Español y Inglés

Wednesday night’s agenda has a proposal to change the process for naming facilities. It would make a citizen advisory committee optional. Currently it is mandatory.
The following item is an action item to immediately change the name of James Monroe Elementary to George Ortiz Elementary with just a Board discussion (no advisory committee).
SRTA supports including the community in this type of decision.

BOARD MEETING
Santa Rosa City Schools
July 22, 2020 6:00PM 
5:00 p.m. - Closed Session 6:00 p.m. - Open Session

*** streamed ***
A live link will be posted on the SRCS website (link).
https://bit.ly/SRCSvideoboardmeetings

Please take time to review the following abbreviated version of the agenda.  Click here to see the entire agenda. It has live links on many items with more information.  If you want to comment to the board about any upcoming items, email  agendacomments@srcs.k12.ca.us. Please CC wearesrta@gmail.com on your comments.

Closed Session Items: 
A.1. Public Comment On Closed Session Agenda Items To comment, email Melanie Martin at mmartin@srcs.k12.ca.us prior to 5:00pm.
B.1. Public Employee Appointment/Employment
B.2. Public Employee Performance Evaluation (Title of employee being reviewed: Superintendent, Assistant Superintendent, Principals, Vice Principals, Assistant Principals, Directors, Coordinators)
B.3. Conference With Labor Negotiator: Classified Chapter 75 

C. RECONVENE TO REGULAR OPEN SESSION (6:00 p.m.)

C.6. Public Comment on Non Agenda Items
SRTA members are invited to raise their hand and provide voice only comments during the meeting. Please observe the time limit. The standard is three minutes, but recently it has been modified at times to a two minute limit. Items not on the agenda are addressed at this time.  Items on the agenda are addressed during discussion of the item, using the same process.

Comments are needed at the board meeting to bring a members perspective to the messages contained in this analysis, and share real experiences of the impact of district policies and practices.  Please commit to watching a board meeting, and speaking to an agenda item that impacts you or your students. Speakers are most impactful when they are well spoken, composed and reasonable.

C.7. Student Board Member Loyalty Oath of Office
Omar Lopez, a senior at Elsie Allen High School, will be sworn in as this year’s student board member.

D. REPORTS
D.7. Ad Hoc Committee on School Resource Officer Report
E. DISCUSSION / ACTION ITEMS
E.1. (Action) Approval for Resolution Declaring Remote Learning for the First Quarter of 2020-2021
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SRTA’s number one priority is the health and safety of our students and our members. ​

Voting will take place Friday, July 17 through Tuesday, July 21, 
​The two votes are separate and independent.

We will vote on two things
The MOU: 

• Sets safety and working conditions for the school year. 
  • This is the “how we will do things document.”
  • A YES vote says, “SRTA negotiated sufficient safety and working conditions protections.”
  • It is a binding document, superseding contract language for its duration (until June 30, 2021)

​
The Resolution: 

• Gives members the opportunity to say what SRTA stands for. 
  • A YES vote says, “we think we should work remotely until there are 14 days with no new cases in Sonoma County.”
  • This is NOT binding with the district.

Español y Inglés

BOARD MEETING
Santa Rosa City Schools
July 8, 2020 6:00PM 
5:30 p.m. - Closed Session 6:00 p.m. - Open Session

*** streamed ***
A live link will be posted on the SRCS website (link).
https://bit.ly/SRCSvideoboardmeetings

Please take time to review the following abbreviated version of the agenda.  Click here to see the entire agenda. It has live links on many items with more information.  If you want to comment to the board about any upcoming items, email  agendacomments@srcs.k12.ca.us. Please CC wearesrta@gmail.com on your comments.

