 633. And first order is public comment. So we have quite a few members. I am going to ask people to be brief and also please name themselves. Jim, can I ask a question before we do public comment? Yes. Oh, yeah, go ahead. First, do we have to take roll call? We do have to take roll call. Okay. And second, could we make it a practice when we have lots of folks from the public to sort of walk them through the agenda so that they understand what the pieces are? I just remember when my first meeting, I had no idea what a consent agenda was. And so it just seems like it might be helpful for helping people understand where we can talk and where we can, what pieces are. Yeah, let's do that. Let me also just give a little context. I think a lot of people are going to speak on the SRO. So, hold on. So I'm going to just minimize my screen so I can look at the agenda, which is not appearing for me. Yeah, so I'll take roll in a second. We also want to amend the agenda. The executive session is not personnel. It needs to be rigid. Could you help me with the language? It needs to be basically. Yeah, it's a contract negotiations and confidential. Legal communications for the purpose of providing legal advice. Okay, so we will amend the agenda to reflect that. So after, after, so we're going to have public comment, there are the consent agenda. The consent agenda represents routine items of business, like approving the minutes, approving tonight, we have the minutes and the warrants, which is basically just the paperwork we have to do to, for payroll. The routine business that doesn't require discussion unless a board member requests discussion on a consent agenda item. Then we're going to have a executive, an executive session with Peter Lynn, who is the district's attorney. Yeah, executive session, obviously is confidential. And then we will be having after that board discussion, reviewing committee assignments. And we're also going to get an update on. Cove it. Where Libby will walk us through where they're at so far with planning to reopen schools. I just, I sense you are, I think many of the members of the public are here to make a statement on the SRO, which I know is a topic of concern to many. I want to make a couple statements. One we heard extensively last week from several people who are very concerned about, particularly about concerns. A book, both articulately and I think very thoroughly. So if you could please be brief, that would be of a huge help. We, and then in terms of timing on that, this is something the board is very concerned about. Both as a separate topic and also as part of the board's discussion, we're going to be tackling systematic racism in our schools. And we want to do it very thoughtfully. We will probably not seriously take it up until September when we start considering budget items. And the main reason while there's two reasons for that one. In September was when we start thinking about budget items and how to allocate our resources. It's also when we have staff back at schools. And we're going to hear from social workers, counselors, other members of, you know, the staff who are, are part of the, you know, part of the structure that, that deals with behavioral issues and then really figure out, you know, what, what the role of the SRO is, you know, how it, you know, how it mixes with, with other functions and other ways it might be fulfilled. And the second piece is, as you all know, we are wrestling with trying to figure out how to open schools safely in a very difficult time. You know, there are a lot of obviously public health concerns and just a lot of logistics of figuring out state guidance that is coming out in this is simply uncharted territory in terms of how to, how to restart school in the fall with, with in-person school with figuring out transportation, doing it in a way that's safe. The administration is working tirelessly on this. And as important as the SRO issue is, it's, it's, it's a primary concern that we get the opening of schools, right? And I just don't think there's, frankly, the bandwidth in the administration's part to engage the SRO issue at the level it needs to be engaged at until we've got kids back in schools and we've got a good plan for that. So I just want to throw that high-level thinking out there before we start public comment so people know that the board is concerned about this. We are planning to take it up. We are, we find it to be a very important issue. But it will be something we more seriously engage in in the fall. So with that, let's do board role quickly. And then, and then we can hear from the members of the public and I would, I would appreciate it if people, if possible, can keep their statements to 30 seconds or less. And when they give it also, please identify themselves. So what did you just say? Present. Present. Let me expand my view here. Jill. Rock. Here. Jerry Huck. Here. Anakit. Present. Here. Andrew. Ryan. Here. Emma. Present. And I don't think I missed anyone. Did I miss anyone, Libby? Everyone's mixed up with the public. All those. Is there any board member present who did not say they were present? I think we got all. You got Anakit and Ryan. Okay. All right. So public comment. Please and the participants. Okay. One other thing too, we also are going to turn off the chat function. The reason for that is not that we don't want to hear from folks, but the chat function, we talked to the school boards association. The chat function puts us in an odd position in terms of public comment because it's basically. It's an open public comment throughout the meeting. So we have decided to turn that off. You are. Welcome to email us with comments. During the meeting or any time as board members. That information is on the website. If you look in the school board portion of the website, there's a link to the chat function. So if you want to make a comment. In addition to what you might want to say tonight, or just generally, please contact us there. And Libby also obviously. Is someone you can contact as well, but we are going to turn the chat function off. So if you want to make a comment. Please, if you look at the participants, if you hit on the participants button. If you hit on the chat function. Hand function. If you can't find that. Please email me at. Jim Murphy. All one word at. MRPS VT. Org again, Jim Murphy, all one word at MRPS VT. Org. And I will get you in the queue. We'll go down the list with the hands raised. Carrie Brown. And even though I just said your name, please identify yourself as well. For the camera. Thanks. Hi. Thank you. I'm Carrie Brown. I am a Montpelier resident. I've lived here for 26 years. I have two kids. One graduated from Montpelier high school in 2017. And one is a rising junior Montpelier high school. And I wanted to just briefly address the SRO question. I have a long time ago background as an educator when I was in college. I went through all the teacher education classes. I learned about how to teach academics. I learned about how to provide. Supports to students beyond academics emotional and to connect them with resources they didn't otherwise have. I learned about classroom management and how to handle behavioral problems. And so I know that educators are equipped to deal with a whole host of issues beyond just teaching academics. And I had an experience about 15 years ago. When through my job, I had a reason to be at the Burlington high school during lunchtime in the cafeteria. And I witnessed a student have a verbal outburst, which the SRO who was there handled. And it got a little bit loud and raucous. And within about three minutes, the student was in handcuffs. And it was, it was so striking to me to see that a behavioral problem that was pretty similar to many that I had witnessed and that I know that teachers in high school see and know how to deal with was handled by treating the student like a criminal. And that it was, it just really struck me that when you put somebody who's in the position of coming from a law enforcement perspective, that it can very easily seem that a problem that presents itself is one that needs to be solved that way. And this is to say nothing about how any of the SROs and Montpelier have behaved themselves. But it is to encourage us to think to kind of back up a little bit and stop talking about what it is that the SROs and Montpelier have or haven't done. And to think about why it is that we think that a law enforcement officer is the person to fill that role in the school, why they're the person we want for conflict management, why they're the person we want to connect with community resources, when we know that counselors and social workers and coaches and teachers and mental health workers and school nurses have the expertise to do that. And that that is a much more appropriate. They're more appropriate people to fill that role. And then I also really want us to think about the issue of safety. And when we are talking about all the benefits that we're hearing that an SRO provides and