Coraggio Consulting Loudoun County School Board, Equity Committee Meeting, Thursday, March 2, 2023 Date: Thursday, March 2, 2023 Place: Loudoun County Public Schools / School Board meeting (see BoardDocs / LCPS-TV) Length: 1h 58m (video) Official meeting video (Vimeo / LCPS-TV): https://player.vimeo.com/video/803701898?rel=0 BoardDocs (School Board): https://go.boarddocs.com/vsba/loudoun/Board.nsf/Public Machine transcript (speech-to-text) produced by Coraggio Consulting. Not an official county record. Names and numbers may be misspelled; check the video at the timestamp before quoting. Speech-to-text: whisper.cpp, model large-v3-turbo. Produced 2026-10-22. Timestamps are [HH:MM:SS] into the meeting video. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- [00:00:24] Good evening committee members. We do have a quorum established so I'd like to go ahead and call to order the March 2nd 2023 equity committee meeting of the Loudoun County Public Schools. So welcome everyone. [00:00:42] I've already lost my agenda. I have it now we're good. All right committee members I've been notified that Miss Denise Corbo would like to remotely participate in tonight's school board meeting. [00:00:58] Denise can you please you are I just looked up your name there a second ago so Denise can you please state your location and if anyone is with you and if so their names and if this is a medical or personal matter and why you're asking for the remote participation this evening I'm alone under good word policy 2420 I'm requesting remote meeting participation due to a medical disability and ongoing medical condition as also recommended by by Loudoun County Human Resources Department under the ADA disability law [00:01:35] thank you at this time I will entertain a motion for Denise to participate remotely is there a motion so moved that was Tiffany I'm going to ask you it's even harder tonight obviously I know Tiffany's name and I know many of you but if when you turn your mic on to speak if you would also say your name so that we capture that for the record and because I cannot read anyone's name tags So I'm gonna apologize ahead of time if I don't get it right at our second meeting unless I've known you for like six years Then you can be mad at me [00:02:12] And then I'm so it's been moved by Tiffany. Is there a second? Tony Simona Johnson I second and moved in second. Is there any discussion on the remote participation? All right seeing none those in favor of the request from Denise to to participate remotely, please raise your hand and say I keep your hands up, please and those opposed [00:02:49] opposed please raise your hand say nay nay and so that will carry 14-2 miss corbo you are in the meeting now welcome thank you all right we're going to move to item three our minutes so the approval of the february 2023 minutes hopefully you were able to read them ahead of time a really good thing is just to check and make sure your name is spelled correctly and that you're in the either whether you were present or absent that's a really good place to start if you didn't already have a chance to look just want to make sure we capture everybody's names correctly and in the [00:03:27] right location and when you're ready if someone wants to make a motion to adopt the minutes you can turn your mic on and do so this is tiffany polifka i move to adopt the meeting minutes from [00:03:59] the february 9th 2023 equity committee meeting sir second i can second it say the sheriff moved by tiffany and seconded by saeed is are there any corrections or comments on the minutes dorothy [00:04:22] Yes it has me as absent. Dorothy to present on the minutes. Thank you. Any other corrections? Okay. I'm going to remind everyone that everyone has one vote here and obviously we're adopting the minutes but that if you were not at the meeting last time so you don't have to approve or oppose. [00:04:51] You also have an option to abstain if you're not comfortable supporting the minutes or not supporting the minutes. if you by chance listen to the meeting or or watched it afterwards and you feel comfortable supporting the minutes that's totally your vote to make I just wanted to make sure everyone understood you can vote in favor you can oppose or you can abstain based on your level of comfort okay so we do have a motion on the floor to adopt the minutes all in favor please raise your hand [00:05:23] and say aye keep them up there anyone opposed anyone abstaining and so that will carry with majority in favor and for abstentions I'm just gonna record the abstentions which was Jill Tony Stephanie thank you I had your last name in my head my apologies and Hugo listen by December I will know all of your names perfectly I [00:05:55] promise my goal is really next time I'm sorry Denise I forgot to look up were you a yes thank you so the minutes are approved all right we're gonna take we're going to move to item four introductions so if you were not present last time we would love for you to introduce yourself to the group I'm going to ask you to turn your microphone on state your name and also perhaps who what group you're representing or who nominated you to be on the [00:06:33] committee and just your why what's your why for being here I'll repeat my why and tell everyone that I am drawn to be the voice for marginalized students that don't have their own voice so that's just short and simple why I love this committee and doing this work and I have indicated we skip public comment it really wasn't on purpose first I didn't have a mic here now you skipped me but but Andrea I got [00:07:09] you a mic I just forgot to call on you so thank you so much I'm at a deficit I'll take that under advisement. Thank you. So We're gonna go to item. Boy, I really skipped it if it makes anybody feel better just so that you know I've been wait I've ordered new glasses two and a half weeks ago, and I'm still waiting which is why I cannot see most of your faces And I missed Andrea. How's that did I get up a little bit? Not at all. Okay, that's fine That's fair. So we have one member for a public comment that has signed up [00:07:47] I'm going to give you three minutes tonight to make up for my deficit, and because we just have the one public comment, and it is Andrea Weiskopf, and Andrea, you know the drill, so you know, turn your mic on, and when the timer ends, that's... [00:08:04] Three minutes, I might sing and dance for you, tell a joke. So, as you know, my name is Andrea Weiskopf. I'm here because I've committed to coming to public comment in case there is someone who does speak against equity. I want to make sure that the children of our community know that the public does support them. [00:08:24] I do want to point out that the slide deck was not attached to the agenda, which also didn't get up until noon, so I don't have anything specific to say. I hope the slide deck gets attached to the notes. My one comment, now that those didn't count, this is not, I would like to remind, the place to debate whether or not equity is needed. [00:08:51] This is a committee for equity, and the question of whether or not it is needed is not up for debate and do not belong in this committee. Thank you. Okay, I'll say it for the record. [00:09:08] Black Lives Matter. thank you and I do apologize for missing that I don't make don't really make light of it I very much value public comment we do thank you for being here all right so we're going to go back now to item four the introductions and just talk I'm going to call on you if you weren't here last time if I miss you for some reason my notes are wrong then please raise your hand and we will ask that you introduce yourself and tell us what group you're representing and then your why for being here and I'm just gonna before we get started I'm going to welcome Charles [00:09:46] and for the people who weren't here last week this committee has always tried to be well we have difficult conversations and dialogues that make us uncomfortable we've tried to remain very friendly with each other and keep it as personable as possible and so we use a first name or on a first name basis here and hope that everyone is comfortable with that if you aren't i will of course abide by your wishes but i would prefer that you call me brenda in this setting and i will do the same for you i'll call you by [00:10:21] your first name not brenda and um and ask that if that's not okay with you just let me know and i will respect your wishes and so we'll go ahead and get started and charles you're first on my list hello good evening should not have sat here so sorry pardon my tardiness i'm charles barrett i'm a school psychologist currently serving as a coordinator in psychological services [00:10:50] representing lcps staff you go my name is tom ketchum i was appointed to this committee by the special education advisory committee i'm very happy and thankful to be here i hope to add my voice to represent a population which is sometimes invisible some of the students that require special education services in the county might be part of other populations that are represented here but more often than not and particularly with [00:11:28] challenges related to social or emotional issues other types of learning challenges like dyslexia and autism may not be always very visible and so i hope to add my voice to help represent those students and some of the challenges that they face i think this is an important aspect obviously of of what LCPS does in terms of delivering services. [00:11:53] And I think that our county in particular with the diversity that we have is a great platform for students to learn about the diversity that they're gonna encounter in the world as they grow up and mature and graduate from LCPS that we prepare them for that next stage of life. [00:12:14] - Thank you, Tom, and welcome. We'll move to Hugo. - Hello, everyone. My name is Hugo Grayling. I was nominated by Erica, and I live in Leesburg. I have a kindergartner at Tolbert Elementary, and my husband and I feel like we're the only two-dad family in Loudoun County. [00:12:36] And my why is just making the world a little bit better for those who don't have the luxury of being the majority. So thank you. Thank you, and welcome. Jill? [00:12:54] Hi, I'm Jill Rotifer. I represent the Gifted Education Advisory Committee. I've been on this committee for a good while. I really hope to not just represent our underrepresented, marginalized populations in gifted education, but also I think what's so important about this committee is that this committee is really rooted in looking for action in terms of not just talking about equity, but seeing how we can help advocate for equity through policy. [00:13:36] Thank you, Jill, and welcome back. Stephanie. Hi, I'm Stephanie Cifuentes, and I represent the Latino Latine community. And my why, I have two kids in Latin County Public Schools right now. [00:13:51] And growing up in Fairfax County, I always felt seen. always felt like I was a part of a community that thought that I was contributing something and I want to make sure my kids have that same experience in Loudoun County Public Schools but have seen that there are spots where there could be improvement and what I'm sensing is just a hesitation of I don't want to say or do the wrong thing and so I want to be a part of the change that will hopefully empower people to administrators to feel like it's okay to start somewhere and evolve and you know we will say the wrong things but we will get there together so that's my why [00:14:31] welcome and thank you for being here tony my name is tony simon johnson and i'm a theater teacher at rockridge high school but i represent the lgbtqia plus community it wasn't too long ago that my husband and i our marriage was not recognized by the state of virginia and and so and then over the last year there's been over 300 laws against trans people and so making sure created against trans people just this past week a law passed in Tennessee making it a felony making trans [00:15:11] people a felony so just making sure that our LGBTQIA plus community has a voice at the table and that LCPS continues to be a welcoming space not only for the students but also staff and teachers as well. Thank you and welcome back. I don't think anybody else it was anybody else not here that I didn't call on I think I'm correct with my list here so great and welcome back to everybody who who came from who came back from last month and we didn't scare you away so that's [00:15:44] awesome and we have a lot of of work to do tonight so I'm really grateful to see that we had a quorum we started on time so thank you for that as well. We're going to move to item five information items policy update so all this item really is is an explanation perhaps you've read your email in the last 24 to 48 hours and you've been given some policies to review that's