disagree on a different lifestyle but that doesn't mean we're hateful if we don't practice it either way so I will be reaching out to some people who spoke tonight because there's a lot of hurt in this community that needs to be addressed for sure thank you let's see so I would like to follow up on what was suggested there I am somebody that has been very engaged in following this VLM flag kinds of concerns and not only here in other settings and my father was there for the MLK I have a dream speech and this is something that I've grown up with and to see that our country suddenly taking a turn and dividing over this issue really grieves my heart and I very much would like to come in and be able to chat with your people I'm a teacher by background I've worked with kids all my life started children's home in Guatemala and it's very important to me that children understand that there's a love foundation and not something that's crossing hate about others John I'd say I agree with Mr. Wood and I think I made those comments yesterday that we need to like really teach everybody to get along the proposed policy document and last month's agenda is the correct policy to have one read tonight only the US and Vermont flag should be flown on school property the BLM flag should not continue to fly RHS for several reasons first as I've said before at these meetings the flag draws requests for other flags to fly some of which may not be very palatable but would have to be flowing the interest of impartial free speech for the First Amendment and the 14th Amendment Equal Protection Clause of the US Constitution I want to remind everybody that in the Burlington PD case about two years ago the Vermont Supreme Court said that hate speech was free speech in the state of Vermont and what would happen if somebody brought that hate speech in the form of like a KKK flag and said I want to fly that RUHS I want my turn on the flag that would be horrible I would hate to see that but the Vermont Supreme Court said that hate speech is free speech and they could make that request and you'd have a really hard time denying it I don't want to see that and you should stick with the policy you read tonight second and this is my belief I believe that we are all created equal and endowed by our creator as it states in the Declaration of Independence I also believe that we are all created in the image of God for the Bible so with that said when I talk about BLM I am not talking about a race of people because we are all of the race of Adam all of us all races and creeds when I talk about BLM I am talking about the organization and its foundations not any race of person no race of person in America should be exalted over any other race that is wrong we should be judged by the content of our character not the color of our skin so BLM the part people might not like about this talk but it needs to be discussed to have a real honest discussion two of the three founders of BLM Patrice Collores and Alicia Garza have professed to be trained Marxists for those who are unaware of history Marxism is the foundation of socialism and communism and more associated with communism today communism is antithetical to the constitutional republic that we have in Vermont and the U.S communism and constitutional republics cannot coexist one of them must go the organization of BLM on its website originally called for dismantling of the nuclear family and defunding the police the defending of the police is still on the site today and we've all seen how that's worked out around the country not very well a lot of violence going on BLM sanctioned a 2020 New York City march in which the marchers chanted what do we want dead cops when do we want them now also at a 2020 BLM march they chanted pigs in a blanket try them like bacon as of late the new as of late the New York City BLM chapter president said that if NYPD went back to plainclothes policing the New York the New York City would burn just real short at the end the children at RUHS may have a different meaning for the BLM flag that being a showing of support for black students and I applaud them for that but in all reality the flying of the BLM flag has a much greater and dubious meaning due to the tenants and practice of the organization organization and it's marked as founders the flag should come down I also want to thank you all for doing this job because it's not easy along with teaching teaching our students and trying to help a community it's not easy we come up two times where we need to be heard but we also have to hear other people because this is where anger comes from I'm first wanting to say I don't think there's any parent out there that doesn't know how much I love their students no matter who they are no matter what they believe in I listen to them I agree with them I never put my own theories or my own ideologies into into their beliefs whatsoever um um I helped start racial justice four years ago because walking down the hallways when I've said this before to the board meeting walking down the hallways um and hearing hatred against our minority my can't talk sorry I had a medical thing today and I'm a little lightheaded but um marginalized students um it was hurtful I like would go home and cry I I wanted to make a change so that everybody was heard because that's who I am as a teacher and that's why I teach I care about our youth since that time we spent like Emily said and a couple of our students said many many hours and there was a protocol that was held to have this flag flow we didn't just put it up there was years of community engagement school engagement um work policy work the students spent a lot of time and still spends a lot of time four years later on this matter I invite along with Emily she kind of