November 17 AAPS Board of Education Meeting Notes

The meeting aired on Zoom and on Xfinity Channel 18. It was also open to the public at the Sheraton. The district typically posts the recording split into segments the day after the meeting or Xfinity Channel 18 will often replay it.

Note: Our family schedule this fall does not make live blogging the meetings easy this year. This year’s meetings have been more routine than 2021-2022. So, I will be recording the meetings on Channel 18 and blogging them as my schedule allows on Wednesday evening and Thursday morning.

Meeting Summary

There were a couple of key items for parents discussed at the board meeting – new Thanksgiving week schedule with a surge in cases, a discussion of how to manage in COVID times, and staff vaccination rates, In addition, there was a report from the PTOC, the routine monthly budget report, dishwasher replacement, and menstrual product provision. Also December board meetings will be virtual due to a COVID surge.

School Closure Thanksgiving Week & How to Manage Going Forward

First, AAPS will now be closed the Monday and Tuesday of Thanksgiving. We have updated our school calendar with these closures and the new Skyline (and maybe Pathways) exam calendar. With the absences caused by this surge along with typical lower attendance and substitute availability the week of Thanksgiving, AAPS has to cancel classes.. AAPS (and Ann Arbor in general) is currently experiencing a surge of cases with more than 20 adult cases and more than 30 student cases. That is more than last week and it is only Wednesday. The cases are spread across multiple buildings and job functions including transportation and food services.

This COVID surge along with continued staffing issues led to a discussion by the board members about how to address this. Last week, substitute pay was increased for a second time. Trustees through out some ideas and what other districts are doing as discussed at the Michigan Association of School Board Meetings that Lazarus, Baskett and DuPree attended last week. Alternatives other districts are using include one virtual day a week, students attending half-days to lower count in buildings, using contracted remote teachers with adult supervision in classrooms. Dr Swift’s team is investigating.

(Editorial comments: I do think something needs to be done in the short term to provide consistency across the system. Schools like A2 STEAM have had multiple last minute closures due to staffing, buses are consistently running late meaning students miss class time, teachers are spending their planning time covering classes, counselors and other staff are spending time in classrooms instead of their original jobs. A rotating virtual day would allow staff to be re-deployed to keep everyone open. While this will be a burden to families, it will spread the burden across the district and allow for advance planning. My hope is that this would be a temporary measure and pediatric vaccination helps ease the situation. My daughter has had two close contact exposures in the last 4 weeks. As a vaccinated teen without symptoms, she has been able to continue her normal activities. Pediatric vaccines will allow younger students to remain in school when exposed and will prevent staff absences staying home for their own or their child’s quarantine.)

Green Apple Garden Upper School Open House

April 18

Open House Christian Montessori School of Ann Arbor

Saturday, April 18

Daycroft School Open House

Sunday, April 26

Huntrix: For the Fans Fest

Friday, May 8

Vaccination & Testing

Vaccination rates among district employees are very high, however among certain contractors it is lower.

• Tier 1 – Employees with daily, direct contact – teachers, parapros, office professionals, etc – 95% vaccinated.
• Tier 2 – Employees with Limited contact – non-school office staff and remote staff – 94%
• Tier 3 – Partner/Contractors –
  • Edustaff (substitutes) – 98% – 391 active substitutes – about 700 in the system that can work
  • ABM Custodial – 79%
  • Durham – 73%
  • Chartwells – 66%

Vaccination is part of the job description for all new AAPS employees. Those not vaccinated are required to test weekly. It has been a challenge for the district to develop a reporting system and monitor the weekly testing. But they know they have caught cases through the weekly testing and having the reports of staff vaccination status allows them to more quickly quarantine exposed staff and prevent further spread.

There was a discussion on surveillance testing or test to stray as proposed by commenters. The burden of surveillance testing would require 140 additional trained staff even if they could get that many tests, so it is not feasible at this time.. Even test to stay for the non-vaccinated would pose a significant staff burden. In the summer, when this option was first brought up AAPS thought they would have a support team from MDHHS to handle it. Instead they have received one staff member from MDHHS who is not qualified to administer COVID tests. Ms Bacolor hopes that once the 5-11 population reaches a level of vaccination similar to the 12-16 age this may become a feasible alternative. The district is conducting rapid response testing when they see several possibly linked cases in a school. But these rapid response tests pull staff from other duties like contact tracing and notification.

Other Items

The PTOC has a virtual meeting November 29 and will learn how Evanston IL has achieved equity in PTO funding across schools.