maybe there are some good benefits and then we weigh that against black and brown children and their families in our schools who are telling us that they feel less safe with an armed police officer, someone with a gun in the building every day. And we really need to ask ourselves are the benefits that we're getting what are what is worth these students feeling less safe every day at school? That's all. Thank you very much. Thank you, Gary. Jessica. Next, Jessica. Hi. Hi, Jim. So just get really well. I live on Blackwell Street in Montpelier. My older kiddos are rising kindergarten this year. And I'm also here to speak to the SRO issue. So first, Jim, I was a little surprised by your opening, not because this shouldn't be a budget issue. I'm glad that you have sort of slated that as a budget conversation. Slated this as a budget conversation. But I don't believe we need a budget conversation to make a decision as a community that we don't want police officers in our schools. I don't think that needs to wait until September. And I hope that you all make that decision beforehand. So that the black and brown students and their families who raise their voices in this moment don't feel like they're heading into another school year, having not been heard, because I think that's entirely inappropriate based on this conversation happening now months ahead of time. And then about kind of how I'm thinking about this as a topic in my kid's schooling. A number of folks, I believe, have spoken to kind of how it is to be triggered by a police officer. It doesn't matter that you don't know them. It doesn't matter who they are and what their personal track record is. But if you're black or brown or statistics demonstrate that you are vulnerable, whenever you're interacting with police, your parents have taught you how to manage that situation. Your parents have taught you that you need to be uneasy and you need to be on guard, that it's your job to recognize that that police officer is going to see your brown body as dangerous and you need to de-escalate. And so even as you are afraid of what might happen in this moment and afraid that the person wearing the badge might not be safe for you, it's on you to keep your hands visible. It's on you to be slow and permissive and respectful. And so you walk into any situation where you see a police cruiser, you see lights flashing, you see a uniformed officer with that kind of unease and that kind of preparedness. And that doesn't change. That does not change when you're in school. It's the last place in the world. We want our kids to feel that kind of stress. So I am hopeful that this conversation will land in a place where we recognize that every student's safety, every student's sense of comfort and ease in their school building is what we need and need to prioritize. Thanks. Thanks, Jessica. Sarah, Parker Givens. Hi. My name is Sarah Parker Givens and I'm a resident of Montpelier and I'm here about that SRO issue. I am deeply concerned about the effects of having police in our schools. And I've been hearing that the purpose of having an SRO is to provide support. And I'm also concerned about having an extra set of eyes. While there are those who welcome SROs and experience benefits, some clearly do not. In fact, I am hearing quite the opposite. That the presence of police officers in schools is in reality, creating an experience for some members of our community. We are seeing those symptoms. And I'm also concerned about those unsafe and stressful. Particularly for people of color. So my question is our police officers, the most appropriate trained professionals to be playing this role. Considering the goal is to create a safe atmosphere for all children. And how do we ensure that we are meeting the needs of everyone in the community? Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Sarah. And. Adisa is the. Last name and sorry if I mispronounced that. Hi, Dan. Although I actually support the members of the community that's spoken. I asked to speak not because of SROs, but because of the COVID plan. And I'm also interested in our training to be able to teach online. But I'm actually also interested in what the expectations will be for that online plan if and when we transition to it. Last spring. It felt like our kids didn't really weren't able to receive the education they deserve. So I'm hoping that now with appropriate planning. And I'm also interested in the U.S. And all over the world. They did manage to transition to a full curriculum. And I'm happy to support in any way. My daughter's. Cousins and friends. You know, we're having full school load whereas she was pretty much done. Very early. And I would just like to see a different plan. And thank you for all that you're doing to open schools. Great. Thank you very much. I don't see any other hands. So we will. And getting any other emails. So thank you everyone for commenting. And also comment is not meant to be back and forth. So we do listen. We do take it very seriously. Even if we don't respond in real time. So next item is the consent agenda. Do I have a motion to approve the consent agenda? I'll make a motion to approve the consent agenda. Do you have a second? Second. All those in favor. Roll call. Bridget. Hi, sorry, take a second. Andrew. Andrew, I hear your name. I think that's Emma. The 802 to four nine. Number Emma. Yeah. Yeah. Hi. Jill. Hi. Anaket. Hi. Hi. Ryan. Hi. Jerry. Hi. I think that's everyone. For the same consent agenda passes. Bridget, I'm going to ask you to make the magic motion. Sure. I can do that. First, since I got the mic, I just want to echo Jim and thanking everyone who is here tonight and thank you for, for continuing to, to be advocates and for sharing your views with the board. To shift to something on a totally different topic. So we are having executive session on two topics. One is contract negotiations and confidential attorney client communications. Made for the purpose of providing professional legal services. For both of those under the public meeting law, the board first needs to make a finding that premature disclosure of the topic would put the board at a substantial disadvantage. So. The motion here is for the board to find that premature disclosure of the attorney client communications and the contract would put the board at a substantial disadvantage. So do I have a motion that. That was the motion. Okay. Second. Second. Bridget. We're going to. Oh, sorry. Any discussion. Bridget. Hi. Andrew. Hi. Emma. Hi. Jill. Hi. Connecticut. Hi. Mara. Hi. Ryan. Hi. Jerry. Hi. Jim, before we go in, it's all right. I've invited the administrative team to help with this conversation as well as Heather. We show the Heather resources coordinator. And our central office administration. Okay. Perfect. For the folks on the phone to add to bureaucracy, not only do we have to have a motion that we. Have a reason to go under executive session. We then have to have a motion to actually do it. So. Have a motion to move into executive session. I move that we enter executive session for the purpose of discussing contract negotiations and confidential attorney client communications. With the board staff identified by the superintendent. I do have a second. Second. It was Andrew second name. Bridget. Hi. Andrew. Hi. Emma. Hi. Jill. Hi. Anakit. Hi. Mara. Hi. Ryan. Hi. Jerry. Hi. Okay. We now have the motion. So now we have to work the zoom magic. Got it. See. Tiedra has joined us. Okay. We will be back hopefully in 20 minutes and half an hour for people who want to hear the discussion afterwards. Well, first off, let's have a motion to appoint the committee that we talked about in executive session and do that formally. And then I actually think if memory serves. We are talking about committees generally next. Okay. I've got the agenda. I do have a motion to commit or appoint the. What did, what did we decide to call it? Libby. Thank you. Thank you, Bridget. Jill. Looks like you're itching to make a motion. At least I saw your head move. I was waving to Sebastian. I moved that the board form a subcommittee of the board members. To. To. To elaborate on some possible leave guidance for educators returning to the fall. Do I have a second. Any discussion. All those in favor. I think we need a roll call. Right. Oh, yes. Sorry. Jerry. Hi. Mara. Hi. And again. Hi. I'm Andrew. Bridget. Hi. Jill. Hi. Ryan. Hi. And Emma texted. I. I'm a texted. I. Did I miss anyone? Ryan. Nope. I'm also says she'll volunteer for the team. Okay. So. And she actually said that I'm not just making it up to head. Okay. Perfect. So we have committee appointed. With Emma as a new volunteer member. Can Emma come back now that we're in the regular session? Yeah. Actually. Emma, why don't you try to get back in now? Are you back in. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. She I'm waiting for seeing the waiting room. Hold on. Why don't you keep going Jim and. Okay. So. For discussion review committee assignments. We're going to reappoint our negotiations committee. My understanding is that. Andrew still wants to continue. And they're still in a position to get to the commission. I believe they're still still in a position to get to the commission. They're still interested. They're still interested. And they're still interested. They're still interested. Jill last week. And rumor has it the jury might be interested. I think if that's a case. That's a good slate. And then. Emma, I hope you're back on. Yeah. We texted. Emma is interested in the policy. to do the teacher's negotiation. I don't have the bandwidth to do the other two negotiations. I mean, you can put me back on, Jim, it's okay. Okay. The key thing is that we need new people on it to pass the torch in a sense, but. I don't know how to do it. I mean. I can volunteer for that. Nice, thanks, Annika. Good. Great, thanks. So should we just create a team of all those members and then have them kind of pair up as necessary for the various, for the various unions or? I think that's a great suggestion, Jim, because we have to regularly coordinate with each other and meet so that we're on the same page. So I think that's a great suggestion. Okay. So I heard someone else has to make a motion, but I heard Andrew, Bridget, Jill, Jerry, and Annika. That's what I heard too. Okay. So I'm gonna make a motion to appoint those members to the Uber Negotiations Committee and then amongst them, they will divvy up the various. I will make a motion to appoint, sorry. Oh, go for it. I'll make a motion to appoint to the Negotiations Committee, the list that Jim had just read out loud publicly. Second. Any discussion? Okay. Andrew. Aye. Bridget. Aye. Jill. Aye. Jerry. Aye. Annika. Aye. Mara. Aye. I go. Emma. Aye. Am I missing someone? Yes, I am. Ryan Zajac. Aye. Hi, Ryan. Yes, thank you. All right. And then go to a motion to appoint Emma to the Policy Committee. No move. A second. A second. Andrew. Bridget. Jill. Aye. Jerry. Aye. Annika. Aye. Mara. Aye. Emma. Aye. Ryan. Aye. Great. Next on the Board Discussion is Community Values Visioning Proposal with Sue and Keisha. I think we just have an update on this, Libby. Excuse me. I got an email on that today. If I can be so bold, I would recommend that we push that off till the next Board Meeting because we just got that communication today. So you guys can have a chance to read that and perseverate on it. The only really quick thing is that Emma and Keisha are also working with the City of Montpelier. And so I had some conversation about that that I can brief the Board on, but I would suggest we do that at the next meeting. Okay, you can be so bold, and unless I know it has objections, we can talk about it at the next meeting. Anyone have objections to that? Great. So now we're into Board Communications around COVID and COVID-19 planning update. And this time I'm gonna kick it to you, Libby, as I know you have. And first of all, before I start off with this, I just wanna thank you and the administrative team and really all the members of the district for all the hard work you've been doing this whole summer, trying to figure this out. I know it's a huge task and it seems like every other day you get guidance that throws a new curveball in. So it's obviously so much is on the line with the health and safety of our kids and the need to bring them back in the classroom safely and meet the educational excellent standards we want. And I know you're figuring out things that completely uncharted territory. So I just wanna acknowledge that and give a big thanks for me personally, and I'm sure the board members feel the same way. So... Yeah, thanks. And the principals and central office team who are also on this side, send them some chocolate, particularly Katie and Beth. Welcome to the principals, girls. So Anna could actually brought this and I can do me last week sometime and we had a conversation and just thought it would be a good thing to bring to the board as well. I know the school, you all are getting emails from community and I know how anxious our community are rightfully so around the opening of school. And I'm gonna talk more about that in a second. I worst start, the principals and I are starting to get a few more emails, but we really weren't getting money. The community was going to you instead. And we need to see those. We need to see what the themes are. We need to see what's popping. We need, it helps us prioritize or try to prioritize some things. So, Anakin and I were talking about just answers to the community around Libby and the principals are really working or Libby and the team are really working hard on this. Please email the principals or Libby and they will get back to you as soon as they can with the information that they have. We would just really appreciate that. It truly helps us when we see them as well. See the emails and the concerns that you all are getting. So, if you're getting them, either forward them to us or ask the person who's writing to you to write to us. I saw Bridget did that the other day around. Just please email Libby around that and Anakin did it. And I think it's just helps to add clarity to the process that most of these decisions of it's not policy finances or your evaluation of me are happening at the administrative level. So, that would be just our ask as administrators. So, I don't know if we need any more discussion around that. I think that's okay. I think that's good and super helpful advice. I just want to, if any member of the board has a question about that, feel free to raise it now. Nope, okay. Thanks Libby. I've been going to the planning. Yeah, planning. So, I have my list in front of me. So, of things that is just skimming the surface around where we are right now. So, our administrative team, the people who are at this board meeting and they'll most likely be asked to come to the rest of the board meetings as we go in case the board has questions for individual principals or central office administrators. Did I see Andrew on this yet? Andrew, oh, Andrew's here. Okay, sorry. Only because he's going to speak in a minute. The team who's on this call is, we're working around the clock to try to put this plan in place. And there is no perfect plan. There just isn't. There isn't a way that we can solve this in a way that is good for everybody, including us. So, this is quite literally one, the hardest thing any one of us has had to do. And the other thing I really want to get across to the board and the community is that the state has issued common guidance for all schools, but all schools and districts are going to put that guidance in place differently. So, there's the comparing between what universities are doing or what other districts are doing or what schools just doing. I'm going to ask to try to not do that because all of our buildings are different. All of our staffing is different. We have different policies and procedures. We have different school boards. We have different community expectations on us. So, every one, every school and every district in the state are going to abide by these guidelines in different ways simply because of the logistics of where we work. And so, we want to try to stay away from, well, Burlington's doing it this way, right? Because we're Montpelier-Roxbury and our schools are the way they are and our campuses are the way they are and our staffing is the way they are. And you all, as board members, are the way they are. You are, right? So, we have different fund balances. We have different everything. So, that's just one of the pleas I have in this process. So, our administrative team met for a good four-ish hours this morning. We meet every Wednesday and then on every Thursday we meet with the nurses, union leaders from all three unions and administration. And I just want to list a few of the challenges that we need to overcome. And this is not an exhaustive list in any way, shape, or form. So, staff illness and substitutes, part of the guidance is not to cross-contaminate people and not to bring outside people into the building. So, we want to, you know, Dan French says we want to protect the perimeter of the building. That means that we need to limit substitutes or not use them at all. So, we're really trying to create plans where we don't have to rely on substitutes. A major problem that we have is how do we protect our staff members who, that we were just talking about, over 40 of which fall into an at-risk category? A huge challenge is health checks at the first point of contact. That means that kids who get on the bus have to be health checked before they get on the bus. That means we need bus monitors for every single one of our buses and we need substitute bus monitors for every single one of our buses who are part of our staff. So, once they're health checked, kids can't cross-pollinate with each other for those who've been health checked and those who haven't. So, the morning routine at, let's say, UES is a bit of a nightmare. And so, that's a major challenge that we're having. And we also, by the way, have