we are kind of the same person we melded into one I invite people in and into my class that isn't a mandatory class but it's a class that students choose to take um and we talk about this and we talk about why it's hurting the community and we have community forums and we start creating more of um more of a togetherness around this issue than having people just yell at each other because that's not going to get any more um I have so many things written down and I didn't say anything and I know I only had three minutes I don't believe being being black brown indigenous Middle Eastern Asian descent um is a political matter um we have the BLM flag up there with a hashtag on it because that is something that was student led um and also like being having different abilities and being gay is also not a choice this is um who people are we need to just accept them and that's what we're doing in this class I think taking it down without these community forums will be detrimental to this town and to the school um I also um I don't know I'm sorry I'm all over the place because this is an emotional thing for me because we've done a lot of work around this and I know how hard my students care um so although okay I'll be done although um my last words are and it's coming deeply from my heart and I think I'm not calling anybody out but I think like students here know that I deeply love them but I'm exhausted and this fight can't just be with a couple of people and I don't even want to fight I just want everyone to be accepted and respect each other so that's all. Thank you. Just quickly um I get that the policy is cleaner if you just have the American and the Vermont flag and that's the easier legal decision but what about our brave decision what about the actions behind the flag is just a symbol of the work we do as a community right now can we say that we can justify having that flag up right now are we doing the work necessary to to live up to that flag saying that Black Lives Matter I just want to consider that it is easier and and every lawyer if there's any other lawyers in this in this community right here um would say it's the it's the easiest thing to do but is it the right thing to do? You have your hand up? Yes I do I would like to speak on behalf of the students at my school um as you know my name is Emily Caswell I'm in eighth grade at RUHS and I have heard throughout our hallways and in classrooms all around our school hatred everywhere I have been part of this hatred multiple times like not um giving it to people but I have been the person that has like had it thrown at them and it's horrible I don't see um why I know that it says the Vermont state flag should be should stay up and it has to be up and the American flag should be um America is supposed to be the land of the free and the BLM flag is for people fighting for their freedom and for their rights and I don't see why they can't have a flag because we fought for our flag why can't they fight for theirs to be in places as well thank you true messy hi I don't have a big speech planned or anything but I have a couple points I want to mention first as a member of the racial justice pbl at Randolph it honestly kind of disgusts me to hear the BLM flag being compared to say the KKK flag or in this case even a Nazi flag I think they're completely different and kind of disregards what people have gone through the fight for the Black Lives Matter moment and the points of discrimination against police police are not a racial minority they're not a minority at all they have power and I just I'm really disappointed about some of the things I've heard in this meeting today so yeah okay uh Cushine yeah Stormy Trombly again um I don't have much to add but I I agree with Drew Messier sorry okay uh Becky thanks um so a flag is a symbol and symbols are important and so having a discussion about the symbol while really difficult is a really good thing for our community to be doing and I thought it would be important for me to talk about what this symbol means for for me um three years ago a study was done on the experiences of students of color at RU and the report was disturbing and frankly pretty damning and I remember being at the same time horrified and also not really surprised which is of course all the more horrifying brave students were speaking out about their experiences in the school and in this town and the truth is is it's can be really hard to grow up as a student of color here in Randolph and so slowly we began the work of trying to recognize and rectify the harms that we were allowing and even doing to our students yeah I'm a science teacher it's it's tempting and easier for me to let a whispered comment in the back of the room slide and move on to teaching about molecules and forces that's my comfort zone but it's not right walking past that flag every morning reminds me of the commitment that I made to honor and bring back all of our students to recognize that that their students that their experiences are different from each other and to work to make this a learning community a place that is welcoming to everyone seeing that flag reminds me that I made a commitment to not let this happen again I think that removing the flag is also a symbol to me it suggests you can accomplish the work is done everything is fine all our students are having the same great experience at RU unfortunately I don't believe that's true I do think we're getting better but I think there's still work to be done I feel like removing the flag to me suggests that we want to see uncomfortable truths back under the rug we need to honor the bravery of our students who stood up to share their stories who stood up to say no one deserves to be treated like they were who stood up and said no more not