The monthly budgeting report was presented. My take away was you can’t really compare to last year with special grants and odd expense timing with virtual learning, but they are seeing cost increases across the board in staffing, food, fuel, and other supplies.

A first briefing was provided on replacing the dishwashers at Skyline and Pioneer. Skyline prepares allergen friendly meals and really needs a good dishwasher to ensure sanitization of cooking materials. Pioneer is a main food preparation location. Final costs weren’t available and they are working to get the final number with a goal of installation in January.

The board received a second briefing on the provision of menstrual supplies in all buildings. The Ann Arbor City Council passed their ordinance on Monday requiring all public bathrooms to provide among other things toilet paper, soap, and menstrual supplies at no cost. Last week they stated the ordinance would go into effect on January 1, 2022 and AAPS would need to take action over the December break to be in compliance. Product will be provided in all female and gender neutral bathrooms. For smaller single occupancy bathrooms for example in some elementary classrooms, they are looking at other options such as a basket. The spending was approved in the consent agenda.

Due to a surge in cases in the Ann Arbor area, the School Board is moving to virtual meetings for December.

Call to Order

Roll Call

Present: Kelly, DuPree, Querijero, Lazarus, Gaynor, Baskett

Not present: Johnson

VP Kelly ran the meeting in President Johnson’s absence

Other Attendees: Swift, Osiniski, Cluley, Bacolor, Langford, Minnick

Agenda

The Agenda is available on Board Docs. This is the approved agenda and will include any updates and results of any votes.

Motioned by Querijero, Seconded by Baskett. Unanimously approved by voice vote

Public Commentary

As is our practice, we do not cover public commentary. There were 8 comments tonight each person got 4 minutes – 7 or the 8 are on Board Docs. The person planning to give comments in person was not in attendance. He arrived late after confusion on meeting location and his comments are below.

Clarification

Kelly: Thank you for commentary. Dr Swift, I don’t know that we heard anything that won’t be in your update.

Swift: Thank you. I do want to clear the rapid test vs PCR for staff is a WCHD policy requirement. We don’t have control over it. I have heard concerns about test to stay. We are all excited about youngest children getting vaccinated.

Reports of Associations

Parent Teacher Organization Council

Ms Grzelak-Lee: I am chair of the PCTO Council Executive Board. She introduced the other members of the executive board (listed on their website) – note as introduced Adriana Rodriguez is the Corresponding Secretary instead of a member at large as listed on the website. It’s the largest number of At Large members in recent years. The theme for the year is “Welcoming All with Respect, Compassion, and Integrity”.. They want to serve and create connections among the member PTOs. They want to define how they will promote the three Cs communication, collaboration, and coordination with members PTOs, district, and community.

The school board can expect monthly reports presented by different members. Tow areas of focus are creation of bylaws committee to revise and to establish an equity committee to ensure there is equity in the systems and structures of the PTOs regardless of where they are located. Next meeting (11/29) they welcome guests from Evanston IL PTA Equity Project to help us frame our equity vision.

We have welcomed members of school board at meetings before and welcome at future meetings being held by Zoom. Meeting times and recording of past meetings are available here or follow on Facebook.

Kelly: Please extend our appreciation to your members and boards for the work you do and bringing schools together to work on important issues. We look forwrd to monthly updates. You always have a place on the agenda.

Board Committee Reports

We have none tonight. Committees do meet in public and you can find schedule on the board website.

Superintendent’s Update

I want to give a shoutout to Ms Langford and team for a successful job fair today with 40 appointments.

You have at your places thank you to MDHHS and Ms Bacolor who headed up the team for yesterday’s COVID0-19 vaccine clinic for kids 5-11 and their families. We gave about 180 vaccinations. And I was inspired by the reasons children gave for getting their vaccine. Tomorrow evening again we will be at Huron HS for the second clinic. We have sent information out to parents.

To update on a situation that you receive updates on, but I want to publicly call to attention that we are very concerned about health & safety of students and staff. We are currently experiencing an alarming increase in staff and student cases and related staffing challenges with an increase in cases. As COVID mitigation step to interrupt transmission and allow sick individuals to recuperate, ew will be providing Monday and Tuesday as an extension to traditional Thanksgiving break. I know many folks don’t want to hear the message. We take school closures seriously and know the week before notice will pose challenges. Over previous days we’ve worked to pursue every option to safely open schools and over the course of the previous 2 days our cases have spiked further.