to maintain physical distancing while we're doing it in a pretty much city school. So, that's a major challenge. The parent drop-off and pick-up major challenge. And how do we do that with the staff that we have? There's no shortage, as I know, every single one of the people on this board meeting and in our community know. There's no shortage of perspectives about whether it's safe or not to come back to school at all, right? There's no common agreement to that. And so, we're working in that environment. We have been told by the state of Vermont that we need to get in-person instruction going. That's not our decision. It's not your decision as a board, but we've been told to get that going. And we all know the conversations that are going around about whether that's the right call or not, but that's the call they've made. Another question that we're really grappling with right now is how do we provide a remote learning option for our at-risk students first and other kids who simply want a remote option or other families who want a remote option? Well, I'm gonna talk more about that a little bit, but that is a major piece and with the guidance that came out at two o'clock this afternoon, that was the first time we heard that we could even give a remote option for a kid who wasn't at risk. So, we've been planning for remote and now we've got a pivot to plan for multiple pathways for kids and staff it. How do we, we need supplies. We need a lot of supplies. The financial responsibility here in Burden is mounting by day. We need tons of stuff to make this happen. And most of the supplies that we need are about five to 10 weeks out. So, the chances of us getting them in time for the start of school for much of the things that we actually really, truly need are probably not gonna be there by the first day of school and that's a challenge. And I'm not talking about things like pencil bins. I'm talking about things like Clorox wipes. And so, we're having to pay a whole lot more to get Clorox wipes into our buildings. We need more time with staff prior to kids coming to train them on the countless new procedures that we have to have in place that we don't even know all of them yet but there's tons of them as well as do virtual learning better because there's a very large chance that we will be back virtual. And we know that we have to do that differently and better than what we did before and we need time with our staff to ensure that they have a better grasp of what that looks like. We're not deer and headlights anymore. We can predict this is gonna come so we need to be better at it and they need training on it. Right now, our staff is on vacation and we can't call them back unless we pay them handsomely and we don't have the money to do that and it's a volunteer piece still. They can choose not to come. So we have to have them when they're contracted to be there. And so we need more time before school starts with just our staff and not kids. I'm working on that right now and I'll talk about that in a second. Hiring, we have a lot of hiring to do and that has nothing to do with, or has a little bit to do with people who are saying they're just not gonna come back but it also has just, we have positions that we need to hire for. So right now we have a 0.5 MHS and a 0.5 RVS special education position. Two different positions that are open. Our one to multi-aged teacher at RVS resigned on Tuesday. So we now need to hire a first second grade multi-aged teacher for RVS. We need at least 10 must monitors. Now we have four volunteers, so I need six more. We have a food service vacancy at RVS with nobody to serve food for kids at RVS. We don't have a nurse at RVS. We don't have a PE or health teacher at MHS, although we have a good candidate for that right now. We don't have a technology educator at UES, although we also have a candidate for that right now. So I'm hoping those two will be filled very shortly but that's a long list and we haven't even gotten into I'm not coming to work. What are you going to do? And we also have a few other IA positions. I believe we have two that Bill is interviewing for either today or tomorrow. So that's a significant list of hiring at a time when people don't wanna come work in a school. And there's some necessary positions. We cannot run our buses if we don't have a bus monitor on them. We can't do it. So we need bus monitors. We need bus monitor to drive, to ride from Roxbury to Montpelier and from Montpelier to back for our students at MSMS. We couldn't find one last year and it's not looking very strong this year and finding one we've posted it for now two months. So that's a challenge. We don't have all the guidance we need from the state to plan. We have no guidance on special education whatsoever, none. We have not gotten guidance on special education. We have not gotten any guidance on our pre-K students. We have not gotten the matrix of how to deal with confirmed cases or school closure. We're supposed to get a matrix from the Department of Health that says when we would close school or when we would close a classroom or when a teacher has to do this or we haven't gotten that guidance at all. And that's coming from the Department of Health. And I know that's a major piece of the anxiety in our community right now that they wanna know those answers that we have been told that's not my decision and it's not the board's decision. It's the Department of Health's decision and they're working on a matrix and we shouldn't expect it anytime soon. That's what the answer to that question was. So that's just like scratching the surface of the challenges that we're trying to overcome. And as our administration learned this morning as we were talking while we knew this but really came to head this morning as we start to get some headway in deciding one piece somebody will be like, well, what about and then it snowballs into new challenges that we hadn't thought about before. So it's significant. It's challenging and it's incredibly hard. I have Andrew and Grant here so that they can talk about some things that are also some concerns that I've seen in the community. Andrew's gonna talk about ventilation work in our buildings and the ventilation that we know about because he was on that right away. And then he's gonna mention our cleaning plan as well because Tom Allen, our lead custodian there is on top of that. That's actually not a concern right now for me which is big because Tom's so good and Tom and my Andrew's team are so good. And then I'm gonna have Grant talk about the different financial supports that supposedly are coming that we also got in the guidance today at two o'clock. So he's gonna tell you what he knows about that as well. And then I'll continue with some other decisions that we've made afterwards. So Andrew, go ahead. Yeah, I feel kind of guilty here in that we are some of the rays of sunshine in this whole dilemma in that we do have real control over of what we've got to deal with. We'll start with the cleaning. We're very fortunate that Tom cut his professional teeth at Fletcher Allen. So he is familiar with this and is very, he's the right man for the job. We are very, very fortunate to have him working for us. He, as Libby mentioned, cleaning supplies, wipes, all that. He is not just placing orders and saying, well, they say it's gonna be here. It's and hoping for the best. He is working on his suppliers. He is not taking promises. He wants, he's not taking, he's not just taking people's word for, oh, it'll be there. He's following up very diligently and has a plan for supplies. Again, when they show up, that's a different story. But like I said, we're not just taking people's word. We're following up with it. He's got a strategy for how he will stay stopped up through the year. And with regards to the staffing, his staff, as we do not have the specific, we will have this person in this hallway at this time doing this, but we are as like we, the principals are doing with their, as they gel their program in their school and how they're gonna operate, we're following behind, figuring out how we're going to be there to help and maintain the buildings. With the public not allowed in the buildings, with things like cafeterias, auditoriums, presumably if I don't remember, specifically locker rooms, there's a lot of spaces in our buildings that we're just not gonna be able to use this year. And so that's gonna free up some of our crew, it was gonna free up a lot of our crew's time and we'll be able to shift those to more of the more visible things that we'll see of doing, rotating through the halls, wiping the high touch surfaces, things of that nature. Tom is comfortable with what he knows today. Libby mentioned some of the hiring and we need to talk about this more about whether we put some feelers out there for additional staff, just so we don't, you know, let's potentially get the word out on the street. And we had not had very good luck hiring in the last year, but it's a different economy now. So