going to be a common practice on this committee we will very often send them to you via email for you to review and then fill in the comment sheet with your comments and you can do those as the representative to the [00:16:22] committee you are you can do those as a parent or as a staff person whatever your perspective is we really value that I will tell you that very often you will see that those policies go back to the committee that owns it and the I know as a board member and while Tiffany and hasn't been here as long but I'm sure Denise can weigh in on this too we really value the input we get from the public and our different stakeholder groups and we look at that and staff looks at it and you challenge the regular thought process of policy writing and it's really important that we get that perspective from our community stakeholders so sometimes we'll do it in committee depending on the [00:17:02] policy if we think that it needs a broader explanation and in dialogue within the committee otherwise we'll ask you to do it outside the committee but a lot of times if we get a lot of feedback we might bring it just so that we can give clarification and so we'll have staff members present to to do that when the committee when the policy comes to that level that we think it needs in person review but please take those seriously and read through them and you can go line by line and make comments and and give us your perspective line by line every every one of them is reviewed and looked at not just by board members [00:17:41] but by staff and counsel to ensure that that we are capturing what our stakeholders would like our policies to look like we might also have to give you feedback sometimes that it's Virginia code and that's the way it is so we truly do appreciate the time you're taking I think I told you last month that this isn't just a two-hour commitment each month it is all month long and we really value your input so thank you for taking that time any questions on that look forward to your input so now we're going to move to item [00:18:20] 6 our committee discussion and as you'll see this is the bulk of our meeting tonight we're gonna pick up and do a little review of what we covered last month because we did have several members not able to be with us and we want to make sure that everybody's on an equal playing field here this evening so i believe ashley you're going to start us off with a recap and then we have several staff members here to guide us through our discussion i'm going to ask that you let the entire presentation go through so that we get through the whole thing and we may take breaks for a little informal [00:18:57] discussion with a table partner throughout the throughout it I also ask that if you have a question that comes to your mind write it down so that we can make sure we address it at the end you might find that a question that arises at the beginning of our of our discussion of our presentation is answered later on so we just want to make sure we we use our time wisely and get through the whole presentation but we will give opportunities I believe for a little one-on-one discussion at your tables okay so Ashley take it away and I think it would be great if if when you do your if you could tell everybody who you are and what you do it might help thank you all right [00:19:34] good evening everybody I'm Ashley Ellis I'm the deputy superintendent here in LCPS and Lottie is unable to be with us this evening so I am standing in for her and then I have some colleagues who will introduce themselves when i pass the mic over to them so as brenda said i am going to give you a little bit of a review from last time there was a lot of data presented we have a little bit more data to present this evening for the first time you'll see it for the first time the slide deck was emailed to you and apologies for not it not being in board docs it should be in board docs [00:20:10] in the next 30 minutes or so I'm working on that so you can follow along or and also as Brenda mentioned we're going to pause periodically throughout the presentation you should each have a note capturing sheet in front of you we will I do believe we will be collecting those correct do we collect these okay I don't know okay you've been told no okay great we do not have to collect them thank you very much so this is for you you can capture your notes and we will you will use them when we start the discussion at the end. [00:20:47] So this evening, we will provide you with a look at the division-wide data on racial slurs and hate speech here in LCPS. As those of you know who were here in February, there have been a couple of board members who requested this information, and so that's how this conversation got started. [00:21:09] To frame the conversation, we are going to talk about it in terms of five Ps. We'll start with the promise for LCPS staff and students. We'll talk about the identification of a pervasive problem that we're seeing, the use of our division-wide protocol for responding to racial slurs and hate speech, prevention and intervention strategies that we're using, and steps taken to prepare our staff to support our students and each other. [00:21:37] So first we'll start with the promise. And the promise is truly our LCPS division-wide commitment to equity. This is our promise for the best possible learning experience for students and staff. As shared at our last meeting, as Lottie shared with you, this is an example of how we used collective input from across the division and this committee to include a variety of stakeholders to develop this shared statement. [00:22:08] Next we'll shift to the problem. I'm going to go pretty quickly through these first slides that you've already seen. So despite our promise of our commitment to equity, the reality is that there is a problem. We do have racial slurs and hate speech in our schools and across the division, and it's counter to the environment that we're trying to create for our students in LCPS. [00:22:30] While many of our students do experience positive interactions with peers and their teachers every single day, there are many students for whom that is not the case. So in order to ensure each and every student has a welcoming and supportive school environment, we have to really look closely at this problem of racial slurs and hate speech and identify ways to improve for all of our students. [00:22:57] So Vladi shared this data in the next few slides, and what you see here is the total number of incidents for the past two quarters, so for the first semester of this school year. The total count is 292, and it's broken down on this slide by type of incident. [00:23:18] And as Lottie described last time, that first row, the general racial incident or offensive language category, represents sort of a catch-all for school-wide offenses. So perhaps something was written on a restroom door, it was blurted out in a hallway or in a crowd of students, not necessarily directed to one student, but it was witnessed or seen and communicated to a school administrator. [00:23:45] So that's that first category. the other categories were created anytime an incident was reported it created a new category and you can see the the counts for each of those incidents for all schools total number of counts the next slide is the counts for just elementary school students and the same description applies that first category is sort of the catch-all it wasn't directed at a particular person [00:24:17] but it was identified and reported to an administrator the next slide is the same information for middle schools and then the same information for high schools so as we saw on the last few slides and during our last meeting we [00:24:54] looked at these incidents across the division and I want to give a special shout out to miss Corbo who asked the question well what does this look like by school we're looking at it across the division but schools should be looking at this as well and schools do examine this this data on their own and it's important to elevate that conversation to this committee so the next few slides you'll see are by school and i'll walk you through i'll walk you through these and please record what you notice so here you're viewing the number of [00:25:33] incidents reported to the office of equity for the first two quarters of this school year they show reports made from the beginning of the school year through January 20th a blank cell indicates that no incidents were [00:25:50] reported the next slide is for middle schools same data broken down by middle [00:26:30] school again a blank cell means zero reports and then this slide same [00:27:03] information for high schools so again these conversations are happening at the school level and principals have been engaging in these conversations with their colleagues at principal meetings conversations have been have been really interesting around you know the the number the number of reports that the [00:27:41] danger of interpreting the numbers does a blank cell really mean that it's not happening at that particular school that's probably really unlikely so consistency and reporting the principals have been having some really important conversations about those so then we ask ourselves more questions and I believe this was in the presentation last time I don't know if you got to it but the following slide really dives into where these incidents are occurring within a school so within the reporting structure the administrator reporting the [00:28:18] incident also identifies where in the school a report an incident takes place so these are the top three areas by level so at the elementary level you'll see the top three areas are classroom cafeteria and recess in that order middle schools classroom pe class and on the bus and high schools classroom hallways and then the stadium the gym or through social media so one thing that you'll notice it's pretty obvious that most of these incidents are [00:28:58] taking place in the classroom across all three levels principals have had some really important conversations about that and we continue to have conversations about that so so far you've heard a review of the promise through our commitment to equity the identification of the problem of racial slurs and incidents and now i'm going to turn it over to jennifer evans director of student mental health services as she provides an overview of the protocol before jennifer starts i will take we'll take a pause and I can go back to slides if you want but just take we'll take about three minutes to pause and capture your thoughts before Jennifer [00:29:37] shifts to the protocol so this isn't going to be out loud you can partner talk at your table right and so we're not going to take questions now and and all of that but feel free to write your thoughts down on your paper and we'll have more out loud group discussion at the end or if you want to just turn to your left right and and speak with somebody at your table if there's something you wanted to bring up and we'll just give you a couple minutes to jot it down may I [00:30:13] make a quick comment sure go ahead Denise um so I actually I appreciate the shout out for the request for this information but the information really started here on the equity committee I believe one of our student representatives um requested that information and then I just took action on that and um and further requested that so um so it it wasn't um from me didn't stem from me I just fraction so thank you thank you so as soon as you're ready to go go ahead [00:30:45] Jen. Good evening everyone. I'm Jennifer Evans, the Director of Student Mental Health Services and I'm glad to be here. I believe the protocol might be where Lottie left off the last time you met. The protocol is an ongoing response to the 2019 systemic equity assessment which revealed some things which we've all talked about but I want to review them that racial incidents are occurring which you've just seen in and around LCPS schools making regional and national news and and set the tone for the larger systems of racism within the division. [00:31:23] Parents fear for their children's safety and well-being at school, and do not trust the division to support them. Responses to racial motivated incidents from schools and the division were slow and ineffective. So the recommendation was to establish the current and establish a clear policy with built-in accountability for addressing the racially motivated acts and create proactive leadership measures to address the student use of racial insults. [00:31:54] The N-word is not tolerated by anyone in LCPS. The message that we wanna make loud and clear is that every individual is valued in Loudoun County Public Schools. When we overheard or when individuals overhear or are reported by students that staff members are to immediately address