Board of Education · Regular Meeting · February 23, 2023

Monthly meeting is now in session at this time we wish to extend a warm welcome to everyone who is joining us this evening the purpose of this meeting is to inform our parents staff and constituents about the work aligned with our mission to embrace educate and Empower every student to serve to innovate and to lead the interpreters for tonight are Martha Romo iguireless and Marty Ramirez thank you all for taking the time to join us the first item on our agenda is a moment of silence.

Thank you the next item on our agenda is celebrations Mr Sutter good evening Madam chair members of the board Dr mabinka it is my pleasure to come to you from my undisclosed location thanks to minor incident of upper respiratory infection and I hate to miss out on celebrations in person we're about to present to you some outstanding students teachers and employees including a few employees that are close to my own heart tonight to present those celebrations in person I turn it over to my colleague our director of marketing and strategic Communications Sheena Johnson Cooper.

Same pleasure to introduce the students and staff who are the purpose behind the work that we do in Durham Public Schools our first celebration this evening is our student of the month tonight we recognize and congratulate Jessica bortiri a senior at the Durham performance Learning Center I'd like to welcome principal Keisha Futrell to the podium to share a few remarks about Jessica.

Good evening school board and guests it is my pleasure to stand before you tonight and speak about a wonderful young lady named Jessica bortiri and to do that I want to use her own words my biggest accomplishment so far is having the opportunity to finish school early with the struggles I have experienced in school in previous years my confidence increased I became determined worked hard and surprised myself and whom I have become in this past school year at boc we give students an opportunity to Rise From the Ashes of their past and become the bigger brighter versions of themselves the best version of themselves Jessica had to pass her own expectations and she is truly Rising as a phoenix it is my pleasure to introduce our student of the month Jessica bortieri.

Congratulations Jessica and we are so very proud of you and your accomplishments and to acknowledge that this evening we have a few special gifts for you tonight we present you with a spark pin because you represent the best in DPS and we want you to wear this proudly throughout your school throughout the community to let everyone know that you have earned this recognition and we also have a special certificate for you tonight acknowledging that as well all right we have another very big surprise for you our friends at triangle e-cycling want to make sure that you're prepared for whatever your next steps are in life and so they have presented you with a laptop this evening.

And we're still not done last but certainly not least the Raven Family Foundation has presented you with a 500 scholarship to further your education congratulations Jessica continue to make yourself proud your family proud and all of Durham Public Schools proud please walk our red carpet our board and administration want to celebrate you tonight Mr Cunningham right here yes.

We are excited to share more student celebrations this evening and we are recognizing two DPS elementary students who are State winners and will be published in the North Carolina reading association's 2023 young authors Anthology Taylor Torrance is a kindergartner at Spring Valley Elementary School where principal Gwendolyn Wilson leads that school community and a fifth grader Natalie Wallace who attends Creekside Elementary School led by DPS 2021 principal of the Year Dr Tori Kramer Taylor is the author of the six princesses and Natalie authored a book entitled a pile of books young ladies Scholars please come forward with your families.

As you continue to shine throughout your DPS career we are so very proud of you and we present you with spark pins as well to commemorate this occasion and we want you to wear it proudly thank you so much for being amazing young students to Stand Here for a third outfit.

We'd also like to do offer a special thanks to the classroom teachers who are supporting those young authors Jennifer Neal and Ann Capello thank you so much. As we transition to our staff recognitions I'd like to ask my colleagues in the office of public affairs to come forward I know that Mr Sutter certainly wishes he could be here in person as we make this very special announcement and we know that he is listening in. I'm not feeling left out at all Ms Cooper I hear you chip the DPS office of public affairs has earned 15 Awards through the North Carolina school public relations association's Blue Ribbon Awards.

While that is a huge accomplishment we have one even better our very own digital Communications specialist Tony Cunningham was presented with a best of the best recognition for his photo entitled heartfelt haircut I'm not sure if we have that image available this evening but if you have not seen it we will certainly share with you it is truly moving and received rave reviews from the judges among the gold silver and bronze honors were the spark Insider publication a campaign slogan the district's DPS notables feature series and several photos and Video Productions produced for our schools and the district the blue ribbon event recognizes excellence in strategic communication writing digital and electronic media marketing special events photography and Publications we are honored to serve the families and staff of DPS through our work thank you so much and thank you team.

And finally I would like to ask Ms Michelle Hayes executive director of talent and acquisition and employee recognition to come to the podium to announce our teacher and employee of the month.

Good Ness.