Over the last 3 weeks our student and staff cases have grown steadily. Unfortunately since Friday we have seen a spike in cases especially among adults – staff and contractors. In recent weeks the cases are distributed widely across many buildings. This is not an individual outbreak at one school, it is more pervasive against many schools. The increase in cases impacts every area of operations – classrooms, transportation, food services, custodial. It is a reflection of the COVID surge in our community (Ann Arbor, Washtenaw County, and state of Michigan). Some numbers, 21 adults in prior weeks was about 1/3 of that and about 30 students. We are well over 50 cases already this week and it’s only Wednesday.

I want to thank students and staff for keeping mitigations strategies. I see the great work in every building I go in to. I know that is helping. We are encouraged that many elementary students are getting vaccinated. Yet continued cases across our schools and high levels of community transmission in Ann Arbor directly impact our students and staff and the effort to staff our schools. We know. vaccines are an effective tool.

(Editor’s note: As a parent of a fully vaccinated high schooler, the vaccine has kept her in school. She has been a close contact in a classroom twice in the last 4.5 weeks. She would have missed 6 days of school and HS sport playoffs if she was unvaccinated. And, that is with her first exposure including the 11/1-2 break.)

I want to urge staff and everyone in our community eligible for a booster shot to get those as soon as possible. We are seeing cases among those fully vaccinated. We know the booster is important.

We know staffing ids directly related to COVID cases. We’ve increased daily and long term sub pay again last week. We know during Thanksgiving week we traditionally have lower sub availability providing additional challenges.

I want to give a heads up to staff and community. We have some immediate challenges impacting us this week. Thursday and Friday there could be intermittent service gaps with transportation or food and nutrition. Our Durham managers continue to drive, many are doubling up. Our Chartwells team has staff fro other locations to come in and support. Members of our staff are deployed into buildings to where we can keep schools open by providing extra staff.

The good news is we’ve completed 12 weeks, that’s 1/3 of our 21-22 school year. This is the wrap-up of our first trimester. Closing will put us at 3 closure days out of the 58 days of school so far. Michigan schools are allowed 6 days of school closures. So, we will continue to monitor the situation very closely and will take appropriate steps to achieve statutory required full school year. WE’re encouraged with the recent availability of 5-11 and the high rates already in 12-18 and highly vaccinated AAPS staff that we will turn the corner. But at this time we remain concerned with the current COVID surge and safety of our students and staff. Everyone I see is working hard and making sacrifices to keep our schools open.

Trustee Questions & Commentary

Querijero: I have more a comment. I want to say I appreciate what you said about hard for our community to hear about at this late date. This has been something we’ve been looking at for awhile with our numbers and what we saw earlier in the summer. I think it came so late because of the desire to try to keep the school open. I appreciate you waiting for as long as you could before seeing the numbers from this particular numbers. I appreciate the decision to keep us safe.

I’m curious about our ability to be able to sustain with the stress it puts on us to double up and mobilize so regularly. I’m interested in hearing your solutions for the future.

Lazarus: I appreciate Querijero’s comments about how you & your team have worked so hard to try to figure out how to keep these days open. I know the high school on the trimesters it falls during their finals and some juggling for them. In light of the rising cases and young 5-11 are currently being vaccinated, we still have to deal with many cases in adults and some students are breakthrough cases. The current question trustee DuPree and Baskett and I had the time to be with fellow board members across the state over 500+ districts – tiny, big, medium size – at the MASB leadership conference last week. We all seem to have similar problems and staffing challenges. It seems the staffing hits districts in more metropolitan areas vs rural. But the rural districts have their own challenges. They have some interesting solutions.- some I don’t think we would prefer. But it becomes how important is it to keep our doors open – quantity of days in school vs quality of education. We might need to have a conversation. Maybe we need to adjust our plan for a more sustainable plan with more consistency. I don’t know the answer, and I don’t think anyone has it. But we do need to have the discussion.Trustee Baskett I’d like to throw the ball over to you about the discussion we had with colleagues in Southfield, and I know a neighboring district has implemented a plan.

Kelly: I’m curious and glad you were at MASB to have these discussions.

Baskett: I was not fully prepared or I would have some props. Lazarus is correct. We had a great opportunity to network and in some cases commiserate over the state of affairs. We’re all pretty much in the same boat being short staffed and in need. For example, Southfield adopted a 4 days in the building and one day remote. Others are looking at half days especially the larger buildings to minimize students in the building. Another option is the use of teachers (and I know Dr Swift your team has probably looked at these options). I would say regardless of the option the community and staff and everyone was looking for consistency. Like us, a lot of board members have children in the schools. To be able to offer eduction consistently. Another option is using teachers remotely with students in the building and an adult in charge to manage the classroom. Using vendors to offer this option. I can see how the teachers would see that as a threat, but it shares some of the burden to manage consistency for the students.