we'll work with Libby and the board and Heather with regards to how we potentially post our needs, because we don't wanna, because there's just a whole process through that. But I think on the custodial level, getting materials is gonna be our biggest challenge. Tom has a plan, Tom is being very diligent with his suppliers to make sure that we can meet the needs. Any questions about custodial aspect of this? Okay, with regards to ventilation, I know that's been a big conversation and the state has now got a little six plus million dollar grant opportunities for schools. Again, we are very fortunate. Last winter, as some of you may recall, we had all our buildings retro commissioned, which means we had CX associates, an engineering firm out of Chittenden County, came down and walked through all our buildings with our controls contractor, as well as Tom and his crew. And we, what retro commissioning is, is to look at your system, see where the faults are, see where there's opportunities for improvement are, document it, put it in a report. I have those reports for every building, except for Roxbury, that are no more than four months old. So, and the only reason we didn't do Roxbury is the building is small. It doesn't have a DDC control system, but we do have a mechanical contract that has very recently gone through that building with the eyes of what improvements do we make down here. So, we're in a great position for that. I am meeting with efficiency Vermont, CX associates, our controls contractor, Tom and his crew tomorrow to kick off basically our grant application for work we wanna do in the district to improve in indoor air quality. In conversations with efficiency Vermont, a couple of months ago when this all started to come about, there was lots of conversations of let's do lots of stuff throughout the whole from the CDC down to local levels. Now, after things have calmed down a little bit, people have taken the stance that says, wait a minute, you don't just start messing with mechanical systems. They're designed, they're engineered to operate the way they're designed and engineered to operate. What you need to do is to make sure they're operating the way they should, make improvements where you can, but just don't go willy-nilly in there and start opening dampers and all that because come November, we're gonna regret that a great deal. So, that's where that retro commissioning is very beneficial because we won't have to do that. We won't do that. We'll be very meticulous in how we make the adjustments. What we're going to fundamentally do is we're gonna make our buildings think there's more people in them earlier in the day, staying later in the day. So, we're gonna move as much air as our systems currently are able to do. We're going to replace filters with a higher MERV rating, which is basically the percentage of particulate that can be taken out of the air. Where appropriate, where we can get filters, we're gonna make those swaps as well. Fortunately, those filters really are just on the recirculating systems. It's not on the air intake. That actually you want as little filtration as possible. It's a little filtration is what we've got will work there. We will make sure that we have operable windows. That's another huge piece to this. Make sure your window that you can open a crack window, that gets as much air into your room as anything. Mainstreet and Union, that doesn't mean every single window is gonna operate, but we're gonna, our goal is to have at least two that someone can easily operate safely, closed, secure, has a screen on them, so we have that passive system available to us. Well, opening doors is not really all that viable. Interior doors, most of them are fire rated. We talked about this last year, the idea of propping doors up to reduce the high touch surfaces. The local code official did not like that, which does not surprise me, which is when case of a fire, we want those doors to close. Outside doors for security reasons, we won't be propping those up early either. But between getting our systems to work optimally, changing out filters the best we can, those Merv 13 filters, as you can imagine, they don't make them in every single size, and there is a huge demand for them. And like I say, we will get our systems working at the best that they can. With regards to this efficient, college efficient, with regards to the state's indoor air quality grant, there are opportunities for other pieces, air purifiers, really anything that we can think of, and we can spend the money before January 1st is a potentially reimbursable expense. They do not have parameters, they didn't have time to really set up parameters of who gets what and what makes sense. They're gonna kind of get everything in and kind of go, yeah, that makes sense, and that doesn't, and that's part of what tomorrow's meeting will be. We'll be working with efficiency from out and say, hey, can we get a dozen air purifiers, even though we don't know exactly what room we're gonna put them in UES, but we know there's 12 interior spaces that doesn't have great ventilation. Can we put down for 12, and they'll say, yeah, or they'll say, yeah, maybe you'll get three, and we don't know yet, but we'll find that out tomorrow. The good thing about that grant and the work that we do is the buildings will only get better. It's gonna be difficult to get contractors now, but we've got, again, for at least this slug of money, we've got until January 1st to spend it, so we may not have a whole bunch of air purifiers on day one, but maybe a couple weeks in, we will, and a few weeks after that, maybe we'll have even more. So that's where we stand with regard to ventilation and we will write up something that we'll distribute that really explains the sort of notion of get what you've got working the best it possibly can and make improvements from there. Any questions for Andrew around ventilation or cleaning? It'll also cut down on my complaints about cold blowing air at Main Street Middle School this winter. What do you want? So as I get, when I get the after, we should have a pretty good handle next week as to, and I'm gonna push for a lot. I mean, I don't want to be a hoarder, but I'm gonna push for a lot. And I even talked about things like dehumidification down at Roxbury, which is just an ongoing problem. And some people were saying, yeah, that's an indoor air quality thing, and maybe we can. And we may have to do some horse trading with them where we say, there's no way we're gonna get dehumidification into Roxbury while kids are in the building, can we pay for the equipment and have it installed over the April break? And they're anxious to get rid of this money and to get it into the right hand. So we might get a yes on that. I don't know. Certainly that's one thing that I'm definitely gonna ask for that we'll see. All right, thanks Andrew. You got it. Grant is up next. So you may have heard of this of elusive CARES Act money, CRF and ESR money. We're finally, again, we got, bear in mind Grant and I got this guidance at two o'clock today. So we've been promised this for quite a long time. The CARES money has been caught up in the courts because of some decisions that DeVos made that were unfair for public schools. So I don't even know if we can apply for it yet but because I didn't have time to read the guys today but Grant did. So Grant, take it away. Yes, good evening. So yeah, the CARES Act, there's two buckets of money in the CARES Act. There's Corona Relief Fund or CRF and then there's the elementary and secondary schools emergency relief fund which is called ESR. So you may have heard of both of those. Those are two different things, CRF and ESR. We have, surprise surprise, had conflicting guidance on what the money is, how we're gonna use it. Right now, the business managers in the state belong to an organization called BASBO. So I may be referring to BASBO. Right now, BASBO is trying to clarify with the AOE several pieces of information regarding these two buckets of money. So for instance, on Friday, last Friday where there was a BASBO meeting, what we heard there was completely different than the guidance that came out today. And I'm not sure which is gonna hold true but let me just give you a little bit of a highlight on the two. So CRF money is money that's available to cover expenses from March through December. So some of that money is considered FY20 and some will be FY21 depending on when you spend it. It's ironic that we don't have guidance on how we can spend money from March through June 30th which is last fiscal year even though last fiscal year is done and we're already in the next one. But we're hoping we can get some guidance on that in time to maybe post like a receivable and have it impact our books, but we'll see. What we were told at the BASBO meeting is if we need to be made whole, meaning we spend money on something like childcare which we didn't anticipate and we need to actually get reimbursed to be back to whole again, then our