on my watch in my town it took a lot of bravery effort and courage and work to apply that flag and I think I think we need to honor that in some way thanks thank you uh Ross where is this daughter it's me Chloe again um and like Vicki was saying kind of similar um since I've gone through a lot of hatred at this school and a lot of it was racially motivated um just seeing that the flag is still like was there was really important for me because it was still a symbol that the school supports me and that the flag is with me and that's it's like very nice and important to me to have that and the flag isn't only supporting students of color in our school it's also supporting people of color everywhere and that they still matter and they're still being being killed every day and black lives will always matter so thank you so Emily do you want to say another little bit you've spoken already um I don't know if you just did forget to know I would like to agree with everything that has been stated so far by Vicki and other students that have let their voices be heard I just I remember going to that school every day and experiencing hate and just disgusting things every day whether that be racially motivated or sexual orientation motivated of just hatred coming from these people who haven't experienced life through the lens of a queer or not or a non-white person and the fact that this flag is being treated as an issue of politicizing a human rights issue is genuinely disgusting and I think as a school we should be striving for a environment that makes all students voices heard and welcome and feel safe and I agree it's easy to not have these conversations and it's not my problem I'm I can't have this issue I'm a white person or that's just our privilege speaking and we need to come together and uplift student voices and have these difficult conversations because this is how work progresses and how change is created and having these conversations need to happen and this is a very important issue that needs to be continued discussing and I am here to stand with these students and these educators who are taking us the correct stand the morally right stand with these students thank you give me a second to get my my thoughts together a little bit I think some of you know what I want to say you know is a reflection of something that Dana had mentioned last night which I thought that was good because it tied into some discussions that the cabinet members have had and it's this idea that you know the schools schools reflect their communities and if we've got hate in our schools it's because we've got hate in our communities and every day what I see happening is I see students that are coming in the door on fire and a bunch of talented teachers trying their darkness to put that out but every day those students leave those doors and they go back out into the community into certain pockets and they're sent on fire again and every day we have to put them down if we want to solve this problem in the schools and there is a real problem in the schools with with with hatred this community is going to have to find its heart that's pretty much all I've got to say at this point in time not to be in here five years and observing and being around nothing to do with the flag but just in general about tonight okay do we have any any other folks that would like to be heard and I'm so sorry I know I spoke but I forgot one important thing I had on my list I forgot a lot but I thought there is a second policy that was supposed to be read about student-led protocol to get flags on the flagpole out front and I don't see it in here and I was expecting another piece of this that upheld all of the student work that already happened so just I guess you're not allowed to answer questions because it's comment only but just know that for anybody who cares I know that there what I thought there was another position and I will write to you and ask you about that and see if we could get it in a future board meeting so we could discuss that position also thank you I would just like to say one thing I think it's I just want to say thank you to all the students who have come forward to this meeting tonight and brought your perspective and your arguments about one way or the other as well as the community members it's nice to see so many people here and involved and like many people have said that's how changes are made so thank you I'd just like to ask might there be a forum in some fashion I'm hearing about all this hate and I I'd like to know more about it as a community member what does that look like I'm happy to ask or talk if that's all right we've talked in the past I think one of the things that I've suggested heavily is having a trained facilitator come in and actually run some fishbowl exercises and one of the best ways that you can do that and they've got to be a very well trained facilitator can come in have people from the community you know up on stage as the panel and talk about the experience that they've had so that the rest of the community can hear and talk about that's the only way I think that people are going to understand where we truly are at and you know it's it's possible there's money there to do it we just have to follow through I'm just going to add a quick piece I mean I've worked in the schools of the area not so much in the Randolph way but I have not seen it so I'm wanting I'm seriously asking what is it that's being labeled the hate that you're seeing it's uh you know the LGBTQ piece is huge those kids are being genuinely honest I had I shouldn't say I had but I was there when it had to happen and it and made the recommendation we had to call the police on a parent who saw one of our transgender students standing out front at pickup time