July 7, 2020 at 2:00 PM - Board of Education Regular Meeting

Discussion (Visible on Public Minutes):  Dawn Robinson opened the meeting and led the Pledge of Allegiance.

Discussion (Visible on Public Minutes):  Dawn Robinson read the above statement.

Discussion (Visible on Public Minutes):  The Secretary, Julie Smith, took roll.

Discussion (Visible on Public Minutes):  Dr. Dyer reports he is working from home waiting on his COVID-19 test to come back.  He feels fine, but under an abundance of caution he took the test last week.  He is following the Cleveland City Schools protocol and he wants to remind everyone that Governor Lee encourages everyone to get tested.  Today we are unveiling the 2020-2021 re-opening plan.  We know that this plan might need to be changed depending on the guidance of the Tennessee Department of Health, CDC, etc.  We have pulled a lot of people together to form our reopening task force.  There was a teacher focus group created, and we received survey information from parents and employees.  Dr. Elliott has chaired this task force.  The timeline has been interesting.  The last day of the 2019-2020 school year was May 15th, June 11 we sent out the surveys to families and staff, June 23 our teachers focus group started,  that brings us to today July 7th at this board meeting, and tomorrow July 8th starts enrollment for the next school year.  August 3rd we will start preparing the staff on protocols..  We are proposing our reconnection week to start on August 10. Dr. Dyer turned the presentation over to Dr. Elliott.
-Dr. Elliott stated there has been a team that worked diligently to put this document together.  The first part of the plan is the academic calendar.  As we all know we needed to maintain 180 school calendar year with 6.5 hours school day.  We knew we needed a time to reconnect with our staff, students, and families.  We would like to use our training days at the beginning of the school year to reconnect with our employees, August 3-7.  We found out from the general council today that they did approve us to use these days this way.  Starting August 10, we are calling that reconnection week.  This is a time for our staff to work with the students on our new procedures, and bridging those relationships.  We will have each student come in for one day on that first week, Monday through Thursday.  Then on Friday, August 14 every student will come to school for a 1/2 day of school.  Then, that afternoon each school will meet and make plans for what is working and what needs to be adjusted.  The remaining holidays and breaks will stay the same.  We are looking at a virtual convocation for July 27 in the afternoon.
-The Board likes that the holidays are staying the same since families may have already scheduled traveling plans.
-The Board asks will the high school be accepting any foreign exchange students?  Dr. Elliott said they are not accepting international students this year.

-Dr. Elliott states our plan is to open in person on August 10.  The plan for reconnection week is Monday, August 10 is last name A-D,  Tuesday, August 11 is last name E-L, Wednesday, August 12 is last name M-Q, Thursday, August 13 is last name R-Z, and Friday, August 14 every student will attend for an abbreviated day.  To reopen we have consulted with the local health department, CDC, etc and we are putting in these mediating factors.  We will be taking the temperature of everyone that comes into the building (our staff and students will have their temperature taken when they enter the building at the beginning of the day and again in the middle of the day), our teachers will be required to wear masks/face coverings when they are within 6 feet of someone, hand washing protocols, and sanitizing.  
-The Board asks what temperature would we turn students away to go back home?  Dr. Elliott states it is 100.4.
-The Board asks if we will have enough thermometers for the system?  Dr. Elliott said through the Cares Act and TEMA we will have enough.  
-The Board asks if the students will be required to wear masks and do we have enough masks to supply the students with them?  No, if they choose to wear the mask then they are allowed to do so, but they are not required.  We do recommend that they wear them.  Hal Taylor stated TEMA has supplied us with a 50 day supply of masks for each student.
-The Board asks if a teacher can ask her whole class to wear a mask can they do that?  Dr Elliott said it has not been talked about but they will discuss it.  
-The Board suggests we should add the mask description into the dress code.
-Dr. Elliott discusses the traditional school option.  Dr. Elliott encourages families to be in person so they can have a normal school day and have that face to face instruction.  The elementary schools have been thinking about how they can have gym and recess, along with classes and have the least amount of contact with people outside of their class as possible.  The middle and high school are working on how to change classes and have less contact with more individuals and with one way hallways.  But, if the virus spreads and we have to close a building or whole system we want the school year to continue at home.  We will be looking at the rules and regulations within our county and state to determine how to move forward if this happens.  As of yesterday, July 5 we had 334 active cases in Bradley County out of 108,110 residents of Bradley County, which is .31%.  That puts us in the yellow "minimum to moderate virus spread" section.