education spending grant next year should not be reduced. If however, we encourage some expenses that qualify but we already kind of had budgeted money for it and we don't really need to be made whole again, then we might be able to put in for that and then the Ed spending grant will be reduced next year which won't help us but would help the Ed fund overall. So that's one piece. What we talked about at BASBO is instead of all of us trying to figure out what we should put in for to help out the Ed fund, there should be some statewide guidance on, everybody should put in for 5% of your teacher salaries from this period of time to that period of time. That way we're all being standard and putting in for the same thing and it should be made easy because it's not helping us out, it's helping the Ed fund out. So that's CRF. I think another piece of that is I think the $6.5 million that Andrew was talking about is actually part of the Corona Relief Fund that was allocated to Efficiency Vermont to execute and that would be money that's basically free to us and would help us. So I'm all for Andrew hoarding as much as he can. We'll see what we can do. The other bucket of money is called ESSER. ESSER money is only for FY21. So it's from July 1st forward and I'm not sure yet what the cutoff date is likely December but maybe not, it might extend further. We were told today that the grant application just opened up so that we could apply for ESSER money. I already went into that grant tool. It's not easy. It's gonna be difficult to do. It shows that our allocation for MRPS is $253,000. But before you get too excited about that, that includes some funding for equitable services meaning for services that kids are getting at non-public schools. So not our schools but private schools. So it's money that's supposed to help out those kids and help out those other schools. Another piece of this is that at least at the VASBO meeting, we were told all the money we get from ESSER is going to reduce our education spending grant. So if that's true, this money doesn't help us at all because it's really just giving us money in our left pocket and taking it out of the right pocket. So that's something that we're trying to sort out. Is ESSER money actually going to help us to get hold or are we basically just getting that instead of getting some other money? Those are the big questions. I wish I had answers to give you right now but those are the two pockets of money. We know that if we get money through the efficiency Vermont piece that that's money that we'll not have to pay back. We do know that there is at least some money in the CRF that we can put in for that won't reduce our ed spending grant. We're just not sure about ESSER. So we'll try to just keep you updated. Libby and I will talk and I'm sure she'll post you, keep you posted on some clarifications as they occur. Our big challenge is going to be digging into ESSER because that grant is open now. We've got to apply for it, figure out what the rules are. So that's all I know for right now and I apologize it's not more. Any questions for Grant just on those grants? Grant is fantastic and you know I tease him a lot about being the most conservative business manager in the state while at the same time being the best business manager in the state. But because of his conservatism, we have a pretty strong fund balance that we save for a rainy day and it is pouring right now. So we are hemorrhaging some money around needed supplies. So for instance, we had to buy, we just put an order in for 100 no touch thermometers and to the tune of $5,000 for that piece. Andrew got a quote for the plexiglass barriers for all our offices and that's gonna cost us $20,000. So it's adding up, it's just adding up. But we have the fund balance to cover those things. Libby, I just have a quick clarification for Grant on items like that. Grant, since those are items that weren't budgeted for and the CRF is meant to cover items that weren't budgeted for, are you aware whether we can reimburse school coppers for those types of expenses like no touch thermometers, et cetera? Yeah, for everything that was not budgeted for, like plexiglass, personal protective equipment, we are putting a project code on that in the system so that at any moment, if we're asked to provide what our costs are, we can provide that and hopefully get reimbursed and we should be able to get at least some money from CRF for that. I think we might be able to get most of it in fact, but at least for the cost that we've incurred to date, I think moving forward as everybody starts piling on to try to get the CRF money, I think the AOE is probably gonna be challenged to come up with some kind of a, everybody's gonna get 50% of what they put in for something along those lines, but we should get something for those unanticipated and unbudgeted expenses. I'm just not sure it'll be 100%. Thank you. And Andrew, we've been hearing, we're gonna get reimbursed for that since March and we don't even have an application towards us yet. So it's one of those things I believe when I see it at this point. Okay, so next up is me just naming some tentative and a few real decisions that have been made. And I wanna stress tentative because of the changing environment in which we are in right now. Our leadership team have, think we're on a pretty good track here, but really it's, we think we're on a pretty good track with these decisions and they could change. So I wanna make sure everybody is really clear about that. So this is a real one, the community can rely on receiving a message from me every Thursday and principles every following Monday. So our website is consistently updated. You know, Anna's a rock star on that as well as our social media, but that's the communication pattern that we've agreed on as an administrative team. So me on Thursday as a district kind of message and then more buildings, excuse me, building specific information coming on Monday from the building principles, usually building off of what I've said. We work on those communications together as well. Our admin is working closely with our school nurses, our leadership from the three different unions, principles are working really closely with what we call the guiding coalition in their buildings, which is a group of teacher leaders to make decisions and some of our kids are coming in to help us with these decisions and parents as well for more local decisions in the building level. We're actively working on a later start date for students in August. So we can have more time with our staff. I have been actively pushing our legislators and our secretary of education to make a statewide start date. Every one of us needs more time. That would require an act of our state legislature to reduce the number of student days from 175, which is what is in statute to at least 170. So far our legislature has been unwilling to do that. Our secretary of education has said that he's for that. He wants to do that. And he's working with legislative leaders to try to push that idea. We haven't heard that yet, which is why I've been kind of holding off on our own calendar because I don't wanna tell people twice, but our administrative team decided this morning that we'd get a later start date out to our staff and our families now. And if the state decides to make another decision then the state makes that decision and that's an added bonus. So as of right now, I'm working on making our start date for students August 31st, which would give us eight in service days versus three. I still would like more time, but that's the amount of time I can get within my power as superintendent. What that does is that we have 178 student days in our contract and we have to have 175. So it's waving those three days, much like we did in the spring or summer last year at the end of the year. It's just waving it for the beginning of the year. And it's working with the regional colleagues that I have who we share the same tech center to swap some in service days that were later in the school year to the beginning of the year. So August 9th or October 9th is an in service day. Currently we've moved that in service day to the beginning of the year. So October 9th will be a school day for everybody. And we've moved that to get more in service time in the beginning. That new calendar will either come out tomorrow in my family communication or I'll make sure the principals get it out on Monday. If Anna and I don't just don't have time tomorrow to do it. So right now August 31st is what we're working on. But again, that could change if the state decides to go with a statewide start date. Right now we're working with the idea that kindergarten through eighth grade will have a shortened school day. There are many reasons behind this. One is that when kids are in school they need to wear a mask and they need to be in the same classroom and they're pretty much at a desk unless they can do distancing in a different way. We do have recesses built in and that kind of