Closed Session Items: 
A.1. Public Comment On Closed Session Agenda Items To comment, email Melanie Martin at mmartin@srcs.k12.ca.us prior to 4:00.
B.1. Public Employee Appointment/Employment
B.2. Public Employee Performance Evaluation (Title of employee being reviewed: Superintendent, Assistant Superintendent, Principals, Vice Principals, Assistant Principals, Directors, Coordinators)

C. RECONVENE TO REGULAR OPEN SESSION (6:00 p.m.)

C.6. Public Comment on Non Agenda Items
SRTA members are invited to raise their hand and provide voice only comments during the meeting. Please observe the time limit. The standard is three minutes, but recently it has been modified at times to a two minute limit. Items not on the agenda are addressed at this time.  Items on the agenda are addressed during discussion of the item, using the same process.

Comments are needed at the board meeting to bring a members perspective to the messages contained in this analysis, and share real experiences of the impact of district policies and practices.  Please commit to watching a board meeting, and speaking to an agenda item that impacts you or your students. Speakers are most impactful when they are well spoken, composed and reasonable.

E. DISCUSSION / ACTION ITEMS
E.1. (Action) The Santa Rosa City Schools Return to School Plan will be presented to the Board of Education for Review and Approval Summary
Safeguarding the health and safety of students and staff is an overarching guiding principle for this plan. It is aspirational as it focuses on Connection, Instruction, Safety, Technology, Communication, and Professional Development. “To Be Negotiated” is inserted in all areas that will be written to reflect agreements in a future MOU. 

SRCS Return To School Plan - DRAFT

SRTA notes that the District is asking for approval of the DRAFT RTS Plan while acknowledging that the guidelines are a mandatory subject of negotiations. We support the adoption of this DRAFT now so staff and families can start planning. We look forward to a finalized plan to be presented along with duly negotiated MOUs at the July 22nd Board meeting.  We stand by the process that has gotten the RTS Draft to this point and, as redacted, we agree that it represents the best thinking for our Return to School Committee. We intend to work with the District to have a ratified MOU by then if we can reach agreement.  

SRTA appreciates the collaborative efforts utilized to create the Return To School plan. Members' recommendations, voices, and concerns were taken into account while writing and revising the current plan. We believe this process allowed for a higher quality RTS plan. We expect that lessons learned from this experiment in robust collaboration will make future collaborations more meaningful and successful. We are grateful to the School Board and Dr. Kitamura for supporting this difficult work.

SRTA Members’ number one priority is the health and safety of our students and our staff. That remains our top focus as we move forward. The Return to School Plan is NOT an agreement to reopen our classrooms; it is a guideline for HOW to reopen our classrooms IF it is safe and reasonable to do so. That is a huge IF at this point. The virus will have to behave, and we will have to grow our District’s capacity to implement these guidelines, before we can return to schools safely.

It is important to note that the Covid MOU, to be negotiated with the Union, will override the RTS plan. This one-year MOU will replace the contract for the topics which it covers. It will contain the “lines in the sand,” the minimum safety requirements the District must provide, and the maximum the District can direct our members to do as employees. SRTA will continue to negotiate to achieve the strongest, safest MOU possible with reasonable workloads. If the MOU contradicts the RTS plan, the RTS plan will need to be revised to be in alignment with the MOU.

We are living in an unprecedented pandemic. Forty-one percent (41%) of all of 1360 cases of Covid-19 in Sonoma County were diagnosed in the last two weeks. This confirms that nearly 3% of our local population has contracted Covid-19. That is 524 new cases in the past 14 days while our death rate has recently doubled. This dramatic shift came after the information gathering for the plan. 


Once the MOUs are agreed to and this RTS plan is approved by the Board, we are still a long way from being able to reopen our schools safely. A close reading of this ambitious DRAFT RTS plan will find over 150 instances where further plans and protocols will need to be created, shared, and carried out in order to fulfill the vision of the plan. Important decisions still to be ironed out include:

• Safety conditions: sanitation, class size, PPE, medically fragile staff and families, and the default to distance learning 
• Working conditions and workload: prep times, distance learning times, and the Wednesday planning times
• SPED concerns: IEPs, 504s, and SSTs 
• Professional development: times, topics, and obligations to attend

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