Again, none of these options replace what we use to have. But this is a whole new world. I appreciate we’re trying to offer “pre-COVID services”. We did make a commitment to 5 day a week in the building, but we aren’t doing it well. Let’s rethink what we’re doing.

DuPree: I was surrounded by people who were stay in school full time and we don’t have to wear masks.

Querijero: I know some of those solutions will work in places, but I don’t think they’ll work here. For me, the solution that works here is the one that produces more people, but we can’t do that. I don’t see much outside of making a day virtual. A half day still has the challenges of deploying people to places they normally are. We’d still have stacked buses. One thing I thought of is when the snow comes, it may be hard to clear the roads as they may not have staff. The only real viable solution to explore and commit resources to is to make one of those days be virtual. I don’t sit where the superintendent does. We did it. Based ont hose numbers, staffing issues, the lack of labor to do the work, I don’t see what otehr idea or creativity we could have.

Baskett: I appreciate. Who is to say it’s one day a week. Let’s talk about what would work. We always have the opportunity to hear from our community. Looking around the table, there is an understanding we should explore what we’re trying to do now.

DuPree: If we were to explore other options, how do we get feedback from our community to see what the impact would be.

Baskett: I don’t think we have a problem getting feedback to be very honest with you.

Lazarus: One of the things I think that’s interesting and I think would help the community to understand is the state allows us 6 days but they call them act of God days. When those are called, there is no teaching, asynchronous, synchronous going on. If we go beyond those days, unless the state forgives us which they did a few years ago, if we were to go synchronous like last year with a live teacher, that would be considered a count day correct?

Swift: Yes

Lazarus: But if they’re home and doing homework and whatever teacher put in Schoology, that’s not considered a count day correct?

Swift: Well, there’s another level which is called two-way communication. That’s not a method we use very much because we try to go for the quality.

Lazarus: I want to make the comment to make sure how the state requires us to fill a count day vs a non-count day or an act of God day. If we go beyond and they don’t forgive us we have to make those up. So instead of getting out June 12, we get out June 17 or however it falls. You don’t call these days lightly.

Swift: Not at all.

Lazarus: As Querijero said the city has informed us that plowing the road and salting the road will be an issue. And not just for the city, but the 8 surrounding townships we pull our students form.

Baskett: Can I add clarification, it’s also we have an expectation of number of students and teachers live. We have to be mindful of the number there as well.

Swift: Yes the attendance audit requires meeting a threshold. Thank you for mentioning that.

Gaynor: I don’t have anything new or very clever to say. But I appreciate this preliminary discussion. The crisis is real. Last year, people would have liked us to go back when cases were peaking. Right now Michigan has the highest cases in the country.. I don’t know why. Every county including Washtenaw County cases are up, hospitals are at capacity. We could foresee some staffing, we raised labor rates. But it’s clearly more than just pay. People could say it’s important to be at school, we need child care. It’s not like we’re saying we don’t need child care. We’ve been working hard to keep schools open, but short term prospects aren’t great. A parent reached out to say they heard we’d be closed between Thanksgiving and Christmas. I said that’s absurd. We’re doing everything we can to be open. We can’t just want it to be so and have it be so. Public commentary today, was mostly wishes. It’s not fair for our unvaccinated children to be quarantined. It’s not a matter of fair, we want to keep them safe and the people around them safe. That’s the priority. Our staff have gone above and beyond. This is a national issue. These are still pandemic conditions with breakthrough infections.

Kelly: Dr Swift, my goal in having this be a conversation is one for our trustees who attended MASB to share what they learned from our colleagues and also as an opportunity for you to hear the type of direction we can move to. Do you have what you need or are there additional topics we should address?