the racial slurs, the hate speech, or a related incidents in accordance with the code of conduct. [00:32:23] The purpose moving forward is to establish consistency across the division in how we respond and provide consistent support to students who are harmed. We work to address the systemic issues through a restorative approach and we have short-term long-term responses. [00:32:44] This is an overview of the protocol and you all have a copy of that I believe. Each committee member should have a copy if you don't let us know. The Office of Equity, in collaboration with other central office, including the Department of Student Services and school-based leaders, we've worked to coach, consult, guide, and provide directions for the matters of equity. [00:33:07] While providing the coaching, consultation, and guidance, principals are expected to operate with fidelity through the following actions: denouncing the use of racial slurs, insensitive language, hate speech, and hateful expressions or actions; taking necessary action to investigate each instance until a healthy resolution occurs, recognizing that appropriate follow-up will take time to meet with the students and meet their needs, addressing the incidents in accordance with Loudoun County School Board policies and the guidelines laid out in the student rights and responsibilities. [00:33:45] And at this point, I'm going to turn it over to Dr. Tyler, who's going to go through some of the perceptual data that we have, and then I will be talking more about prevention later. So thank you. I'm Ryan Tyler, Director of Research Assessment School Improvement. [00:34:02] So you may have wondered at different points when you're looking at these incidents, and you may have wondered about, is there other data that gets at the climate within our buildings? Is an incident or three or four incidents representative of the experiences of students? [00:34:18] So over a number of years, we've administered surveys to students at the elementary level and the secondary level. We do alternate the secondary surveys between middle and high schools to not over survey students who have to take the state survey. [00:34:34] So last year we had elementary and middle school students respond to our local survey. What's interesting is that while students tend to feel at very high percentages that staff are respectful of students, one of the areas that is still relatively high but lower than other areas is how students treat each other. [00:34:55] So as you look at the results on this slide, you'll see at the elementary level, One of the lowest indicators, still at 84%, was the percentage of students who agree. The students treat students who are different from them with respect. And because it's at the elementary level, when we take it to the secondary level, we get more direct with the question number seven under middle school students. [00:35:17] Students treat other students with respect regardless of race or other differences. 84% at the elementary level, 67% at the middle school level. You may say to yourself, these are still relatively high percentages. Also, sizable populations of students disagree with that statement, meaning they're seeing instances or they have the opinion that students are not consistently treating each other with respect, regardless of race or difference. [00:35:43] So this gives you something to consider along with the incident data, that there are students who are having experiences where they're seeing disrespect between students, sometimes because of group differences. The next slide you see at the middle school level, we do disaggregate it by race. [00:36:02] We also disaggregate it by other demographics. And you see it was lowest for African American students. But what you see here is something to consider along with the incident data. There are sizable percentages of students who do see instances in which, while they may feel that adults are treating students with respect at a higher level, they're seeing more challenges student to student. [00:36:26] So I'll hand it back over to my colleague for the next slide. Good evening. I am Ray Mitchell, Executive Director, Chief of Schools. [00:36:41] And I am here to give you some information on behalf of our Office of School Administration. So what you see on this slide are some of the considerations that are made when administrators have to administer discipline. [00:37:01] So there are some considerations that they take into place such as age and health of the student, appropriateness, the student's understanding and the impact of their behavior and attitude, their willingness to repair the relationship if their behavior was geared toward another student and they caused either some type of harm or they, in elementary, it could be sometimes when they hurt the feelings of one of their peers. [00:37:30] so it could be something a statement that is made such as a racial slur or it could be something physical next slide so what you see here are their levels when we get into discipline and so levels one and two are here in yellow and these are discipline issues that are handled in the classroom and they're tier one strategies that can be accessed by those teachers and then there's There's some examples there of what those level one and two standards of conduct are, such as tardy to class or a food or drink violation, a dress code violation. [00:38:07] Those things are handled with the tier one strategies. This slide is when we get into the second levels of behavior, which are three through six. And I'm not sure if you can see it, but the hate speech and slurs are part of the levels three through six. [00:38:28] And on this, where you see hate speech and slurs, there is also a response protocol. And that is the link that takes administrators to the Google form that spells out the steps for handling hate speech and slurs when they're used. [00:38:44] What level three through six means is that it requires an administrative response. So below that are some of the MTSS pyramid of tier responses and strategies and some other considerations that are made when there is a level three through six infraction. [00:39:02] So this is SBAR or the Student Behavior and Administrative Response Collection. And these are codes that the Office of School Administration uses when working with administrators when they have to administer discipline. [00:39:24] So when they input the disciplinary action, there has to be a correlated S-bar that aligns with the consequence. So this gives an overall viewpoint of those S-bars. So the elementary and secondary, they have S-bars that align with them. [00:39:49] And as parents and community members, you have access to the student code of conduct. And page 33 of that document displays the various levels and the responses that align with those levels. So when we get to the next slide, the next couple of slides, I'll give you an example so that you can see how the levels align with the behavior and the SBARs that are used. [00:40:15] For example, what you see to the far left are the codes, and then there is a VDOE description of the behavior. And then the next column is the LCPS description of the behavior. [00:40:33] So what you see when you see LCPS Division Response Level 1 and Level 2, so those are the different levels, and when administrators click on them, it will direct them to the Student Code of Conduct, and it will tell them exactly what are some ways that they can address the behaviors or the infractions that have been committed. [00:40:55] And elementary sometimes have different responses and interventions than the secondary. So the behavior might be the same or the infraction might be the same and the SBAR might be the same, but the response and the intervention could be level dependent. [00:41:11] Next slide. So you see on the second column there that racial slurs are described by BDOE and then the LCPS description is using slurs based on actual or perceived identities. So elementary is the level one. [00:41:28] If it's a secondary, it automatically starts at level two. And the reason that you see it can go to level five is because we also look at progressive discipline. So for example, a level one response at an elementary might be, or a level two response at a secondary might be, that the first time there is a racial slur used, they can do a restorative practice where they have the students that were a part of the interaction come in. [00:41:56] It's a structured conversation where they talk about what was done, what was said, how it made the parties feel, and sometimes that is enough to resolve the conflict. However, if a student is repetitive in their behavior and continues to target certain students and or use the same racial slurs and continues to have the same SBAR used as a part of their discipline, We can look at progressive discipline, which, again, looks at different levels. [00:42:28] And the next step might be, it doesn't have to be, but it might be, depending on what was done, it could be ISR, like in-school restriction. So that is why you see the different levels there, because if it's repetitive and the interventions and responses that are being put in place are not working, then we look at progressive discipline. [00:42:50] Thank you. Hello again. I am going to review the prevention and intervention services that are in place with regard to social-emotional learning, the unified mental health teams, and restorative practices, which Ray was describing just a minute ago. [00:43:13] First, we'll start off with how this ties into our core value of holistic support. We want every student to have the support to feel safe, happy, and cared for in school. The LCPS Department of Student Services takes that holistic approach in supporting every student, which includes but is not limited to social-emotional learning, unified mental health teams, and restorative practices, which are embedded in the multi-tiered system of support framework. [00:43:41] Social-emotional learning is having social awareness and relationship skills. Social awareness is having the ability to understand perspectives and have empathy for others. Relationship skills involves having the ability to establish and maintain healthy and supportive relationships with diverse individuals. [00:44:01] As you can see, what we're thinking and what we're teaching at the elementary level across all elementary schools is empathy and kindness, problem solving, and then when you get into the middle school level, we're building on that with recognizing bullying and harassment and managing relationships and conflict. [00:44:20] The unified mental health teams, I'm proud to say, are now in every one of our schools, including the elementary. We started with implementation at the high school level and then went to the middle school level, and now we have a unified team at the elementary school. [00:44:37] You'll see the members listed here. The stars indicate those are at the secondary level, but at every level you have school counselors, a social worker, and a school psychologist. When you get to the secondary level, there are other individuals who have expertise in certain areas, like the student assistance specialist who has substance abuse knowledge and expertise in that area. [00:44:59] The whole goal of the Unified Mental Health Team is to work and support students' social, emotional, mental health, and behavioral needs across the tiers. So we do prevention presentations, we do individual and targeted group support, we do responsive services, we do threat assessments, we manage crisis response. [00:45:17] and we manage suicide screenings as well. All throughout that, we're communicating with parents, collaborating with community partners, just trying to wrap those supports around students and identify their needs. So when a student experiences an incident, we are there to support that student, identify the best intervention to support the students involved and repair that harm. [00:45:40] Many of our Unified Mental Health Team members are also restorative practices facilitators And restorative practices, as Ray was describing, is a way to repair harm. But that is just one piece of what restorative practices does. That's called conferencing. [00:45:56] That's when we've had a situation that could be managed by discipline. This is an opportunity for students to come together. Parents are included in the conversation. And students are asked to take accountability and repair the harm. We're not going to force any students to do that unless they're at that place where they're willing to acknowledge they've done harm. [00:46:15] So sometimes those conferences don't go forward because we are 100% one to guarantee that a student doesn't receive any additional harm by going through a conference. So unfortunately, some of those referrals don't go forward. And we have had some