random student yelled and screamed obscenities out the window and so it's not just like I said it's it's a community problem it's not every member of the community but it is a community problem and it spills over into the schools and it's a it's a big thing you know like I said it's it's it's hard enough trying to manage it within the district and within the schools and we get outside of the school walls if it's a little bit hard for a district to be able to impact that and can I just add very quickly in closing I think as a policy governance board one thing that this board could do that would move us further forward instead of backward would be to adopt bsb bsba policy c 29 which is an equity policy that would as I mentioned actually hold our schools accountable because I I hear the criticism that we can put whatever flag we want to on that poll and it doesn't mean anything if that's not the experiences of the students in our building so as a policy governance board I would strongly urge urge you to consider what is that policy number going to be c 29 and I think it's curious that the bsba has not recommended any policies around flag polls okay I believe that concludes our discussion and public comment we will move on to a second reading of the policy during the next meeting and then Lane the next thing is the what we've got Scott is here okay so sorry so why don't yes and and Devin's held on um so why don't we move on to that and we'll we'll get that done so we're going to regroup and we're back to just introducing our two candidates uh from the Brookfield community who are interested in serving on the board and uh what we're going to do is we're going to try and we'll try and do this in a fairly timely manner since we're already at eight o'clock so Scott if you want to come uh into the room what we're going to do is we're going to start and maybe you folks want to or some folks want to depart before we get started in this so we'll give you a few minutes to get ready and then yeah we'll take a two minute stretch break and then uh folks can do what they need to do okay we are ready to recommence with the and I appreciate both Devin and Scott for being very flexible given uh sort of what has been transpired this evening um and again what we'd like is for um each one of you to um just speak for a minute or two about your interest in being on the board and then we're going to open it up for board members to ask some questions of you we're going to uh alternate between we'll ask one of you first for one of the questions and then the next question we'll ask the other candidate first um we'll do that for about 10 minutes or so and then we'll open it up for you to ask us a few questions and then we're going to move into executive session to deliberate and then we can let you know via email if you'd like or you can stay on and uh come back for you it would be come back into this room for the decision and Devin for you it would be coming back into the to the regular board meeting uh google google meet okay so to start um uh shall we start with you since you're here and ready um can you tell us a little bit about your interest in being on the board good evening guys so my name is Scott Claude and I'm the captain of the Orange County Sheriff's Office um yeah what my interest is you know I saw a position here that uh and I've talked about it for the few um and what my I wanted to you know try to have another avenue to get back to my community um not in a law enforcement sense and yes I do apologize I'm sitting here in the uniform um it's not what my one of my goals was today but today was just kind of a crazy crazy crazy day um but you know what can I do to get back to my community um I have a lot of uh I've dealt with the school with schools uh um for many many years uh I've been a Orange County resident since 2010 um where I came on right into the Randolph area as a patrol officer and uh I've seen the good the bad and the ugly um from all the schools and I like to have a more broader view of what's going on here um I attended this meeting for the first 15 minutes before I had to go and back to my training and uh it opened my eyes greatly uh I'm missing a boat and I don't like missing boats I like to you know have an understanding of what's going on in my community so I was extremely shocked with um the first 15 minutes of this meeting that I'm I'm not paying attention um so I need to kind of fix that and one of the things that I've been trying to do here was be a part of this board um how can I help um that's me professionally personally I have three small kids that are going to be navigating this school system and we've got a kid going to sixth grade next year and two twins going into kindergarten so I've got a vested interest in regards to the school system um trying to abgate the best I can for my kids and all kids and that was my interest in and seeking out this position thank you I'm gonna I'm gonna have a switch now to Devin so we're gonna kind of be doing this back and forth um and it looks like you you have the floor Devin hi how uh thanks thanks for having me um my name is Devin properly I am a westbrook field resident um I've been a resident here for about a year and a half now um prior to this I uh was a lifelong resident of Connecticut and the great state of Vermont brought me here um brought myself my family here and uh you know when looking around we're looking into different towns and I gotta say uh I fell in love with Brookfield um it was the town where you could be the farthest apart but still feel the closest together um and part of that is I think the community that we have are very very close knit um especially our little area that we have over here in westbrook field and um you know like I put in my letter to