-The Board asks if a teacher has to be quarantined and we don't have enough substitutes  to cover the classroom could the teacher use Google meet and still teach the class?  Dr. Elliott said that is definitely an option but we hope to have a substitute teacher or another staff member to be present in the classroom.
-The Board questions the difference between the green "Low Virus Spread" and the yellow "Minimum to Moderate Virus Spread "columns?  They would like the columns to have more clarity and more specific details to separate these columns. Brittany Hopkins-representative from Bradley County Health Department- suggested we put a quantity behind it to help clarify.  For Example: In the green we will use at least 3 mitigating strategies, and in the yellow we will use 7 mitigating strategies.  Dr. Elliott stated they will look into changing this diagram.
-The Board asks if there is an outbreak within one school in the system will we be closing just that one school down for 2 weeks?  Brittany states you could quarantine one or two individuals.  But, if it becomes a cluster (which means 2 or more infections from the same source)  then you would consider if you need to close the whole school or just part of the school.  Another closure would be closing for 2-5 days to give the department of health time to identify their contacts.  
-The Board asks how the health department conducts the tracing of each positive case?  Brittany states if a student has a temperature you would have them go home get tested for COVID-19.  If the test result is positive, the result will be sent to the department of health.  Then the department of health contacts the person and do an investigation and see who they have been in contact with 48 hours prior to the onset of the symptoms.  If they began symptoms on Sunday, got the test on Monday, and tests positive: Anyone who has been within 6 feet of that person for more than 10 minutes becomes a contact.  The department of health will then ask for all the contact information of anyone that falls into that category.  They will call and let them know they have been in contact with someone who has tested positive and should quarantine for 14 days and should be tested themselves.
-The Board asks if a student has a temperature and the school ask them to go home and get a test but the student refuses to get a test what should we do?  Brittany gives guidance and says if a student refuses to get tested the individual needs to be quarantined for 10 days, and be symptom free for 72 hours.
-The Board asks if the school nurse or CareMobile can test for COVID-19?  No, they can not.
-Dr. Elliott states if there is an outage of a school, or the whole district they will still be having class at home during their regular class times with the online platform and paper copies.  This will be called Traditional Learning At-Home.  The district wanted to provide as many laptops to our students going forward.  As the CARES Act funds became available we put in an order for 3rd-5th grade students to all have chromebooks.  We also had to reorder the chromebooks for the lease for our middle school.  Dr. Raper stated we ordered 2,900 devices for grades 3-8 and there is a shortage of chromebooks across the nation.  We are hoping to get all the devices back by late September.  The high school devices will be ready to deploy at the beginning of the school year.
-The Board asks what the recovery rate for getting the chromebooks back for the middle school students?  Dr. Raper stated the recovery rate wasn't as high as it would have been if the students were in the building at the end of the year, but it went well.  Our blade facilitators are contacting those students still trying to get those chromebooks back.
-Dr. Elliott states the system does know we will have families/students who will be interested in virtual school.  We started investigating CCS  having a virtual school on a smaller level.  We visited other schools to see how they operated their virtual school.  This helped us to be able to open virtual school registration starting in July.  This will be a year long commitment to be in virtual school.  We will have 300 spots available for virtual school students, this is around 5% of the student population in CCS.  We will be using Florida Virtual School curriculum that was purchased from the CARES Act fund. The students will need to have their own laptop and WiFi access. 
-The Board ask what was the response to the survey?  Dr. Elliott said they had over 700 families show interest in virtual school. 
-The Board ask if we would raise the number of spots available from 300 to more?  The system will be monitoring the response and see if they need to do that.
-Dr. Elliott states the Virtual School requirements: A teacher will be present everyday, there will be attendance taken daily and those attendance protocols will be in affect, they will be assigning grades on a regular basis.  The system wants the families to know it will look different than the spring virtual school. The system would like to start enrollment tomorrow, July 8 for traditional and virtual registration in our school system through July 22.  