situations that were successfully managed through restorative practices. [00:46:35] I do have some numbers that I wanted to share, but I didn't get them in the slides. We've had 11 incidents this school year that have resulted in conferencing. And I do have a breakdown, which I'll share. There were two related to hate speech, one at the high school, one at the middle school. [00:46:52] And racial slurs, two high school, six middle school, and one elementary school. So out of the total number of restorative conferences that have happened this school year, 12% were for racial incidents and hate speech. Another thing I'll point out about restorative practices is that it's completely voluntary. [00:47:13] So it has to be something that they're willing to do that they want to be part of, and they've recognized that harm is done. So at the end of the conference, there is an agreement, and our recidivism rate for these instances is very, very low. [00:47:31] We don't have a lot of students, once they are able to see how they impacted someone else, that they do the same act again. But unfortunately, we have situations where parents are scared to have their child go to a conference. They don't want their child to be in the room with the child that harmed them. [00:47:49] So we're trying to explain the process and ensure that we won't do additional harm. But sometimes parents aren't open to that process. All right. At this point, I'm going to turn it over to Cynthia Lewis, who will talk about preparing our staff. [00:48:06] Good evening, everyone. I'm Cynthia Lewis, and I am the supervisor for culturally responsive instruction. And I've previously served on this committee, so I'm happy to be with you again this evening. So I'm going to be talking about some ways that we prepare our staff and continuing to focus on prevention. [00:48:26] So, again, I just want to reiterate that we really continue to lean on our equity statement as well as our core values for holistic support and equity and opportunity when speaking to teachers about our commitment and our responsibility to our students that every all of them should have the support to feel safe, happy and cared for in school. [00:48:43] and that all students and staff should have access to resources, programs, and support that enable a successful future. And that's what we lean on. We're a part of the collaborative team that also helps support schools when responding to incidents. [00:48:59] So I'm a part of that team. So when we think about preparation for teachers, it really speaks to our work around culturally responsive instruction. LCPS really started this work around cultural competence and culturally responsive instruction. [00:49:14] well before the state mandated this as a requirement for teacher evaluation. In 2019, the culturally responsive framework was created, and it really focuses on three overarching principles, which are creating a welcoming, inclusive, and affirming environment for our students, inclusive curriculum and assessment, as well as engagement and challenge through deeper learning. [00:49:39] So all three of those are really important when we think about climate, when we think about the climate in schools, because we know as students feel connected to what they're learning and what they're working on, that increases engagement. And finally, we want to talk to teachers about how to be really intentional in creating a learning environment where students feel supported. [00:50:01] So this all supports the climate for our students and what we want for our schools. Our focus in thinking about that environment and creating an environment for respect is really based on our definition of what that is, and this is just included on the screen, a welcoming, inclusive, and affirming environment. [00:50:22] It creates a productive learning environment that feels safe and is designed to support high quality instruction for all. It is a space where people can find themselves represented and reflected, and where they understand that all people are treated with respect and dignity. [00:50:38] The environment ensures the multiple identities and cultures of students, staff, and families are affirmed. valued, celebrated, and used as assets for teaching and learning. So that's language directly from our culturally responsive framework. So when we think about how teachers can be more intentional around this, through my office and as well through collaboration with other offices, we've provided professional learning for teachers and leaders that really support creating an environment for respect where [00:51:13] Teachers are focusing on creating and developing consistent routines and strategies for protocols when students are involved in classroom discussions, teaching students how to collaborate with each other and participate in discussions even across differences of opinion or differences of experiences. [00:51:35] So the goal is for the teacher to really create an atmosphere where students can be a part of creating the norms for how we collaborate, how we speak to each other, how we deal with conflict, how we're going to learn together. [00:51:51] So some reflective questions that teachers might ask themselves and include students in that conversation might be how will teachers get to know students, how can I intentionally help my students get to know each other, how will they learn about each other, asking students what do you value? What are the values that you center around listening, participating, and interacting with peers? Also thinking about ways that we can encourage students to have interactive, respectful participation and getting their ideas on that as well. So they're creating [00:52:26] that, they're helping to create that environment and teachers are helping to facilitate that environment. So we also wanted to include some other ways that teachers are engaged in learning this gives a more broad and comprehensive look in other ways that teachers are involved in training. [00:52:52] So obviously our teachers really get learning around our policies and regulations around discrimination and harassment. Our building leaders have had opportunities to look at the protocol and get into some scenarios in order to think about how to be proactive and also how to respond to those incidents as they happen our licensed staff have additional opportunities to engage in learning we have learning around teachers helping students move through sensitive conversations as they as they appear in our curriculum and how they can facilitate those conversations there is [00:53:30] diversity awareness training for that is available to teachers in addition to a lot of the work we do around common learning for equity each year which is is the Centering Equity in Instruction Professional Learning, which is really around culturally responsive practices and equitable instructional practices in the classroom. [00:53:53] So we'll just give you another few minutes to return to your note-taking, what you're noticing, any questions that are coming up for you before we open it up to questions. [00:54:16] - Can I just ask a quick question? What is the restorative conference? Or should I wait until the-- - If you could wait, we'll open it up for questions And then I'll have my mic on. We'll do like we do every meeting. I'll ask that you wait for me to call on you so we recognize one person at a time and move through the group and give everybody a chance to go once if they want to and before we do duplicate questions from people. [00:54:42] Okay, but take a couple minutes and gather your thoughts and questions, write them down. We'll just, just a couple minutes. Thanks. [00:54:49] All right, so I'm going to start by thanking everyone for the presentation, the thoroughness of it, [00:56:27] and and for being here tonight to also take questions and as as we dig into this topic and so now i'll open it up for any comments or questions from committee members i'll just ask that you raise your hand and wait to be called on and um does anybody want to start with a question or a comment arjun there we go uh so first off i would like to thank everyone for getting the data [00:57:06] aggregated by each school it was really helpful to see how at the end of the day this boils down to a reporting problem. I did have one question about the definition of hate speech. I noticed there wasn't anything or any reports for sexism or otherwise misogynistic language. Does that fall under the category of hate speech or is there something different for that? I do believe it falls under the category of hate speech and if it's not listed separately that means that when [00:57:40] it was reported it wasn't identified that specifically. All right thank you. Tom. So just two things I wanted to mention one is I think it's an interesting correlation that the the numbers regarding respect in your survey roughly declined by about a hundred percent right given a margin of error declines from about 15 15 or increases I should say from 15 percent to about 30 percent between elementary school and secondary school I also noticed that that may correlate to the focus [00:58:20] in SEL on things like empathy, the elementary school level, rather than the focus in SEL on identifying bullying at secondary level. So there could be sort of an interesting correlation there. That was a point that I have a question, or would you like me to pause and answer that first, because it looked like you were? [00:58:41] My understanding of the SEL is that it builds upon the existing lessons that are taught. So they're still embedding the empathy and kindness while layering in bullying and harassment and relationships and boundaries and respect. Absolutely, and I recall history class also built on itself, but that doesn't mean everybody remembers. [00:59:02] The two questions I had was, one is, as part of the training for the staff on these matters, is there a testing aspect to that? In other words, do we test staff to ensure that things like specifically, they know how to categorize these events? [00:59:21] So the training that is coming from the Division of Equity doesn't typically include any testing I think some of the training around policies and regulation might include a short quiz but it's really informing and making teachers aware last question but I'll just follow that with a quick comment I know in my own experience in doing other types of training that without that testing it's very hard to figure out whether or not people know how to categorize things that's just a specific experience that I've had you [01:00:00] mentioned about the recidivism is very low with students that have been through that process of reconciliation but overall we see these raw numbers in terms of incidents do we have any data that looks at individuals involved versus number of incidents that is students that may be involved in multiple incidents so that it's a kind of a different way of looking at the data do we have any data on that Ryan correct me if I'm wrong I believe that the schools capture that in the student information system and it is we don't [01:00:36] have easy access to that at the division level but the schools do capture that is that correct so that is correct when it comes to referrals we have the ability to have an incident that can involve multiple students multiple violations and multiple dispositions I think starting off with this is at the incident level so maybe we can move on to actually categorizing and having more data how many students were involved but it's focused at the incident level from [01:01:06] my understanding now I'm gonna get to you in a second Jill I have a question to build on what Tom asked about if what do we do to inform parents about restorative practices prior to their child being involved in an incident that would start could create that situation I think educating parents because of what you indicate as a success rate what what are we doing to proactively and tell people before it becomes personal and when I was presenting I forgot to [01:01:44] mention there's more to restorative practices than conferencing so we start with the tier one level which is all students receive this so we do restorative circles in our classrooms and we really weave it in with the culturally responsive instruction and also social emotional learning because students then are able all to have a voice and share their ideas what they want their classroom to look like how they feel included in the classroom discussion so parents are aware of that but we do do presentations about restorative practices through our parent seminar series we had one of our sessions at our mental health and wellness conference but we try to [01:02:22] educate parents about that option really early on in the process and we have facilitators who are leads within each region so they really do a great job at