Thank you all sometimes it's hard for us to stop the work but we appreciate your your recognition thank you and now I'm Michelle Hayes. Good evening good evening good evening chairman I'm sad members of the board Dr mobinga and cabinet members I am pleased to bring two recognitions to you tonight our teacher of the month sponsored by North Carolina Central University's tennis team the tasa chapter of Omega Sci-Fi fraternity Incorporated and DCL Consulting LLC and the Vail cares foundation and our Employee of the Month sponsored by the office of Human Resources both recognitions will be brought to you monthly and we congratulate these high performers our February employee of the month is Andrea Resto is the School treasurer at Spring Valley Elementary School.

Andrea Resto is a builder of community she is a collaborator an organizer a champion for students while being fiscally fiscally responsible for the students for the school's funds Miss Resto spreads kindness throughout the building as she does the afternoon announcements telling everyone to keep smiling and bringing joy to everyone you meet you never know how much being kind can change someone's day I'm so grateful you showed up today as always be brave be creative be thankful be happy and be you congratulations to Andrea Resto for being named Durham Public Schools February employee of the month she will receive a spark pen and a flag.

A February teacher of the month is es Fede Herrera Rodriguez first grade teacher at Glenn Elementary School. While this is Miss Herrera Rodriguez first year at Glenn and only her second year teaching you would never know that when you walk into her room she has transformed her space into a bright peaceful child-centered place that models best practices for all learning every day when we asked Miss Herrera why she wanted to become a teacher she said I am passionate about helping students find their strengths voice and passions I want to act as a support systems for families who are not originally from the U.S and help them with navigating a new school system language and culture as a Mexican teacher I want to help students realize they can be whomever they want no matter where they are from or what they look like we could not say it better than Ms Herrera said it herself she has done a masterful job celebrating and meaningfully making her Heritage and culture and an important part of our.

School Community during our Hispanic heritage celebration Miss Herrera and her brother performed a traditional Mexican dance to share an important part of their culture with our students she became an instant celebrity with kids wanting to take their picture with her immediately in the classroom is what ever is where her skill and dedication really shines being bilingual in Spanish and English allows her the ability to communicate fluently and support her students in both their native language and new language she has made an extensive effort to communicate with her families and to advocate for them by helping them to interpret and translate for them at Glenn where Miss header really shines though is her ability to support students learning during the most recent m-class window all of her students met or exceeded growth and 25 percent of her class jumped one or more levels recently she was reading a book with a student who has been in the United States for less than a year as the students worked through sentences like Pam has a cat.

With deliberate determination at the end she turned to her teacher and said Miss Herrera I can read that that one sentence May encap encapsulate the best in teaching that student didn't even realize how much she was learning every day but she knew she loved school and she adored Miss Herrera in a time when we frequently hear about teacher shortages and challenges in the classroom Ms Herrera Rodriguez represents the promise and the future of teaching congratulations Herrera Rodriguez Rodriguez excuse me for being named Durham Public Schools February teacher of the month she will also get a spark pen and a presentation from coach Lawson good evening everyone I had the pleasure of meeting Miss Herrera Rodriguez last Friday when the men's tennis team from North Carolina Central University we gave a surprise visit to her in recognition of this this great honor and we are delighted to be able to celebrate to recognize are being truly a transformational leader and role model in the Durham public school system so in addition to all of the.

Surprises that we gave to her on last Friday on behalf of DCL Consulting we would also like to give her a check for one hundred dollars just for her to go to dinner or to celebrate again in recognition of her Excellence so and while we we give recognition to the the teachers of the month I would be remiss and have been remiss and Matt also acknowledging and giving thanks to the principals because if they were not giving the nominations of these wonderful teachers then we would sometimes be a little clueless so principal Hunt is here I had an opportunity to speak with him a couple of times so thank you principal hunt and again congratulations to miss Herrero Rodriguez.

This concludes our celebrations for the evening thank you thank you Miss Cooper Mr Sutter and the team also just want to add up another celebration next week is the crown act week for DPS and we have a series of celebrations that are happening and so we'll be celebrating our students and our crowns and the board passed a resolution I believe it was at our last meeting but there'll be a event on February 27th about beauty standards and stereotypes March the second off to the top Kings and their crowns and then other Spirit Week celebrations all throughout the week I think they're pulling up a flyer now so check it out on Facebook or on Twitter Instagram I think the information is posted and I'm excited that we work in the district that we're going to be celebrating crowns all next week all right all right the next item on our agenda is the superintendent's update before I pass it to you Dr mobinga I also want to make a note.