thing but I think that's a lot asking our kids. And so a shortened day we're working on for that. Arrival and departure times will be very specific and we will need everyone to adhere to them. We have an idea of what those will be but we're still kind of ironing that out. So our buses will arrive first and then our walkers or people who don't take the bus will arrive after the buses have already cleared away. There are so many challenges to this as I said earlier you can't cross contaminate the kids who've been health checked. So we really need people to adhere to that. There won't be people coming and playing on the playground at UES or RBS before school. That's just not an option. We'll have gates that close it off. Part two and bridges are after school programs and UES and RBS and MSMS is an offer too. Are set to run for after school hours. Our principals will be working with those club coordinators to make sure that we can do that particularly with our shortened day. UES, RBS and most of MSMS will be shifting can fit all the kids in classrooms with individual workspaces at six feet distance which is what the guidelines require of us. We can do that. We have the furniture to do it. We have the room to do it. MSMS are seven, eight classrooms. A few of them are pretty small. So we have to move those seven, eight classrooms into other classrooms or other rooms which may become classrooms and not currently classrooms now, but we can do it. And they'll be six feet apart, they'll be in mass. We're working on building a pod model for K-8 with two adults in every room. So what we're trying to do is not bring new germs essentially into a group of children or teachers or instructional aids. So if we have two adults, either a teacher in an aid or a teacher's special educator or a teacher's and a special person in every classroom that helps us with the need for subs because if one person is ill or has a child who's ill and needs to stay home from work then the other person can be the lead teacher for the day. So we're working with that pod issue. It has ramifications. It has a lot of ramifications. So it would, and we're working through all of those right now but we know that keeping kids with the same group of people and keeping our adults with the same group of people every day greatly eliminate and keeping them six feet apart and washing our hands and wearing masks greatly reduces risk with this virus. So that's what we're doing. It's a huge staffing lift for our kindergarten through eighth grade. At RBS, we may need to increase some FTE to make it happen because we don't have the staff currently at RBS. That may be a subject for an export meeting as we're working through these decisions. UES and RBS will be scheduling recess for kids but it will look very different than typical. It's not the whole second grade going out to play. It will be one classroom out there with their bag of tricks, excuse me, bag of recess toys that is just theirs and not touched by anybody else and playing on most of the structures will not be allowed because they're impossible to clean. So that beautiful new playground we have at UES we may be able to use the swings. That's about it because those are the easiest to clean. Food will be served in the classrooms. We're developing the process now for how families can order food, can how our cleaning staff cleans it up, how we compost food, which is by law we have to and all of those processes and how we get the food to the kids and how we take it away. So we're working on that process now but the food will be in the classrooms. We're not allowed under the guidance to use our cafeterias in that way. MHS, the high school, can't fit more than 13 kids and a teacher into a classroom. We measured it out today in every single classroom at MHS and so we're limited to 13 kids at a time in a class at MHS. And so Renee and her guiding coalition team are working and I know Bridget took part in some of this last week working on a cohort model where some kids will be in the building at sometimes and some kids will be at home at sometimes doing more remote learning and then it will flip flop. So they're working on that model now. I know people are eager to hear what that's gonna look like. Give them time to work it out. It's rescheduling our whole group of kids and we have to figure it out how we're gonna do that. So they are working incredibly hard on that and I know Renee has two days ahead of her tomorrow and the next day with our guiding coalition to do just that and that's after a couple of long days this week already. So they're working on it and to have some patience around that. The guidance clearly states that all students and adults are required to wear a mask in school with the exceptions of those who can't for medical reasons. So that will be a requirement. Their parents and families can help us out now by getting their kids in masks, getting them lots of them. We bought an MRPS mask for every kid and every adult but we just had one for everybody. So get your kids wearing a mask now with that in-person option because they're going to have to do it. We don't know what it says for pre-K yet. That is not as clear as the other guidance or kindergarten. It's not as clear. So we're still trying to get some clarifications on that but pretty much every other child and every other adult will be wearing masks in school. And we have not solved the challenge if an adolescent says to us, I'm not wearing a mask and you can't make me. We haven't solved that very expected challenge. So those are some of the tentative and the real decisions that we've made. I'll stop right there in case the board has any questions around those. Questions for Libby. Just phenomenally impressive work on the part of you and your team. It's just mind-blowing and humbling how much you guys have thought through and making these decisions and we're very lucky to have you. Thanks, Jill. I know that the community is really anxious for the specifics. We're just not ready yet. We're just not there yet. We're working very hard to get there and we're almost there but we're just not there yet. Libby, I also have to commend you in talking with friends who are teachers and friends who have kids in other districts. The level of communication even though you don't have all the specifics hired out from both you and all of our principals so far has been tremendous. Just saying, this is what we know. This is what we don't know. This is how this is the direction that we're working in. It's just really helpful and it lets people know that there are other people like you're not just a superintendent. You're not just principals. You're people who are working on this. And so I thank you and I know many people in our community too, so. Yeah, but I got the best team around. They're awesome. They're awesome. Okay, so let's talk about remote learning a little bit. So as I've said to you multiple times tonight because it was a big thing for us today, we got the guidance today around remote and hybrid learning. When I say guidance, I mean rules basically when I say that word from the agency of education around remote learning up until two o'clock today. We have been told by the secretary that this was not an option except for kids who are medically at risk. That's why we haven't said much about it because we didn't know if we were allowed to or not. What we were told was you need to plan for in-person instruction and that is what the expectation is. Through pressure, I believe, the secretary backed off of that a little bit. And so we talked at length this morning about and this was the beginning conversation because we had been told not to have this. And we were just planning and predicting that this was gonna happen this morning. So this is all very new information and we are really, truly working out everything on this one. So I know the community wants to know answers and wants the options and we're working hard to get those, but truly the guidance came out at two o'clock today. So we're working on it. Principles, so what we decided this morning is that we would first contact our list of kids who are at risk. And so we have across the district 71 kids that we know who would qualify as at risk right now by a medical diagnosis in the categories that we've been given in guidance. So each of our principles are calling or emailing those families in the next couple of days to see what they want. Do they want a remote option completely or are they ready to send their kids back in person knowing what our school day is most likely going to look like? We need to know how many of those kids want remote and what their grade bands are. So here's the thing about remote. When we say we're going remote education, it doesn't mean that if my child was placed in Susan Koch's first grade classroom, but I want a remote option, then that doesn't mean Susan Koch now is your teacher still. It may mean somebody else is your teacher. It may be the remote instructor, instructor is your teacher. And so this is a way