describing that to parents and we'll provide that outreach to try to talk them through what it looks like but again sharing this with all of you is really important to me so restorative conferencing does work when students are actually able to look at the person they harmed and hear how it impacted them and then they develop an agreement moving forward on how they're gonna fix this and not everyone comes out being friends and I don't want anyone to expect that [01:03:00] either but they learn to respect one another and can navigate the challenges in a different way Ashley Jen could you give an example of because I know this does happen if one or both parties does not agree to a restorative conference what would happen in that situation so the process begins with the administrator making that referral talking to the student and the parent about the process and just saying would you like to talk to a facilitator about what this looks like then there's a phone call and a meeting scheduled with [01:03:36] the students both involved and their parents to talk about that process and that's called a pre-conference so in that they're actually giving them an example of what it would look like what the questions are that are asked what happened how did it impact you what were you thinking at the time what can you do to make this right those are the questions so this the students actually have the conversation the facilitators are the most invisible people in the room so we try to explain that process but sometimes the parents are too angry the parents are too upset they're fearful of that their student being with [01:04:12] that other student so if the facilitators determine one that more harm could be done or one there's no accountability being taken by the student who did the harm we're not going to put them in the same room so sometimes we go back to the administrator and say this isn't an appropriate referral maybe we should try something else so it's not a one or none there's other options we can do an individual lesson with a student with a counselor or whoever has that best relationship with this student to support them and make sure that they feel safe in the school one of the other things I'd like to point out is these [01:04:50] are not often one-on-one student situations oftentimes we have to look at the scope when we're going through the protocol sometimes it's a bus incident and a lot of students hear that so what does that response look like that could be a conference let's say the other student doesn't want to participate that could be a conference with the parent and the administrator but then what are we doing to repair the harm with all the students witnessing that that could be a circle that we could talk about respect so we have to take a look at the scope sometimes if it's at the secondary level at the high school level we'll do classroom circles across the whole student body depending on the size and [01:05:29] scope of the incident jill then anna and then robin that's who so you do have your hand up too okay um thank you um i'd like to tag on to what arjun said about this possibly being like a reporting problem because i think anecdotally anybody who has worked in a middle school or in a high school or who has children who are middle school or high school students find it highly unlikely that there are so few incidents or there are high schools where we [01:06:04] We have had zero incidents reported in the first semester. So how are admins at the middle school and high school level being kind of coached and supported so they can better identify, they can better make sure that we are accurately using these protocols? [01:06:25] Because as I said, like I know as the equity lead in my elementary school, like I am fairly frequently or almost immediately when an admin has a report of an incident brought in to talk about that incident at the elementary level. [01:06:43] And I find it a little bit hard to believe that we're doing that at the elementary school level and we're maybe seeing incidents at the feeder middle school that we're going to and then there's zero at the high school. So I find that pretty difficult to believe that we go from reporting in elementary, reporting in middle and then having zero incidents in a high school just based on the current climate of what we see in our high schools and the reporting of high school students and their experience. [01:07:18] - So, thank you for that question. I'll start and then ask others to chime in. We had a very similar conversation in a recent principal meeting. I think it comes down to initial education about the protocol and the steps that we are to take continued conversations like we can't talk about it in that we have to continue to talk about it and you know one principal said point-blank I deal with these situations all the time and don't always have my administrator you know or my AP take the extra step to you know we just forget to put it in the [01:07:56] system and so we actually saw an increase in the in the number of incidents after we had that conversation with principals so it's it's It's constantly talking about it and reminding ourselves and each other of the process that we need to take. Because if we don't capture the data, then we can't address it systemically. [01:08:14] I would just add, and I think Ms. Lewis shared this, that we have been in front of principals, in front of APs, in front of deans to talk about the protocol and have them walk through different scenarios and share out and come up with what they would do. [01:08:32] How would you handle this situation? What would the scope look like? are the services that you'd recommend? How would you identify who would be the best fit to provide this service? So we are having that ongoing dialogue and conversation every year. We have three or four scheduled for the next month in front of our APs and deans. Anna? Good evening. [01:09:00] Anna Purdy, principal at Meadowland. I have a few comments. First of all, in terms of the categorization, we don't ask our teachers to categorize. That's not at the administrative level so I think we're able to do it with a little bit more fidelity because there are less of us so our teachers report any incident to us then we categorize and we seek input from our equity lead and equity department so that does help with that I also wanted to say that I do think this kind of speaks to another comment that I think we do need to look at this not just in [01:09:40] terms of elementary, middle, and high, but in terms of our clusters. So my elementary school feeds into a middle school, which feeds into a high school. And typically problems that are happening in our high school, there's someone living in that home that is attending my school at the elementary level. So, and most of the time, racial slurs are learned from younger siblings by older siblings in all of my work with my students. That's what I've discovered. A comment that I or a [01:10:12] question that I had and I did talk to Ms. Spurlock, I called her yesterday, is that how might we inform families a little bit better of, I think I had an assumption that there was much more of a knowledge out there about what a racial slur was and I'm finding that that is getting lost in the translation when I am talking with parents about that in addition my families I had two families ask me [01:10:44] what the n-word meant and obviously I did not say what the n-word meant but I do think that there is a lack of awareness with some of our families that we need to really acknowledge that their teenagers may be saying a word that the families, be it culturally or linguistically or any other number of variables, the parents aren't even aware that it shouldn't be said. And so as we're teaching our students about these things, that we're actually also educating our parents. [01:11:24] Thank you. Thank you. Robyn. I'm sorry. Now, it used to be that four could be on at the same time. [01:11:42] So that's apparently not the issue tonight. I apologize because I kept touching my button. Hi, Robin Scott, MSEC, delegate from Kenneth Colbert. [01:11:58] I have a couple of questions. First of all, what does the response or the restorative practice look like when there isn't anyone held accountable? When we're seeing graffiti or messages or anything like that where you can't specifically hold a person accountable? [01:12:17] Sending out an email, I think, doesn't do it. And I'm just curious what other steps are being taken as far as that's concerned. What I would say, what I would recommend, if you're noticing climate shifts or you're hearing things but you can't pinpoint it to one individual or a group of students, right, would be to address it as an entire school. [01:12:39] And that's been done. So having those circles in the classroom and having facilitators lead the conversation about the expectations we have as a district of what is appropriate, what's not appropriate, and how are we going to commit to that moving forward? What can you do to commit to making this a more safe and inclusive space? [01:12:58] My second question is the level response of discipline response. Do all the schools in our district use this? Yes, we have a student code of conduct. And when you get access to the slide deck, there is a link where it says student code of conduct. And if you click on that, it'll take you to what the schools use that have all of the different levels and things in it. [01:13:24] So, yes, that is what our schools use for administering discipline. And to, I'm sorry, to follow up on another comment. When you asked what happens when there's graffiti and there is not one person, when we do have things like that in our schools and we see more of it at the secondary level, we are involving our SROs, which is law enforcement, to investigate those things. [01:13:51] I have a whole bunch of follow-up questions on that, but I will save them. The other thing I wanted to ask about was the UMHT, United Mental Health Team. So the specialist you talked about in the schools, are the students aware that they have that much resources available to them? [01:14:07] And also, is there follow-up after a student uses those resources, maybe after they, you know, years have gone by? Are they still staying with those students? We have so many mental health issues, so many self-harm issues. I'm just curious about that as well. Yes, so I'd like students to be more aware of the individuals and their specialty, but they do know that there's a team of trusted folks who all have mental health backgrounds. [01:14:31] I'll leave it at that. And yes, we do do follow-up services. For instance, when we have a student who has a violation of a substance use policy, 8240, sometimes those students don't want the service, but we provide it, it's required as part of the discipline, and regardless of whether they want that check-in later on or not, we're gonna follow up with them and see how they're doing. [01:14:53] And the parents are aware of that. parents have to give permission for that but we want to make sure that they're on track so we usually have to have the kids that you know agree to is it okay if i follow up with you in a month is it okay if i follow up with you um in three months and by the way i'm also going to be at your high school so i'll follow up with you there so there is consistency with the service provider saeed and then just so you know i've captured you tony and then stephanie okay so sure so my name is Syed Ashraf. And again, thanks for sharing all the data. I think it's very helpful. I think the [01:15:31] one comment that I wanted to make, especially, I think maybe we should focus more on help reduce these incidents before it happens. So maybe more focus on the proactive steps. I know some were mentioned, but I think if we can have better messaging and set more expectation and the communication around it. And also we talked about the teacher training and maybe culturally responsive instruction i think those will be helpful and as the and i mentioned maybe setting some expectation for the parents as well so just on wanted to add that the focus on the proactive [01:16:06] steps thanks i did want to mention that there are resources for families who want to have these conversations with their students at home there's some resources that are included on the division of equities website and also as schools are looking to expand their learning for students around these issues. They're leaning into their family engagement practices and sharing their work with parents and having conversations with the parents as well. Tony? Thank you. Tony Simino [01:16:44] Johnson, a theater teacher at Rockridge High School. On slide 17, you talk about notification via Google Form to Office of Equity, so on and so forth. Is that Google Form supposed to be used by teachers or to whom is that Google