Swift: Thank you. I appreciate the remarks of the trustees. I know it is hard when our choices aren’t the ones we want them to be and it causes stress for everyone. The goal with the MondayTuesday and I had a good conversation with the head of WCHD. The hope is the vaccinations will help us get ahead of winter seasonal uptick. I asked if there was hope that if we got boosters and our young kids vaccinated if we could pull out of this. No one knows and it will be a few weeks before we know that answer. But our goal with these 2 days is to interrupt the chain of transmission that is occurring in our school. To give sick people a chance to recuperate. And to allow time to focus in on vaccination and boosters.If there is a hope to pull out it is getting that rate up. As of 2 das ago, Washtenaw County is a bit above 25% in 5-11 and that was before we did 180. It’s impressive how quickly the numbers are moving up. But I know we’ve discussed there could be.a plateau. But also many of these cases are breakthrough cases so there is that concern as well. I think I have the general ideas that were shared and we’ll continue our conversations. Hopefully this will do the trick.

Lazarus: A couple of our public commentary is the comments on Test to Stay. We’ve had conversations, we’ve met with WCHD and WISD members and we have looked at it. I’ve done some simple numbers in my head with how many student and staff we have. That’s about 22,000 tests a week we would have to do. My understanding and I keep hearing there are ample tests for us to access. I’d like to be clear it takes about 15 minutes for 1 test times 22K/8 hours per person without a lunch and we’re talking about 5000+ hours which is about another 140 people to administer the tests. Are there ample tests ot support a program like this and we don’t have access to 130+ people to do testing on an ongoing full time basis when we are struggling with school. I appreciate the community trying to do this and I know some large districts who have been supported privately to do test to stay, but we don’t have that luxury.

Swift; The number you described are accurate for surveillance testing. The Test to Stay is the students who have been exposed. It is a smaller subset. Once our younger children are vaccinated, the numbers who would need it would come down. So we have said it is a consideration. We do need to get the number of cases down so the math becomes more doable. At this time, we don’t have the personnel to do that. Our folks, the nurse team and health service team have help from the state now with one person. They are doing a lot of testing in areas where there were cases that popped up. They’ll be at an elementary school tomorrow where we have concerns. There is testing going on in the district. At high school for 12+, we are not quarantining a lot of students because of high vaccine rates. That’s a benefit that many communities don’t share. (audio dropped)

Lazarus: Is this a semantics issue? I’m hearing surveillance testing, test to stay, and rapid response testing. Are they all similar, different?

Swift: Surveillance or screening would be testing everyone or a certain percentage. Test to stay is only for those who were identified as close contacts of a confirmed case. The rapid response test we’re glad to get. We would not be able to access enough for everyone int he system.

Lazarus: Is response testing the same as test to stay?

Swift: No, the response testing is if we have a few cases in the building we might test a wider group, but test to stay is only for a close contact.

Bacolor: I think that was fine. Sometimes we would get a few cases in a classroom or grade and several students who need to quarantine We’re able to deploy our team to test the non-close contact students and welcome students who are in quarantine to test as well. That’s a change. Especially recently we’ve received notice so late that the class is already in day 4, 5, or 6. We’ll in effect do Test to Stay and they stay. We have found positive tests that way. Every time we do rapid response, that takes our team away from case investigation and contact investigation. It’s not like we have another group doing the work. We have a health resource person from the state. But she isn’t an RN and can’t do the test yet. Sometimes it’s thrown around that I said we would do test to stay. In August I was excited about it, but I thought we’d be getting a team from MDHHS. Instead, we just got one person and she isn’t able to do the tests. I’m disappointed, but we would need. a huge group of people. We can’t use volunteers. This is confidential information.

Kelly: With respect to Monday & Tuesday (Nov 22 & 23), what can families expect. Will it be off like a snow day? How will families not watching find out.

Swift: This is an extension of the traditional Thanksgiving break for students and staff. Mr Cluley has sent the message to every family. That is going by school messenger. We’ll use our school principles. So our families do understand.

Kelly: We’re going to take a small detour in our agenda and ask Dr Powell to provide the comment from earlier.

Delayed Public Commentary

Powell: I apologize for being here late. I went to the Sheraton, then Forsythe, and now at the Courtyar.d. On November 11, we celebrated Veterans Day. I’m Nate Powell, Librarian Teacher at Pioneer HS. Thank you for your support of the VFW and we had more students from AAPS enter the essay contest than every before. Join me in congratulating an 11th grader from Huron who won a Silver medal and $500 for his Voice of Democracy entry with the theme “America Where do we go from here”. Tappan MS also won a silver medal and $300 in Patriots Pen whose topic was America; How can I be a good American. Lastly, another 7th grader from Clague won bronze and $200. Students and parents will be congratulated and awarded medals at ceremony in January.

Kelly: Thank you for the update and congratulations to the students.