-The Board asks if we get the same funding for a virtual student as a traditional student?  Yes, the virtual students fall into our school district so we will get funding for them.
Dr. Dyer wants the board to know the reason they kept the enrollment number smaller is they want to do this with fidelity.  We have never had virtual school and we want to do this the right way for our students and for our staff.
-The Board asks if a student chooses virtual school and chooses to finish a 9 week classwork in a 6 week time frame would they be allowed to do so?  Yes they can, but there will be check point days/times to make sure the students are on pace and if they have any questions.
-The Board asks what happens with testing and teacher evaluations?  The state testing is still on the table for every student, virtual or traditional.  We are monitoring this situation daily.  Mr. Kiser will advise us on the teacher evaluations when he speaks about Human Resources.
-The Board asks if families can not afford chromebooks if we could have some donated?  Mr. Raper stated that might be a problem since we have to legally have specific filters on all of our chromebooks owned by the system.
-The Board asks how we will continue to educate the Traditional K-2 students if they have to be out of school for COVID-19 since they will not have chromebooks?  At the beginning of the year, August 6, we will get a roster of students on who needs paper packets and who can utilize our website, www.ccsathomelearning.com to continue learning at home in the hybrid learning model.
-Dr. Dyer updates the board on Health and Student Services: We will be using proper hygiene, teaching social distancing, temperature checks, PPE, and instructing our students on how to implement these mitigations.  We will also be diving into mental health of our staff and families, including implementing Capturing Kids Hearts Model.  We have been and will be cleaning and scrubbing our building thanks to Hal Taylor and his cleaning crew. We will be providing PPE for all of our staff.  Academics and the health of our students create the whole child.
-The Board asks how are we going to deal with the discipline aspect for a student that doesn't follow the mitigating factors?  Dr. Dyer states Doug Moore is out of town and he could give us a perspective from a student services perspective, but we will have to write these procedures down in detail and have a more in depth discussion on how to move forward.
-Mr. Kiser updates the board on Human Resources- There will be a temperature check daily for our students, and staff.  They will also be filling out Google forms filled out daily with COVID-19 questions.  We want our staff to wear their masks/face coverings as much as possible.  We don't want our staff to be out multiple days for quarantine and wearing the mask will help with this.  We have contacted our substitutes and we have had some feedback that some substitutes do not want to come back.  We are looking to get some waivers on how long the substitutes can be in a particular classroom.  Next, we need to understand the estimated hours of work for a week.  Traditionally, staff would have one day every week or two having a "duty" within the school.  We feel for the beginning of shool, at least, we will be utilizing all staff all day to help students daily with mitigation practices.  We have not heard anything from the state about evaluations, but there is guidance out there for evaluations on virtual teachers.  Staffing of the virtual school at the elementary school level will be decided upon once we know the number of students that want to be enrolled in virtual school for each particular school.  Once we know how many virtual school teachers we need for each school we will ask for volunteers to go to virtual.  Once we have used all the volunteers we will go into an application process to fill the remaining spots.  This will be similar to the last process used for Candy's Creek Cherokee Elementary School.  If we don't have volunteers it would go to involuntary transfer.  The middle school is looking at a dedicated team approach to virtual school teaching.  The high school is looking at pulling some of the traditional teachers and having one of their classes in their schedules to be a virtual class.  
-The Board asks how the high school will have the lunchroom open?  Dr. Elliott said the system has been in conversation about this and they are still trying to iron out these details.  Gena Reed will be here to discuss this later in the meeting.  
-The Board asks if a teacher says they have a family member with a high risk family member in the home and the teacher chooses not to teach because of COVID-19.  Will the teacher be able to not teach this year and come back next year when COVID-19 is over?  Mr. Kiser says the teacher will be expected to be in the school doing their job.  There will be multiple scenarios regarding leave requirements and there are options to look at but the overall expectation has been stated by Mr. Chuck Cagle: If you are expected to be there to do your job you should be there doing your job.  
-The Board ask if the system is liable if we bring staff back to the building?  Mr. Kiser says no, Chuck Cagle stated if they are required to be at school then they are essential workers.
-The Board asks if a teacher does have a vulnerable medical situation would they have priority to be a virtual school teacher?  Mr. Kiser says they will need to go through the process like any other teachers.