Form? What is that in reference to? That's where the administrator will put in the information. So teacher reports incident to the administrator, and then the administrator is required to enter that information, which goes to the different offices. Sure. So I guess my next, my follow-up question is that I heard you say that sometimes [01:17:23] administrators forget. I mean, I understand they're totally overwhelmed and there's a lot going on. Similar to what teachers have to do for, I don't know, field trips, where a teacher has to fill out a google form that google form goes on to the administrator and then to the office of administration is there a way that you can create a google form that a teacher fills out as soon as the incident happens it gets reported immediately to administration and then that goes up so that you're capturing all of the numbers in an aggregate with teachers on the on the front line i really like that idea because the teacher doesn't have to wonder did something happen did the administrator [01:17:59] do their part so there's that paper trail so we can bring that up i'm just thinking about as a teacher on the front line. It would be much easier for me in my 88 minute block if I see something to report it immediately right there in the Google form and to address it immediately in my classroom. And if you do go that route, you know, QR code on a bookmark might be awesome for the classrooms as well as you continue to address this. Thank you. And then my other question is, and this involves money, but the proactive approach, is there programming that we can [01:18:37] bring into the schools? Can we explore programming that we can bring into the schools that's proactive, sort of like cross the line, that the whole school, you take a day and the whole school engages in this beyond advisory lessons. Maybe there's a public speaker that comes in, just something to unify the school around what we're addressing here. And again, that costs money but is it possible for you to explore that as a proactive approach to to this issue yes I think that's a great idea we're always looking for ways that we can expand the learning [01:19:13] around this and we're looking into different avenues no place for hate is something that comes to mind so yes we're looking at different options and opportunities for communities students and teachers great thank you so much Stephanie Stephanie C Fuentes representing Latino community and Tony actually to build on his last point I was going to ask about I know that in my professional life we've identified that a lot of times things kind of start with what happens [01:19:48] unconsciously so do we have any training around unconscious bias and then that usually progresses like if you don't address the unconscious bias that usually progresses into microaggressions which usually progress into racial slurs so piggybacking off of Tony's message there of like is there a way that we could kind of bundle those things together so that both for the students and the parent community? And I have one more after that. So we've been doing equity training for quite a few years in LCPS and some of our earlier trainings definitely spoke to bias and how teachers [01:20:27] can really reflect on their own views, on their own life experiences, and how that interacts with how they interact with students so we continue to focus on really deep reflection for teachers around their instructional practices around how they engage with family how they engage with families so that reflection is certainly a part of training and learning for teachers what about for students though that's what I was talking about so I would say that the schools are doing a lot of work with their students and it would be different from school to school [01:21:05] might look different about what their lessons are focused on and what the content is okay um and then piggybacking off of well i was hearing from the meadowland principal for the um the restorative practices do you have translators for the different languages at each of these schools because i'm just thinking through about um when we talk about not understanding slurs that could be a language barrier so i just wanted to learn more about that yeah for all of our services from the unified [01:21:36] mental health team and assortive practices we will use interpreters. Arjun I see your hand is up but I'm going through the people who haven't had a chance yet but I'm making a second list okay so we'll wrap around back to you and so Mark you're next. Thank you. Mark Lucero. I have a pretty simple question. When you put the slides up that said what are we doing about it and I think everybody was really excited to see what are we doing about it. The first few slides you talked [01:22:10] about discipline and I think everybody understands what that means but then we we heard about cultural culturally responsive frameworks holistic support restorative practices unified mental health teams social emotional learning those are all new things to me I know what discipline is and good bad or indifferent we know whether they're we know where they're effective and whether or not so my question is about these new things that you've presented they sound great But my question is, do we have any evidence that these practices or these approaches are effective? [01:22:44] Thank you. Okay. So with restorative practices, yes, there's a lot of research. We were trained by the International Institute of Restorative Practices, which is in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. [01:23:00] So we sent our trainers there to get certified, and then they turned around and they provide the training to staff. So only staff who are trained should be facilitating so that we stick to the fidelity of that program because of the outcomes that we do see. Social-emotional learning through Second Step is evidence-based as well. [01:23:18] And it really focuses on how to consider other people's point of view and how they might feel, honoring and understanding differences, ways to demonstrate acts of kindness, resolving social conflict, and how to recognize and respond to bullying. And each lesson has learning opportunities and reflection opportunities within the classroom. [01:23:40] As far as the unified mental health team, we use an evidence-based model with all of our services. So individual services will have a goal. Group services will have a goal. And we're measuring those outcomes in the multi-tiered system of support module that we've rolled out this year. [01:24:00] Thanks. And just a quick follow-up. uh so we're trained and certified and we follow the models and have goals that's great but again back to the question of how do we know that it's effective do we have have we seen a track record has it been used before in other places and we've seen the the results yes so with restorative practices we've been implementing that for 10 years so we do have historical data to show the types of incidents and whether the students have repeated harm if they felt safe in the in the circle or the conference and if they felt more safe in the school after they participated in the conference and as far as mental health we're looking at [01:24:39] those outcomes on a regular basis to see if students gain additional coping skills if they have more trusted adults in their building or out in the community so we're looking at that a little bit differently as far as their skill building okay I have Tiffany and then Shandana and so and I'll add Dorothy if there's anybody else just you can just wave at me when somebody else is - I'm just talking, okay. [01:25:07] - Tiffany Polifco, I'm the Broad Run District School Board representative, but I'm gonna speak as a behavior analyst right now, so I'm gonna take that hat off and look at this through a different lens. And I do have quite a few questions, but a few comments as well. And I think it's actually really helpful for all of us to come at this from different perspectives. [01:25:25] And I obviously bring my behavior analysis and the importance of the identification of functions of behavior. And so when I look at this data, What it tells me is that we have a mechanism in place to record frequency. We're recording frequency of occurrences, and we do have it broken down based on what types of slurs are occurring. [01:25:46] But what we don't probably have is why that behavior is happening. And so I always, when I look at a behavior, I always ask why is that behavior occurring? What is it that's motivating that individual to engage in that behavior? And the only way to truly understand the function of a behavior behavior is to see what happens right before that behavior and then to capture what's happening right after. So what is that consequence? What is the consequence that's put into place? [01:26:14] So, I mean, it's kind of, if you think about it, somewhat similar to a toddler who's hitting their sibling over and over again. Well, we don't want the toddler to hit their sibling and we need to teach them how to stop, but before we can teach them those effective, the effective behaviors to enable them to stop that hitting, we have to understand why they're hitting to begin with. [01:26:36] So those behaviors could be occurring for multiple different reasons. It could be for attention. It could be for escape. It could be for access to something. So I think those are things that we should probably consider, and I don't know if they ever have been considered. But secondly, one thing that I noticed when I was looking at the data over quarters is that first quarter tended to be lower than second quarter. [01:26:56] And that concerns me because when we put practices into place, especially at the beginning of a school year, we can anticipate the behaviors might be increased in that first quarter because we're laying the groundwork we're setting rules we're setting expectations for students and then we would hope that by the second quarter those if we do see behavior issues that those are starting to decrease um so that does concern me and and one of the one of the questions i have about restorative practice and and something that we we should probably consider when it comes to whether the mechanisms we have in place to address behavior are truly punishing that behavior and when i say punishing i don't mean something that we're inflicting in a negative manner what i mean [01:27:35] is, are we truly seeing a decrease in that behavior? Because if we're effectively punishing a behavior, we should be adding something or removing something from the environment that's going to decrease the likelihood of that behavior from happening over time. And that's what we want to see. We do not want to see these behaviors. In addition to that, though, we obviously have to put into place positive practices, positive reinforcement, and setting the stage to be proactive, as Mr. Ashraf said earlier, because I absolutely agree with him that we do need to be proactive and that we have to set up an environment that we motivate kids not to want to engage in that [01:28:10] behavior. But my question about restorative practices is that if children know that there is a possibility that if they engage in this behavior one or two times, that essentially they're going to not have much of a consequence for it, are we actually getting at the root of the problem? Are we decreasing the likelihood of those behaviors from occurring in the future, or are we potentially reinforcing them? [01:28:36] And that's what I worry about. So is it possible that kids are getting into these circles and they like that and they like that time and they like being able to sit and talk with their peers and they enjoy getting that feedback from other staff members. And it's almost like a therapeutic situation rather than addressing the problem, which is that we don't want that behavior to occur. [01:28:58] The behavior should not be occurring and I feel it should be met with swift consequences that will actually stop that behavior from occurring in the future. And what we see right now is that that behavior is not stopping. And in fact, it's increasing. And I believe this was a problem last year as well. [01:29:14] So what we need to ask is, are we effectively reducing the behaviors or are we, in essence, unintentionally reinforcing behavior that we don't want to see? I would just say from facilitating conferences myself, they're not fun. [01:29:30] They don't enjoy being there. They don't want to sit there with the person they hurt. and with their parent, and with the other student's parents. Circles are a little different, because that's about connection. That's about community building. And those aren't the discipline side of things. [01:29:47] A conference, you have to be very vulnerable. And a lot of kids don't want to do that. They have to own up to what they did. So