AAPS Team Vaccination Report

Swift: We have Ms Langford and Ms Bacolor who have been in charge of this endeavor It’s been complicated with 3000-4000 people and with all those who have been hired. On July 30 last summer that we notified AAPS that they would be required to be fully vaccinated or submit to weekly testing. We were ahead of President Biden’s mandate. And Mr Cosma is following all the legal decisions, but our requirement stands. Our goal from the beginning is to ensure the healthiest school environment possible. We want to ensure confidence for our staff and parents that we’re doing everything possible to keep them safe this year. The complication was we had a hiring endeavor unlike any previous year. This database has undergone transitions and constantly changes. You are seeing a snapshop as of November 1.

The report can be seen here.

I’ve heard from parents to just go ahead and require it. In Michigan, that authority is held by MDHHS. It is vaccinate or test.

Bacolor: We’ll be modifying a bit after what’s happened the last couple of days. Unvaccinated people are more likely to test positive, be hospitalized, etc. Delta variant is more contagious.

Langford: First we had to identify, who is and isn’t vaccinated. Dr Kellstorm (IT head) helped us develop survey and secure system with upload of vaccination card. For unvaccinated, we required weekly testing and worked with LynxDx for testing weekly at Scarlett or Wagner Rd. Or they can test elsewhere. Then, we have to continue to monitor and make sure we are in compliance. The monitoring is a daily/hourly process.

Divided into 3 groups –

• Tier 1 – Employees with daily, direct contact – teachers, parapros, office professionals, etc – 95% vaccinated.
• Tier 2 – Employees with Limited contact – non-school office staff and remote staff – 94%
• Tier 3 – Parnter/Contractors –
  • Edustaff (substitutes) – 98% – 391 active substitutes – about 700 in the system that can work
  • ABM Custodial – 79%
  • Durham – 73%
  • Chartwells – 66%

Bacolor: We do believe we have been successful in preventing transmission by detecting positive earlier. We get notified as soon as the employee does. We’ve had staff get sick of being tested and gotten the vaccine. We’ve increased awareness of need to be tested. Increased awareness of breakthrough cases. This week we’ve had the most ever breakthrough cases. For our vaccinated staff who got vaccinated in March/April, if you got Pfizer for sure get your booster. School employees are eligible for a booster.

Challenges have included technical issues uploading vaccine cards or linking tests results to AAPS, developing new systems, and the time investment in monitoring.

Program detected 15 COVID=19 cases in employees (more were detected this week). The system has helped expedite quarantine for unvaccinated staff.

Next step is to continue supporting vaccination. It is now required of all new AAPS employees. WCHD says a lot of school outbreaks start with an unvaccinated staff person.

Swift: One thing you trustees have asked me is how do we compare to other districts. I know of only one other district doing testing with the regularity we are. We are above other districts. Others don’t know their employees vaccination status. I know we lost some because they didn’t want to be part of the vaccinate or monitor. But, I am proud of this effort. I believe it sets us apart and provides a layer of comfort for staff, students and families.

Green Apple Garden Upper School Open House

April 18

Open House Christian Montessori School of Ann Arbor

Saturday, April 18

Daycroft School Open House

Sunday, April 26

Huntrix: For the Fans Fest

Friday, May 8

Trustee Questions on Vaccination Report

Gaynor: I want to thank you for implementing the policy and I’m proud we are doing it. I’m impressed by the rates in most categories. I know we’re out for compliance and not punishments. Can you talk about those not in compliance.

Swift: Ms Langford is in charge of ensuring compliance.

Langford: It has been a lot of work I am proud to announce we have every employee in the system has now completed the survey. It wasn’t easy. For those who are not testing weekly. sometimes we’ll have employees drop off and we are having to send an email reminder. Most of the time it’s just been a glitch that we didn’t’ get result, but a few times we’ve had to put more pressure on them or even going through the disciplinary process. Overall employees have been great.

Swift: There have been weeks where we have a theme to fix the issues. Once it was helping get the cards uploaded.

Lazarus: Thank you for the presentation. Now we understand where we are. My question is around partners and contractors. It’s good to see Edustaff is very high. But our other partners, are a little lower. I’m wondering are we also responsible for testing them or is ti through their employer.

Swift: That’s a wonderful question. We’re proud those numbers have come up recently. I know wen I’ve been over there, I see contractors coming through. Is it different than for our own employees.

Bacolor: No, the expectation is across the board and we provide testing to the contractors. Ms Margolis has lit the fire under some of our contractors to get the form filled out, then work on getting them registered for testing. The contractor groups are more difficult because we don’t have direct access to them.