-The Board asks if they have a teacher who is out for 2 weeks because of COVID-19 will it count against their sick leave?  Mr. Kiser advises there is a Families First Coronavirus Act, and under this Act they could be paid for up to 2 weeks to deal with COVID-19.  There is specific documentation that is required to qualify for this.  
-Dr. Elliott spoke about Academics - As they stated before there is a Traditional or At-Home if needed option and a Virtual School option.  We will be providing the staff development week to help teachers be ready for the school year starting August 3.  We are working on a curriculum guide to have ready before school starts.  In the spring we had K-8 teachers create curriculum videos so we can use them for instruction.  We will continue with the grading scales and assessments as we have in the past.  We have spoke with the special ed and ESL staff and we are continuing the intervention programs.  Our new CKLA Program allows us to do intervention in the classroom.
-The Board asks will there be specific regulations for our special ed population?  Dr. Elliott states they will, but a lot of those decisions will be determined by their IEP.
-The Board asks how they will address the students who are behind, especially K-2 students, while still teaching the current years curriculum?  Dr. Elliott states they will be focusing on this years curriculum, but they will be using the past videos from our teachers to help bridge the gap for curriculum for the previous year.  He states it will be a balancing act. Mr. Kiser states our new CKLA program has a boost program which will help with this.  Also, we have set funds aside from the CARES Act to bring some students in for summer school to further bridge the gap.
-The Board asks if the student is enrolled in virtual school would they be allowed to participate in sports?  Yes, they would have the opportunity to tryout for sports teams, extracurricular activities.  Band and Choir are part of the in school curriculum so they will not be available to them.  
-Dr. Elliott states they are suspending field trips at this time.
-Carolyn Ingram asked about an email she received.  A parent ask if Juniors and Seniors can take core classes at the local colleges and it count toward our high school core requirements?  Dr. Elliott stated if it is a core credit class it would need to be taken by one of our instructors.  If they are enrolled in the dual credit classes, then they can go onto the college campuses and take those classes.  This is something Dr. Elliott's team will need to look into.
-Dr. Elliott speaks about Transportation- We are asking if parents can take their students to school we would like help with that mitigation factor.  Bus Drivers will be wearing masks, there will be an empty seat behind the bus driver for social distancing, there will be a seating chart this year for students on buses, and we will be disinfecting buses after each run-morning and afternoon. Mr. Taylor wants to remind everyone most of his staff are in the high risk category and we have potential for a route not to run or be late because we will be short on drivers.
-The Board asks if a bus is late because we are short on drivers will the student being counted late?  Dr. Elliott states No, that will be a principal excused tardy.
-The Board asks if there will be an assistant on the buses?  Dr. Elliott state that during reconnection week we will have assistants on the buses to help navigate the students and expectations, but going forward we will be limited on who can be on the bus.  
-The Board asks since we are starting school at different times at the middle school and high school will that make it difficult to run the bus routes?  Mr. Taylor states it will not affect our routes.
-The Board asks if they will be limiting how many students would be allowed to be on each seat?  Mr. Taylor states they don't see a way to financially feasible to make this happen.  
-The Board asks if they will be putting plexiglass around the bus driver?  Mr. Taylor states they can not do this because it is a violation of the Department of Safety.
-The Board asks will there be temperatures taken before students get on the bus?  No, the temperatures will not be taken except for Special Ed buses.
(Tom Cloud had to leave the meeting at 4:10 pm.)
-Dr. Elliott states the school day times.  Since we will not be able to allow our students to congregate in the large spaces like a gym or cafeteria we will need our staff at the schools ahead of the students ready for those students to come through the doors each morning ready for the students to be in the classroom first thing.  The start times for each school:  Elementary Schools: 8:15 am - 3:15 pm, Doors open at 7:45 am, car riders will begin dismissal at 2:45 pm, and bus riders will begin dismissal at 3:15 pm: Middle School: 7:50 am-2:50 pm, their buses start to arrive at 7:15 am, bus riders and 6th grade students will dismiss at 2:30 pm, 7th and 8th grade student car riders/walkers will dismiss at 2:50 pm.  Dr. Elliott states they are still working on the details for the middle school pick up flow of the pick up lanes.  High School 7:30 am - 2:30 pm: Doors will open at 7:10 am, and dismissal will be at 2:30 pm for cars and buses, we do not believe dismissal will be an issue since they have more student drivers. There is an app that Candy's Creek used last year where a parent lets the app know that they are there to pick up their child and it will let the teachers know in the classroom so the student can leave and go to their car.