it is not a fun. It's not an attention seeking. They're not getting therapy in a conference. Like, they're the ones speaking most of the time, as well as the other students who are harmed. [01:30:03] So when we do RP, we do restorative conferencing, we aren't seeing repeat behaviors because, in my mind, there's an accountability piece that you don't get with typical discipline, where they don't ever have to come together again. They're removed from the school. There's no accountability or learning opportunity. [01:30:20] But I would like to look at the data a little bit more with the conferencing, but also, what are the other measures we're doing when RP's not an option, and what is the why behind that behavior? I think that's really important that you pointed that out. And I saw you taking notes because I'm sure you can do some analysis with the time of day and maybe a pattern with a student. [01:30:42] Is it before lunch? You know, we've all heard about judges right before lunch. So are there things that we need to be looking at time of day, things that might be going on at home that are trickling into the school? So thank you. Chandana. [01:31:00] Thank you so much. So I do yoga therapy with children who have been traumatized and bullied. And I'm pretty sure there's a lot of non-reporting going on. And they're mostly worried about getting their peers in trouble. But I also, I didn't know that you guys actually surveyed students. [01:31:15] And I wonder, like, the elementary school children, if they even understand some of the questions. Like, do they really understand what it means when they're answering? They probably tend to want to be more positive than negative. So, I don't know. Just, I don't know what the exact questions are. [01:31:30] But just something to think about. Just given that I work with children who are like, well, they said this. but I don't want to get them in trouble. I want to be a good kid, and I don't have any, many friends, so I just want to do my thing and come home. But my question for you guys is pretty similar to the previous question. [01:31:48] Since you've already done this and you guys are already doing this, I know you're presenting to us, but what is your sense of what the challenges are and how we, I mean, obviously the cases seem to be increasing, and we don't even know what it's like outside of school with social media and all these other things. [01:32:06] I mean, yeah, you said these conferences are difficult. Do you think they're actually helping? Do you think there's any hope? Do you see, you know, what are some of the challenges that you see and what can be done to reduce them further than what's already been happening? I really appreciate that question. [01:32:30] And it's something that we, so we talk a lot with principals, but we also talk a lot at the central office level because it is upsetting. data. I mean, one incident is disturbing. Zero, as we talked about, is also disturbing because we know that's not true, right? And it is worrisome that the numbers increase over the course of the year, particularly if you look at last year's data. And this year, first quarter compared to [01:33:02] second quarter, as Tiffany pointed out, is exactly the same. And so, yeah, your question is a valid one. We are constantly open to input and different perspectives. We do think the things we have in place are important to have in place, and we think we need to continue with them. You know, this year is the first year that the teacher evaluation system has actually captured culturally responsive [01:33:34] instruction. So that will be a new tool for us and for teachers in particular. So we are constantly evaluating this and absolutely open to feedback. And I'll let Jen chime in about the specifics of RP. So I have no data on what I'm going to share, but my speculation is that the first quarter to second quarter, from a mental health perspective, that's when things get harder. That's when stress levels go up and students might be reverting to behaviors that are not healthy coping skills that's just speculation I don't have data to support [01:34:14] that I also have talked to students at the superintendent's advisory council and gotten feedback about the mental health concerns that they've shared and there are specific times of year that they are extremely overwhelmed they want more support and they've shared that so during right before the end of the second quarter right before our SOLs and our testing and all of the all the things that are thrown at us graduation and also applying to college so there are spikes of stress levels we all feel that as adults tax season is coming but [01:34:52] I also think we need we need to take a look at that I think that's important information and we do see trends we do see spikes with substance use around homecoming so there are patterns and waves that I think are trying to tell us something so I appreciate that question so I'm just going to jump in as chair of the committee for a second and tell you that the reason we're having this discussion last month and this month is because we're as a school board member I get all of the emails I see everything that goes out as is Tiffany and Denise and wanted to make Denise I see your hand up so I'm gonna put you on my list [01:35:30] okay thanks that's why we're having this discussion here because we want to we want to give that feedback we want your perspective in each of the roles that you're serving in and the conversations you're having your community next month we're going to ask you to what what can we what can we suggest what are the other things that are out there we want we want to do that brainstorming and and how can we further support our families and our students and our staff in in their roles that they that they're in in their buildings and at home what else can we do because I'd love to see a downturn But I think as we ask for the consistent reporting, we're going to see an uptick. [01:36:09] It's how do we continue to address it and how are we proactive in teaching. But that's why we're having this conversation. I think this is the perfect place to have this conversation for our division. So our next person is Dorothy. Dorothy Roney, MSAC Committee Advisory. [01:36:29] My question is, this year, LCPS hired an ombudsman to kind of be an advocate and equity for all. But I haven't heard any mention of her in this process. So of the 292 reported incidences, how many was she a part of? [01:36:50] That's a great question. And I know that she's been involved in a lot of situations where parents are upset, students are upset, and they've gone to her. And they've gotten direction from her. so that is something we can look into if there is that correlation between these incidents and going to the ombuds but I do know that she has been very busy a lot of the support that she's providing us to staff as well as parents and some students have sought her out as well to help manage some difficult situations is it being tracked by like have we seen a direct positive [01:37:26] impact from that position within LCPS because it is new to us this year so I do know that she is As you mentioned, she is new, and it's a new role in LCPS. She is tracking her conversations. She is supposed to be a neutral, non-biased, confidential, thought partner is the only word that comes to mind. [01:37:49] She doesn't really, and she's very upfront with people she interacts with. She's not there to solve their problem. She's there to help direct them to the right resources to help them solve their problem. So she is tracking her interactions, and that tracking is not necessarily connected. [01:38:07] It is not connected to the tracking of these incidents. But I do believe, Brenda, correct me if I'm wrong, that the board will receive a report of trends that she sees. So we will be able to capture that data. [01:38:22] Is that correct? That's correct, and I like that you used the word trends because that's what it is. It is not a specific reporting out. is trends that she is is witnessing and and not and nothing specific to a certain situation was that your only question I just make sure I'm not yes thank you but I just wanted to follow up on hers that I do believe that the that the the questions that the elementary school is given that they don't understand what they're being asked that it is more of a positive thing that they just want to they want to look good maybe they're reflecting on maybe teachers versus [01:39:01] students and that it's not the questions aren't kind of correlated to it their level of being what understanding as to what this really means and what they're answering because those are really high percentages in my perspective I have five children and my perspective is they're really high percentages for what is really happening and impacting the schools Haley and then Denise just so you know you're next okay I think Arjun was right before me he's already had a turn so i'm going through first turns and then um arjun's on my second turn list okay um my [01:39:39] question was thank you um haley singer and my question is since um for elementary school kids they are walking in lines to classroom there they have a lot of teachers that are around them all the time compared to high schools and so in high school since there's so many situate or there were so many blank spaces in there my guess which could be incorrect but is that they don't have adults around as often as elementary school kids are since classrooms are a place where it seems [01:40:11] to be reported most of the time and my question is for high school students especially when you are attacked in this way it could be really hard to approach an adult when this happens to you it could be embarrassing or something and they might not want to approach an adult is there a way that they could confidentially get this across to somebody for them through surveys like surveys given to an entire classroom or some other resource that they might have to do this [01:40:48] that's a really great point and the we have had similar conversations at the high school level if it's reported it's it's typically a student who has witnessed it that reports it to an adult and then the adult reports it to the administrator so we've noticed the exact same thing that those zeros are probably because there isn't that constant supervision in hallways in lunch rooms you know at the elementary level there is always an adult present and we know that's just not true [01:41:24] as students get older in terms of confidential reporting students are told that they can report it to absolutely anybody any trusted adult in the building should be able to get that information to the administrator so whether that's a teacher a coach it doesn't even have to be a teacher in the building it could be a coach it could be their school counselor someone from the umht any trusted adult knows to report that to the administrator Denise? I just want to thank everyone [01:42:01] Denise Corvo, school board member at large. I just want to thank everyone by thanking everyone for being here in this room because we're here taking our time and sharing our thoughts because we truly care about making a difference with equity in our schools and also to our staff members. I appreciate the feedback that you're giving and that you're truly listening to the concerns because you're the team that is going to put these things into action. So we can come up with suggestions, we can give our feedback, but the action really starts with your team. So I appreciate all of you being here [01:42:38] and listening. When I look at the data, I see the reporting problem, as was already mentioned, And I do believe that as we talk about reporting and how to report and the importance of reporting and also looking at streamlining the reporting, as Tony mentioned, I believe we are going to see an uptick in reports and incidents that should be expected. [01:43:09] believe that understanding, as Tiffany mentioned, understanding why those behaviors are happening is critical because we can't solve the problem until we understand the why. And also, I think that seeking ways to proactively have lessons so that students are aware, some aren't aware. [01:43:28] And as was mentioned by the Meadowland administrator, that students learn things from their siblings, and they just don't know. But when they know, then they can do better. And that's part of our job is to teach them so that they can do better and show them the hurt. [01:43:45] I think that that's important, too. As a classroom teacher, when a student's feelings do get hurt, we need to teach them how to advocate and how to stand up for themselves and to say, hey, that's not right or, hey, that hurts my feelings. And those are all lessons that we can teach as educators. [01:44:02] And so my question is about proving that