Swift: After this week of high case number, we will be putting pressure on them. While some don’t have contact with students, they do have contact with each other.

Lazarus: These are contractors we have large agreements with. But others like the construction contractors.

Swift: We’re on a journey with that. We do hold a litmus test of are they in during the school day or a weekend project. Anyone in while hte children are in school, we want them vaccinated.

Bacolor: They’er required to follow the same thing, but they’re a small number. May be in for a single job and then gone. Last spring, we had some construction workers test positive and had to do contact tracing.

Baskett: Thank you. When you go to these conference, there are certain things you get asked – how big is your districts. New this year was what’s your vaccination rate. This really lays it out to be easy. Will we get this update again?

Swift: We update almost daily. We wanted to get a fall update out.

Querijero: I’d like to ask if we could get a booster line on there.

Swift: We have not asked at this point to show proof of booster.

DuPree: For new hires, are we asking for vaccine status?

Swift: Yes, it is on every job description and it is required.

Querijero: I’ve calculated the Tier 3 at 83%. Can we get that on therre?

Kelly: Regarding contractors. It’s a delicate balance of how we instruct contracted partner to handle their employees. But we’ve seen issues because of the low vaccination rates. Would it be your recommendation to make vaccination a. requirement for renewals?

Langford: It would be mine. We worked with EduStaff.

Swift: We feel very strongly about it, but we also want to have school staff.

Monthly Budget Monitoring Report for October

Trustees took a brief break for technical difficulties.

You can view the budget report here.

Minnick: October General Fund is considerably lower, but is in line with last month. Last year we received grant funds in cash at the start of the school year. This year aligns with 2019 cash holdings This year we see a general increase in costs and expenditures. Last year we saw a lag in expenses as we were in a virtual mode.. Changes are to be expected with the large cash influx in 2020 and increased expenses in 2021.

Gaynor: I think giving anomaly of last year, I think we’re going to see big deltas from last year. But after 5 yaers.

Kelly: I’m curious when we’ll see the impact of the decision last week to make a bonus payment.

Minnick: We’ll pay in December, so you’ll see it in January.

Kelly: You said costs have risen. Is there a specific area we’ll see it?

Minnick: With substitutes costs, contractors cost, it’s an upward trend across the board. Just like household budget we’ve seen increases in food and fuel. We see that as a district too.

Querijero: I’m thinking of operational costs this year vs last year. When I look at expenditure increase on page 4. I’m trying to see where the cost of doing business in COVID times would best be seen.

Minnck: I’d say they’re related. Increased costs are related to COVID – supply chain, labor costs, etc.

Swift: I believe you’re right on target. Generally speaking it is staff, materials, operations. In every line almost there are costs like PPE, increasing sub pay twice. I’d say most is unique to the circumstances.

Minnick: A small part is also we have differences in when we incurred costs. Last year was an anomaly.

First Briefing: AN-2065 Dishwasher Replacement at Pioneer and Skyline

Two of our dishwashers are beyond their useful life. We’ve talked with finance committee and confirmed additional information. Both are from high productivity kitchen. They do a tremendous amount of volume even though Skyline is much newer.

Minnick: They are at the end of their useful life and are necessary for food service program. They wash and sanitize at high temperature and volumes. Pioneer is the satellite kitchen. Skyline provides allergen free meals and it is super important the machines properly clean and sanitize cooking items. Zachary Smith of Madison Heights provided best bid. $86K at Pioneer and $32.5K at Skyline. Prices will increase November 1, but we don’t have new price. Vendor said 11%. So with continegency we recommend $132.5K from 2018 building fund.

Lazarus: I notice there is assembly, installation, training. Do we need to contract a separate maintenance agreement.

Minnick: We have vendors that service equipment that we have preferred pricing with. Maintenance is not included.

Lazarus: In finance committee, we asked about leasing. Restaurants often lease. Did we look at that option?

Minnick: We explored and got 7 quotes. We received 6 responses saying no, or no response. The one response would only lease 1-3 years and did not provide pricing. It did not seem a viable option. They’re probably experiencing the same supply chain issues.

Kelly: Do we have a commitment to installation timeline? Supply chain issues, timeline to get them.

Minnick: We expect to order on approval and have installation in January. When we get the new quote we should get the anticipated delivery quote.

Second Briefing: Annex AN-2064 Menstruation & Personal Product Dispensers and Supplies

Swift: There have been no changes since our first briefing.