you folks is uh you know I'd like to have more involvement in the school system and to see the inner workings and you know bring positive change and bring insight where I can you know I can't I can't speak too much on as far as experience with the schools but you know being a parent and seeing the struggles and adversities that other parents have I think uh I could I could bring something to the table either you know a different point of view or just some different thoughts and different different opinions thank you very much Devin so um now we're gonna open it up to um board questions um so I'm gonna if folks have a particular question that they hopefully you saw my request for you to bring at least one question for the new candidates um I have a question um do you have an understanding of what policy governance is and we'll start we'll start with Devin since we've got Goldfurs there um prior prior to to this uh proposal I did not um I went over the readings which were provided as far as the policy governance and protocols with that um you know and that's a pretty deep read but obviously I still have a lot to learn about that that's very normal it's not a thing that everyone fully understands I think okay and let's have Scott's response to that question sure uh pretty much the same boat um I deal with I deal with policies all the time in the sheriff's office um and I know that this is a total different beast um which I don't have a lot of experience about um but uh I don't want to try to dive in and try to have a more understanding of what's what's the point so I'm gonna ask a follow-up question to that and and my question is um um it is a fairly complex system of governance um and as you I sent both of you the uh video from the VSBA the Vermont school boards association school school boards in general are policy level governance structures um so there is a fair amount of learning that has to take place and so um I'm just curious um given that you're going to have to spend some time learning about our system of governance governance how do you see yourself learning this system like how is that going to be for you given your life and given that this is a volunteer board will that be something how well will you be able to fit that into your schedule and yeah are we on yes we're on use uh like a lot of things you know my my life is pretty chaotic at best uh you know I joke about I look into zoos uh my professional life and also my home life um but I always try to make time as much as possible to um deal with whether I got to learn training um readings watching videos YouTube is a great thing all the way around um but in regards to what I've got to catch up on I feel like I'm trying to do that pretty good and Devin I think I have to agree with Scott also you know obviously having a family and in a full-time career and such is is tough but you know you obviously will make time for the things that you're passionate in and and if uh getting on this board is something that will happen that is a passion that I will pursue um I will note that you know obviously family will come first every single time you know and but I will make accommodations to uh to educate myself on the policies and practices okay um when I wanted to be on this board I was like I've got kids in school they're young I want to be part of the the school community and I've come to this table um and after being here for like a year or so I've realized like we are really um decision makers of the overall policies not the uh issues that we see within the schools like I kind of thought I would be I guess I didn't have a good understanding in the beginning and I've come to really enjoy this seat but is that would that affect your decision of wanting to be on this board like we don't actually have that much power but we do you know what I mean like in regards to like the daily in-school issues and we're on Devin right yes I don't think that you know being on the board is is going to immediately affect immediate in-school issues you know that's kind of the same idea of management you know there's people in place to to fix school level issue and I think it's up to the board to govern policy and and give them what they need to do at the school level you know and having a diverse board will I think you know make a positive impact on that so to be honest when I first kind of took a look at this I had the very same stance not gonna lie and the more people I talked to and things like that that's you know I've come to have that kind of understanding that I don't have that influence on the day-to-day ops you know from the schools or all above and you know what I I saw in the first 15 minutes here too I know that more now so change gears on this guy which is cool and it's expected whatever we can do to try to help push this forward in regards to policies or whatever needs to be governed I think that's the place that we need to strive for especially with this Sarah sorry Sarah based on what we just discussed although you know as a board member you aren't directly bringing your opinions to the table you're more so voting on these policies I'd still like to ask the both candidates what changes would you like to see in OSSD schools number starting with Evan thank you I mean there's a lot of happening I mean just by listening to the conversations from the speakers tonight I mean it's hard to put one one topic at at the height of the issue about you know that would require some thought but I mean I think making sure everybody is very inclusive and in the schools is important but you know is that your end did you end or did okay there was some noise and I didn't know if there was like you got cut off okay I agree with that and I'm trying to take an easy way out the my eyes have been