to work with at risk staff, absolutely. However, I don't believe we'll, it depends on the amount of numbers that we need. So what we're looking for is whether kids who are at risk are going to be and fall in a medically at risk category, that's important. And it's the kids who do that need want remote or want in person. Finding that information and that number out first and what their grade bands are. Once we have that information and that number with the administrative team will look at that and decide if we have the capacity to offer that option to other people in our community. We don't know right now if we have that capacity or not. We are not a college. We do not have a technological infrastructure or a tech support staff that can really support a full remote system. And we have teachers who are in person instructors. We don't have online instructors yet. So we need to train those who are doing that. So once we know those numbers and make those decisions and we talk to our staff, then we can make to some decisions around how broad can we offer this as a option. We expect and hope to make that decision in the next two weeks. So if people can hold tight or in the next week, then we can try to make that work. Let's see, I just wanna look at my notes here. So yeah, we will most likely, if we have a large number of kids who, if we offer it up to a large number of kids and a large number of kids take the opportunity for remote learning, that will most likely mean that we have to completely reshuffle our staff and our buildings. And so placement of kids wouldn't happen. And so with all of these decisions, we have to weigh the pluses and minuses. We have to weigh all the consequences and some consequences are good and some consequences are bad. And what consequences are we willing to take and what do we have the capacity to take? And then we'll need to determine our staffing for the remote academy. I mean, the most logistical thing is look at our at-risk staff, right? That's the most logistic way to say it, but what if we have eight elementary at-risk staff and we only have need for three teachers in our remote academy? How do we make that decision? So that's, those are kind of the dilemmas that we're playing with right now and they're not easy ones to solve. So really these remote ideas we're literally just discussed this morning. And so they're big and broad and we don't have the exact answers, but that's where we're pointing to right now. I'm happy to try to answer any questions from the board that you have, but just recognize that it might be, I'm not sure about that yet. Is the implication that not at-risk students whose families let the school know that they are not planning on sending their child would be able to access the remote academy as well? If we determine that we have the capacity to offer that. Because remember every instructor that we take away from our POD model in K-8 eliminates one adult who can be in those classrooms. And that's a separate logistical question from if we have a case or something and we need to go back on, stay home, stay safe, then those kids would still have their own classroom teacher when, yeah. Yeah, that's different. Yeah. Any other questions on? Potentials for remote. I know that this is a big, sort of big piece of conversation in the community. I recognize it and I recognize the desire and the need to know. And we would like to have it figured out too. We just haven't been able to yet. All right, that's what I have for my COVID updates tonight. Again, happy to take any questions about anything. Questions for Libby. I have a question. This is Emma. Go for it, Emma. Okay, sorry, I can't tell if people can hear me or not. Yeah, we can. Okay, so I'm wondering, I mean, I'm guessing at this stage, at-risk means the actual students themselves is in an at-risk category. Are we looking at potentially expanding that to let's say the student lives with a parent who is high-risk or has underlying conditions? Would that child then also qualify to be in the hybrid academy or remote academy? I'd have to go back and look at the guidance at the definition, the first guidance documents that came out for the definition of at-risk. Cause I don't know if a family member is on there or immediate family member is on there. And the reason why I say that's important is because we don't have that information. We have information about our students, but we don't have information about their immediate family members. So if that is part of that guidance, then they would in my mind be qualified for what we're planning right now, right? But we just have to figure out a way to get that information. But again, I have to go back in the guidance to see if that qualifies. Right now we're really trying to prioritize our students who have that, who we know have that medical need. Okay, thank you. All right, Jim. I've totally muted you all. I totally summed you all. No, I think you've covered it. I mean, again, I can't reiterate how much we appreciate the amazing work that's been going into this and continues to go into this. I know this is not on the curriculum in superintendent school. So we really appreciate that. We appreciate the work of all the principals and administrators and just everyone who I know is working tirelessly and thinking about this from the clock. So a deep, deep, deep thank you. We have an action item, two quick pieces that I think we can adjourn. Action item to vote to increase the nurse at RBS from 0.2 FTE to 0.5 FTE. Olivia, you just want to give a quick reminder of the justification for that. Yeah, so if we were able to increase it to a, well, right now we can't hire anybody for a 0.2 position. And if we were able to increase it to a 0.5 that we feel that might be a sweeter pot to hire as well as it would give us the opportunity to have a nurse at RBS every morning. So it's really essential during that health check time that we have a nurse there. And 0.2 is a one day a week nurse. So we need somebody there five days a week and that would at least give a, and if we end the school day early, it would give us a nurse for the majority of the time the students will be at school. And there will still be an hour or so where they won't have a nurse, but I think that's, we're asking that that's better than nothing. I had Grant cost it out because I knew my friend Andrew would ask. And it's his best guess at the cost is about $16,000 more than what we've budgeted for. Pat, again, kind of a question for Grant here. Isn't that kind of a COVID-19 related expense though, you know, meeting some additional healthcare services at Rutland, or sorry, not Rutland-Roxbury that weren't budgeted for? It might be, that probably falls in the gray area. Grant, do you know? You may not know. Anyways, it's just something to consider. Yeah, it is. Yeah, it might fall in the gray area and it might be covered by that. You're right. I'll move that with the board of proof increasing the FTE for the nurse at Roxbury to 0.5. I second. Any discussion? Great. Going on my list. Emma Kim. Yes. Bridget. Hi. Jill. Hi. Jerry. Hi. Andrew. Hi. Mara. Hi. Emma. Hi. And Ryan. Hi. Great. Hart is approved. And then last item, we have the second reading of the C28 transgender and gender nonconforming student policy. I sent this to our social workers and guidance counselors to get some feedback on it. And they gave me a little bit of feedback for the policy committee. Can I just say those around a couple of language things? Under the definition of gender identity, and Mara can speak much more eloquently about this than I can probably their thought or ask is to use outright's definition of gender identity, which says, sorry, one's internal sense of being male, female or neither of these both or other genders. Mara, is that right or sounds about right? Yeah, sounds about right. So their request would be for gender identity for the policy committee to consider the definition of that, the outright Vermont's definition. And then then in the use of gender segregated facilities part in the second paragraph, they would like to make where it says transgender, trying to make sure my notes are right, to make it, not just transgender, but anywhere it says transgender, make it transgender and gender nonconforming because some students who are gender nonconforming do not consider themselves transgender. So it includes both of those words. Those were the big ones. They had a couple of other ones, but I think those were the big ones around those pieces of language. Is any further comments or edits on that for the third reading? No. Guys, we have one more reading and then it's finalized, correct? Mm-hmm. Great. Next item, it's this motion to adjourn. Do I have a motion to adjourn? No. Yes, adjourned. Second? Second. Andrew. Aye. Bridget. Aye. Jill. Aye. Jerry. Aye. Anaket. Aye. Navarra. Aye. Emma. Aye. And Ryan. Aye. Thank you all. We're adjourned. I really appreciate you holding it on these longer meetings and helping everyone out through this. Thanks, everyone. Good night.