impact. I think that's critical that we understand the impact of our efforts. And I'm wondering, do we know how many students are repeat offenders? I think that's one way of being able to calculate how, if we're making impact in some way. [01:44:23] I mean, a lot of these things are really hard to track, and it's hard to know if we are truly making that impact. But to me, one way is to look at repeat offenders. So do we have that information? Thanks, Denise. The schools do capture that information in Phoenix in the student information system. [01:44:44] And so the school administrators do have that information. We don't track it centrally. Would we be able to have that information as well? I think that would be important for this committee to see. I would have to consult with Dr. Tyler, with Ryan. [01:45:03] I know it would take us a while to gather that information. It would be a manual process. And I would like to distinguish, so Ms. Corbro, you're speaking to the actual incidents, not discipline referrals or other incidents. You're speaking to the racial incidents, if we can drill down to student levels and see if there's repeat offenders in that data set, correct? [01:45:25] Correct. So that's something that we would have to, I would have to go back to Ms. Spurlock and to the actual data set to see the level of detail that the schools provided. And that would be the only way to determine if we had students who were showing up in multiple incidents. [01:45:42] And that's something we can build towards in the future, the idea of being able to drill down by incidents, students, and if it results in a particular violation. - Thank you. - And if I could, I know there's some great questions around the idea of age appropriate questions for students and surveys. [01:46:01] And we actually over 10 plus years have worked with an educational laboratory and student services to use a kind of an industry standard for developmental student surveys from third grade through 12th grade. [01:46:16] So those questions and items have actually been tested over multiple years. Where it gets challenging is when we start to introduce some of our local concepts of what it means to be a collaborator, for example, our five Cs. So that's when we've had to really experiment with language that kids can understand what it means to be a critical thinker. [01:46:36] So a lot of these questions that get at items like bullying and respect, a lot of that's embedded in the PBIS training that students get so they're familiar with the terms. but we are evolving when it comes to introducing new local concepts, like what does it mean to be a collaborator, a communicator, and we are still working with the language on getting third graders to understand that concept when they see it. [01:47:00] The difference between yelling something out loud is different than saying something and having people understand what you said, and that's actual communication. So that's still an evolution for us. - Thank you, Ryan, I appreciate the clarification how the questions are developed I am going to now so I've exhausted my list of hands that I saw for first time so before I go to a second time I'm just gonna do a little look and see if there's anybody who wants to take a first-time comment or question and if not I'm gonna go back to our June go [01:47:35] ahead so I'm generally an optimist so I looked at some of the data on the slides and I noticed that the numbers or the amount of hate speech that we see in schools decreases from middle school to high school so I was wondering is this a reporting kind of fallacy or is there actual preventative practices that have been shown to cause this decrease I was just gonna say that's a really good question I immediately thought okay maybe there's a maturity aspect from middle school to high school too and they've learned or their [01:48:12] prevention efforts are working but I those are just my initial thoughts I would say I think the reporting at the middle school level is very similar to the high school so i also would hope that those factors like maturity thinking before you speak okay and i think a second question to build on that is i think mr johnson might have mentioned this earlier was i think it'd be great to see more meaningful discussions about these topics in the classroom i know as a student personally i don't know if this is true for all schools but a lot of the advisory lessons that we [01:48:51] have are like this is what equity is give an example of equity in your life and it's funny because this we had this discussion once at the academies and one student just said don't be a jerk as their answer I mean you're trying to be funny I mean obviously that's a good point to an extent depends on how you look at it but it would be great to see more meaningful discussion about these concepts I think one example is I attended a meeting of our schools black student union once and they were having a discussion on the difference between equity versus equality and I think through that discussion we were able to learn a lot more about these concepts understand other people's point of view so I don't know maybe something along the lines of a Socratic seminar might be [01:49:29] great. All right Anna I think you had your hand up again and then Tom and I just want everyone I just want to point to the time excuse me we try very hard to keep to our 7:30 stop time because we've been here for two hours and I respect everyone has something else important to do today and or perhaps to get ready for tomorrow so I like to respect your time and value that and we just need to get through the rest of the agenda which should be quick so Anna and then Tom and then we're going to wrap this up and go to our next item thank you I'll be quick Anna Purdy from Meadowland I just wanted [01:50:09] to address two things first of all I've been in education for 17 years and in all 17 years quarter two has had more discipline than quarter one those variables include comfort level of the students they include having a trusted adult because in August they do not have a trusted adult that develops over time and so the reporting increases significantly in quarter two based on having a trusted adult and the third variable is the weather when our students lose their access [01:50:43] to go outside. They lose their access to getting out a lot of energy, a lot of frustration, and that does increase frustration in the classroom. So those are just three variables I want to make sure that you articulate. The second thing that I wanted to say was that we have offered restorative practices four times this year, and all four times we were not able to hold the circles based on parent refusal, so I think that is a huge factor in those discussions, [01:51:16] so we handled those situations in other ways. I think that might be it. Hold on, let me see. Yes, that's all I have, so thank you. Thank you, and we'll wrap this up with Tom. Tom Ketchum, and this is very quick, just a comment, and this is going back to my earlier comment about training obviously evidence-based practices are a huge part of modern education and the evidence that I'm hearing is a lot of questions about whether or not the data collected is valid or really representative of the incidents that were actually occurring in the schools as [01:51:56] well as I even hear some questions from folks that are our staff about the process of how this works which would suggest, that evidence at least, would suggest that perhaps the training really does need an assessment component to it to really understand if the training itself is effective. Because it all starts there. If the training isn't effective, we're not going to have effective implementation on the front lines, as somebody mentioned earlier. Training without an assessment is basically just a seminar. Thank you. And thank you, everyone. Kudos to everybody for [01:52:32] your great questions and comments and the thoughtfulness and the respect that we showed everyone I really appreciate that that has always been my favorite part of this committee so thank you for keeping that trend alive I do want to thank also the staff that was here on our panel this evening number one for your transparency and a truly wonderful presentation and the ease with which you've answered the questions tonight speak to the fact that this is genuine and this is what's really happening and so I wanted to point that out that there were there was no discomfort it was you know what these are practices that we're truly [01:53:10] implementing and so I very much appreciate that that came across to me and I hope anyone watching and the people here in the room tonight and we don't end here we can be here tonight but we don't end this discussion tonight we're gonna keep building on this throughout the year so I know Lottie wasn't here tonight but I will get with Lottie I'm sure she's gonna watch this and we'll plan for the next meeting if there is something that you want further information on please email Lottie and we'll put those items in as we go through the year and in the sequence most that's most appropriate so we'll [01:53:47] move to our next item which is seven announcements the only announcement I have is to please leave your name tag on the table and then we'll go to item 8 new business is there anyone who wants bring up Robin thank you Robin I'd like to make a to add an agenda item and ask a question about a policy from I guess it was last year policy 1045 has been tabled by the board it's our commitment to equity MSAC has made some amendments and revisions and we would like to have [01:54:23] it sent back to the equity committee for more feedback and to review again with those with those changes okay so I'm just gonna try and make sure everybody understands provide a little more feedback or knowledge to everyone who might not be aware of what you're talking about policy 1045 is indeed with the school board at this time the school board tabled this policy and I'm not going to get the name of it right it's an equity policy that the this committee sent forward to the board last year it was tabled by the school board and for [01:55:00] further conversation until after the school board passed or developed and adopted the strategic plan as you know that hat that time has come and but because it is currently with the school board we would need to if if MSAC is asking for us to bring it back so that this new committee can look at it and perhaps further deliberate on it we we have different choices we could do we could ask the school board to refer it back to the committee the school board may choose to discuss it on the dais. [01:55:32] But the first thing I would like to know is the consensus of the members in the room tonight to ask the board to send it back. And you can do that with a thumb up or down if you would like to have the committee look at this policy again. I just need to know if you would like to bring this back just for conversation and to review it here on the committee. [01:55:55] You have a question, Mark? Yeah, can you tell us the title of the policy? No, I already said I can't remember can maybe robin knows and i don't have my i don't have my computer with me so i gotta look it up it's the draft policy commitment to equity it's policy 1045 thank you we developed it here in committee and we sent it to the school board the school board tabled it so arjun i don't exactly have my policy numbers memorized but um is there like a brief description of what the policy does [01:56:26] i'm blanking on it right now it's an over i believe it's an if i'm remembering correctly it's an overarching policy um and with the division's commitment to equity and it was developed again it was developed in this committee and sent to the school board so i just need to i think i had thumbs majority of thumbs to ask the school board to bring it back to this committee so what i will do is put that as an agenda i will ask for that to be an agenda item at the next [01:57:06] committee for the school board to take it off the table and then I will let them know that the committee would like to look at it again this being a new committee start of a new year is that understood by everyone yes thank you very much and this is the minority student academic achievement advisory board asking to have our inputs and edits and so I understand that that's what you're asking of this committee what I'm going to do is I've taken a consensus of this committee to ask the board to refer it back so it won't come as an MSAC action it's coming as committee a committee request okay just surveys on the board [01:57:42] there any other new business all right seeing none we are adjourned and again thank you all for your time and don't forget to review those policies thank you ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Coraggio Consulting ยท aguyonx.com