open quite a bit and like I stated earlier I feel like I'm missing the vote to pick a topic or topics at the first front of you know what can we change I don't have an answer for that just yet I feel like I would have to dive into it a little bit more and have a better understanding now as to make that kind of opinion doesn't just read other board members any questions if we're doing pretty well do you have questions of us as board members about anything in regard to the board Devin any any questions no I mean there's there's lots of questions you know there's a lot more detailed things I guess that I need to read into and look into but nothing specific I think at this point we will move into executive session to deliberate and we will let you know be it email would that be okay okay and same with you Devin yep okay I'm gonna so we need to have to enter executive session to discuss I'm going to refuse myself it wouldn't be appropriate so but I got to switch things over to the executive session so all those in favor say hi hi so Chelsea you'll take the notes okay so we're back in regular session so I'm looking for a motion for the appointment of the Brookfield board first member so I moved to appoint Scott Claw as the Brookfield representative for the OSSD board I'll second we have a second from Megan any discussion for their discussion and seeing none all those in favor say hi hi hi okay congratulations welcome aboard welcome aboard it's morning right you got a good morning yes and Linda's got a little connectivity on that yeah yeah you can stay for the rest of the meeting I just can't do anything can't can't vote or right can't chat I'm supposed to walk well good okay so next up on the agenda I believe we're back on track so we have the consent agenda what is the first reading of you know two-point set of vested policy change oh oh we do the governance review and update for policy governance review uh yes okay yeah that was June 1st although we've got Scott now hopefully that's going to work for him as well well I can talk a little bit about this so um executive limitation 2.6 was the asset protection that was approved at last uh board meeting and I'd point it out during the two readings of about provision five and so how it currently reads is um you know make any purchase where a normally prudent protection is not been given against conflict of interest of over $15,000 without having to pay any comparative prices so in other words when the board originally created this um probably I think was 2016-ish um or so what they did was they took the language of the law you know at what point at what dollar amount what threshold do we have to go out to bid when we're doing purchases on behalf of the district and it was $15,000 at that time this last year it has changed to $40,000 and so the the recommendation is um that you know since the original intent of the policy was to to have it state exactly what the law was um was to just update it now that that law has changed and so that's the you know the proposal change is just the dollar amount so anything that we're purchasing or buying that's over $40,000 we have to go out and get at least three competitive points for it is it important to have in this policy a number or no this is just reflect that reflect that we're trying to follow state law like do we have to put $40,000 in there should we just put what happens when the law changes again so you could change the language to to to match the law um one of the but there's a complication here and see if i can explain this so there is monies that we spend from the state level like from the ed fund right that's what what what funds our budget there's also money that we get in that comes in from federal grants the threshold to go have to go out to bid by law at the state level is $40,000 the threshold for federal monies is $50,000 and in talking with robin it just made more sense and less confusing to go with the lower threshold for both so that that's the only quirk that's in there and this is looked at every year so next year if it changes to i'll inform you and we'll have to do this again and again you also have the right to say hey yeah you know we don't we don't we think $40,000 is too much um you know we want to stick with $15,000 or you want another dollar amount that's in there um robin and i talked for a little while typically um if it's a bid for something that's over $15,000 it's typically over $40,000 anyway too if that's what it's making sense it's not a lot that falls between $15,000 and $30,000 as soon as you hit that $15,000 mark you're over the $15,000 mark sorry i apologize if i got my back to you okay so um um is there any are there any other questions about this um change and it's really just that dollar amount that we're changing in that policy um so is this the first reading of this yeah possibly yeah yeah we can do a first reading of it um so we'll do a first reading and then um we'll follow up the next meeting and do a second reading to adopt it so again if you happen to think of things afterward um we can always look at that again and remember with with policy governance we we don't want to get too too specific in the in the policy um because then it just it's really hemming him in um and these these are our guidelines but when you when you think about it um you know we want him to follow follow what the law is saying given the amount okay so that will appear on the agenda for the next meeting so this was a first reading okay so next and please stop me if i've missed something we're moving on to the consent agenda um so again here these are things that um are just they're operational in nature and we're just uh because we have to approve them um for legal reasons we're we're approving them um so if anyone we