DuPree: I did have a few questions. I apologize if they were asked already. It says cost will come from general fund, my understanding is that is our primary operating cost. Is there. a certain dollar amount we are trying not to exceed?

Swift: You’re doing great with that question. We have no baseline on how much product we would need. We committed to keep track based on first couple of months how to budget. The restock is the general fund, but the dispensers is the largest cost is bond funds.

DuPree: What type of product? Specifically BPA free, made of cotton, etc.

Swift: Ms Margolis and Ms Minnick have done the research. I know you have a specific vendor.

Margolis: Guards and Tampons are the paper cardboard not plastic. I’m not sure they’re 100% cotton and we can look at it.

DuPree: As far as the type of products we can partner with companies to increase access to menstrual products to cover this.

Swift: There are requirements around our use of public funds in acquiring product. This will be an ongoing. This is a great discussion.

Minnick: There’s two facets tot hat thought. Because we’re not certain of the volume, we will be ordering from the same supplier where we get toilet paper, paper towels, etc. We always go for cost effective products. To the point of donations, it’s not a lawful expense for us to donate, but we can work with groups that champoin causes. Ms Margolis did look into a product were about 2x per unit and that could be cost prohibitive.

Baskett :Does the city ordinance have guidance on products?

Swift; They told us what product but not brand names.

Gaynor: I assume while cost is an issue, quality is another issue.

Swift: Elementary, middle, and high school. They’ll be in female, gender neutral,a nd unisex bathrooms.

Querijero: Outside bathrooms at some locations. What will we need to do to ensure compliance.

Margolis: We will have to include stadium and any public bathrooms. They’re included in this.

Kelly: Are we talking about a full dispenser in small individual classrooms bathrooms.

Margolis: Offices, nurses stations, will have them and looking at small containers for smaller bathrooms instead of big dispensers.

DuPree: There was discussion about having wipes available to clean up.

Margolis: The ordinance does not call for them. Our nurses station does have it. The ordinance did pass on Monday, so we have to do this.

Green Apple Garden Upper School Open House

April 18

Open House Christian Montessori School of Ann Arbor

Saturday, April 18

Daycroft School Open House

Sunday, April 26

Huntrix: For the Fans Fest

Friday, May 8

Consent Agenda

• Approve
• Approve Minutes of November 10 Regular Meeting
• Approve Donations – air purifier donations

Motioned by DuPree. Seconded by Gaynor.. No discussion. Unanimously passed.

Board Action

Reschedule attorney/client private meeting originally approved for November 18 to December 7.

Motioned by Baskett. Seconded by Lazarus. No discussion. Passes unanimously.

Items for Agenda Planning

Querijero: I’d like to reiterate I’d like us to discuss being proactive about using OERs in our curriculum. It’s a long term cost saving and the opportunity to let faculty work together to design curriculum.

Kelly: Are you asking for time on agenda to discuss, or study session to learn about them?

Querijero: I’d take either. I think it’s important to learn about it and there is confusion. I’d like to consider using it vs textbooks that are costly and not environmentally friendly.

DuPree: At conference, our final speaker mentioned importance of havign a community engagement plan. I’d like an item where we see what ours looks like and if its adjusted forthe pandemic. Also I’d like a discussion on our position as a board on mask and vaccine mandates.

Kelly: Given the spike in COVID numbers and staff time and risk that group gatherings can pose, the Board will move to virtual meetings for December including the closed session. Public commentary will be open the same way it was previously when we are on Zoom.

Items from the Board

Querijero: To reiterate what PTOC chair said. On Monday, November 29 the PTOC will host visitors from Evanston who have created equity in their PTO. The process took years to do.

DuPree: A takeaway from conference about a book. Miseducation a Memoir by Brandon – I just started it and it is excellent. What stood out was representation. In teaching staff, those working with students. It is important for students to see those that look like them.

Kelly: We always appreciate recommendations from conferences. I want to extend my appreciation for the 3 of you representing Ann Arbor and bringing back observations on how we’re diong school.

Lazarus: I’d like to say I have a new appreciation for serving on the school board after going to MASB. I was only there one day and went to a class. It was eye opening that there are board members in Michigan literally receiving death threats and causing them stress. It is a real thing. I hope this does not come to Ann Arbor. These are public servants doing this on a volunteer basis. I hope and pray this does not come to Ann Arbor.

Adjourn

Motioned by Baskett seconded by Querijero. Unanimously passes. Adjourned.

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