-The Board asks what if a parent wants to walk up to the school and get their child?  Dr. Elliott states they have discussed this but have not nailed down a specific decision on how to handle this pick up procedure.
-Gena Reed discusses Child Nutrition- Breakfast and lunch service will use disposable material no matter where they eat.  Breakfast will be a grab and go service, we can utilize the offer v. serve option for elementary and the high school.  The middle school will still have breakfast in the classroom.  At home learning or virtual school students food can be picked up on sites.  If the system if out for less than 5 days there needs to be a designated spot at each school for pickup.  If the system or school is closed for 5 days or more meals can be delivered.  Breakfast and lunch will be delivered together on Monday, for Monday and Tuesday's meals, and Wednesday delivery, for Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday's meals.  The buses will deliver 30 minutes later than the original time at the elementary school level, the buses will deliver an hour and a half later for the secondary schools.  Car pick up sites will be open 9:00 am - 10:00 am.  If its a system closure the buses will pick up at limited schools to help with staffing and safety: at CMS, BB, CCCE, Stuart, and Yates.  The sites for parent pickup are BB, Mayfield, Yates, CHS, and CCCE from 10:00 am - 1:00 pm.  We have applied for and received some waivers- We have these through June 30,2021: Non-congregate feeding- Which allows us to eat in the classroom or wherever their designated area is. Meal service time flexibility which allows us to serve multiple meals at any time if needed.  Parental pickup: Which allows parents to pickup food for students.  We will be using system rosters for meal accountability. Meal pattern flexibility: These are approved by the USDA, but we have to get approval from the state and I will be working on that once this plan is approved.  Offer V. Serve flexibility has been approved for 9-12.  Waivers that have not been approved :  Portable water,  and Seamless summer Emergency Feeding for the school year.  Daily staff checks will include the same protocols as the rest of the system.  We will be taking our employees temperatures and they will be filling out the Google document.  Procedures if a staff has COVID-19:  If they have to close a kitchen, we will use another schools kitchen to help.  Hand washing protocols will be enforced, and they will be cleaning the lines between classes.  They will be doing a bi-weekly training for these procedures.
-The Board asks if a student is in virtual school can they receive lunch? Yes, they will have a roster and they will check their name off at pickup locations.
-The Board asks if employees are wanting to come back in the nutrition department?  Gena Reed said they are just now calling the employees and they haven't noticed a mass exit of employees.
-The Board asks how they will handle the busy lunchrooms at the middle and high school level?  Gena said they are having meetings with Sodexo and principals to determine how to keep 50% of students in the cafeterias.  There will not be any self service.
-Dr. Elliott spoke about Attendance and Enrollment- We are opening enrollment July 8, and it will be open for 2 weeks.  As a reminder: Attendance will be taken for virtual school as well.  For those who have not enrolled in school by July 22 they will be automatically enrolled in traditional school.  We will still be getting funding for students who are in virtual school as long as they are present each day.
-The Board asks how they enroll: They go to the website at www.clevelandschools.org/enrollment 
-The Board asks if they don't have a computer or internet access do they have paper options to enroll in school instead of having in person registrations?  This year we have a paper option at the school.  
-The Board asks what happens once the student is enrolled in virtual school?  They will meet July 23 with parents.

Dr. Dyer states the sales tax locally came in strong and the BEP Funding came in strong as well.  
-Mrs. Robinson hopes since the BEP funding is coming in strong she hopes we can give a bonus to the staff.  Dr. Dyer agrees, but wants to watch to see how the numbers are in July.
-The board thanks the whole task force and appreciates them as well.  Dr. Dyer is very proud of this product as well.  
Dr. Dyer states we will be broadcasting every document out so the community, families, and students know the plan.  We will have posters and signage as well at the schools.  Dr. Dyer knows we will be getting new information and this plan can change, but he recommends we approve this plan with the changes.

Discussion (Visible on Public Minutes):  Dawn adjourned the meeting by general consent.