have to have someone move to pull something out if you want to have a discussion about it i have a we'll have a question can i ask a question what's the league of absence request i don't think like i saw that in my uh guidance counselor um from rtcc we'd like to hear the absence um right well i don't know why i kind of personally do things but just um end of covid our people are exhausted they're trying to recruit for their intent is to return with the other year and we have a we'll have a higher then so i will hire one for please it's an unpaid okay we only do one remember we only do one i move to approve the consent agenda we have a second i second it all those in favor hi hi hi uh superintendent's report i think we heard a fair amount of it yeah unless there's questions on on the parts and pieces okay and again remember these are there for our understanding of um sort of what's going on in the schools it's our view into the schools um a little bit um just so we know what's what's going on uh and then are there any questions about any of those reports and can i just say something i've been joining as the newsletters come to me i've been forwarding them out to you because yeah that's excellent you know different format and yeah current amount is yeah no sometimes they have a video so you can see it so if that doesn't work let me know but that's what i figured that's a lot better yeah yeah it's it's actually really nice okay yeah i like yeah good um seeing all of that uh okay so gotcha update update on the uh teacher appreciation all right so uh the information that i have is um i do have if we're going with the with the gift certificates we have in past year and um chef's market is a yes um i have a call into kuyas and also village pizza because we lost one one huggable mug closed i have a call into wit and grit as well to see if they would be interested in this um gift certificate program i'm waiting back and call small three um so other than that i have chefs ready to go i'm just waiting for those other two to say yes once i have that done i can make up the um certificates and get them to linda and we can get our places paid for and get that done when does that have to be done by when does the teacher appreciation week or do you get some in your time all right great so that's where we're at anyone has questions thank you for doing that or anything different how time has that been for you it has not been very time consuming when i remember to do it okay remember what i was saying so may first to me that's the week of may first okay week of may first so apologies everyone so will you have four or three uh i may have four okay or yeah if all four come back to me and i'd like to be part of it then the more the merrier yep and more options for our staff to be appreciated yep okay so we're on uh we're recapped for the meeting and so we are going to just have a confirmation hopefully um from jackie on she said june 1 would work so we'll get information out and scott this is um some training in policy governance so we're doing sort of some some board work and how how first one's going to be june 1 we think yes which is the lens and i yeah so hopefully that will work okay um we did a poll and that's what seems to be coming through for everybody um we are going to have the second reading in the flag policy we are going to have the second reading in the el 2.6 policy so that will mean we'll be voting on those and um if any of you have things that you want to put on the agenda don't forget that you can contact me and let me know and we can add those to the agenda uh and that's that's what we have coming from this meeting and then of course i'll be looking at the annual calendar just to see where we're at um in terms of other things that are coming along i didn't i actually have that with me but i didn't look at it to be able to let us meeting evaluation i was honest are you right yes okay so basically we've got all ones except for i gave us a five for the meeting as well attended um oh we were all prepared for the meeting so that will be a five two um um i gave us all a five for listening attentively as part as participants spoke but i also kind of did like as everyone was speaking um there's a couple of twos and some random bridge in here um i did do let's see for um board chair helps the board get its job done rather than supervising or becoming involved i gave four um and then i also did a four for uh spending most of its time board spending was time debating defining clarifying and then i made a side note um that um this was uh this meeting had an extensive public comment and you did an excellent job with time control thanks for helping um thank you and then overall control of public comment and clarifications of policies and just complaint procedure etc which i'm sure we will be hearing a lot via email yeah that's a fact so uh kind of a crappy meeting but overall like the board specific things i think we did good any other comments no okay uh so we'll move on from there we're going to adjourn this meeting and go into one more executive session for the labor agreement i moved for enter executive session for a labor agreement possible mou discussion so sarah we're going to move back over to executive session so for executive session okay we're back into the regular meeting so do we have a motion for uh accepting the support staff mou yes i make a motion to accept the os wba support staff mou the draft from 330 as we have a second second seconded by cacha uh any discussion before we take a vote all those in favor say hi hi hi hi um and do we have a motion to open negotiations for an mou with a professional staff not seeing a motion do we have a motion to adjourn the meeting i'll make a motion to adjourn okay adjourning at 9 30