That a board member Louis is absent this evening she is taking a medical absence day and so we just want to recognize that absence but since her love and appreciation to everyone here Dr mobinga thank you thank you madam chair members of the board good evening I want to spend some time this evening talking about the Arts and in Durham Public Schools and our incredible student artists this is one of the clear difference between Durham Public Schools and our competitors no one else in Durham County can match us when it comes to the death and creativity and resources that we have committed to the odds you have only to look at Tuesday night performance by our students at the Durham Performing Arts Center for the evening to shine we had the highest attendance ever with future not only our music and dance programs but also our Theater Arts and visual arts programs it was a tremendous success I'm grateful to Jeremy Tucker our director of art education and to all.

Our teachers and staff and guest instructors who supported our students through it I'm also grateful to the Durham Public School foundation for co-hosting the event our arts program are available for their own sake but also in providing an opportunity for our students to use their voices to affect change in our community this month gun violence in Durham has one small touch our school communities with one of our students losing his life away from campus the pain and grief of our students is evident and it came across in the performance of the play state of urgency at Hills Side High School this month for students across Durham Public Schools as well as the Border community when sheriff burkek and I collaborated on bringing Mr Wendell tab play back this month we did not know how close to home the play would feel state of urgency was followed by a TalkBack panel comprising DPS leaders and community members including Chef Burkett Duke Physicians and leaders of agencies and Community organizations the actual friend Matic Perry and Tamika.

Would sort of feel answered questions with insurances that our students and staff mental health continue to be a priority state of urgency at Hillside theater student captured the attention of thousands I want to thank principal William Logan Drama teacher Tiffany Augustine Mr Tapp Mr Tucker and everyone else we gave our students this platform finally I want to talk about teachers pay and the state's responsibility for it last week the professional educator preparation and standard commission send recommendations to the state board about starting a pilot program that will change how teachers are licensed and paid the plan which the commission approved on a 9-7 vote in November creates different levels of licensure and measures of Effectiveness that would affect Teachers Pay it's a complicated proposal it's sitting with the board the State Board now but all this ultimately will have to be approved by the state legislature and I want you to know that I do not support it not this way not at this time teacher compensation in the state of.

North Carolina is not sufficient to put it in madly the public school Forum of North Carolina notes that we are 38th in the nation for teachers pay the starting base salary is below the state minimum living wage the public school forum is calling on the legislatures to raise teacher sellers by 24.5 percent if the state paid competitive wages to our teachers then our counties will not be in such desperate arms race to to do each other with local supplements if the state pay competitive wages to our teachers then it will be easier to attract people to the profession then perhaps we can look at licensure additions and further opportunities for additional compensation for our teachers I do not support the Pepsi proposal until we have taken those first steps Madam chair does conclude my report thank you Dr mavinga so many things that we could touch on on that report but I appreciate you staying abreast of what's happening around the state and also highlighting so many of the accomplishments of our students students.

And staff the next item on our agenda is agenda review and approval Madam chair I'd like to add to the agenda after the District 3 vacancy interview questions the capital project Amendment. Second the agenda as amended it's been moved by Miss Rogers and seconded by Miss buyer any other discussion all those in favor please say any opposed please use the same sign passes unanimously the next item on our agenda is the Board of Education monthly meeting minutes for January the Board of Education monthly meeting minutes for January 26 2023.

This approval of the minutes as presented second to move I'm inspired seconded by Miss Chavez any other discussion all in favor say I I any opposed please use the same sign passes unanimously the next item on our agenda is general Public Comment they give us some instructions and then we'll get started a quick review of the rules first please state your name and if you're speaking for an organization please state your name and the name of the organization second speakers are asked to present their comments in a specified time there'll be three minutes this evening when the yellow light comes on you have one minute left to start winding up your remarks when the red light comes on it will beep which indicates your time is up complaints about name staff students or parents should not be voiced in open session however we are very interested in hearing your concerns with regard to the public education safety of students or to the operations of the school system finally the board members will listen.

Carefully and consider the comments but we do not engage in a discussion with speakers our first speaker is Minister Paul Scott will be followed by Kim single Singletary.

Good evening superintendent mobinga chair Umstead school board and all present two years ago the Durham city council and the Durham school board passed the resolution against house bill 324. Which is also known as the anti-critical race Theory bill today February 23 2023 a new bill where the same bill has been re introduced under house bill 187. And they again attacking what they term as quote critical race Theory unquote what's ironic about the name of the house bill 187 is I'm as a hip-hop connoisseur and gangster rap terms 187 is the California penal code for murder and that's appropriate with this bill because they're trying to kill the culture of black children so I stand before you this evening hoping that Durham will continue to be the Vanguard and standing against this attack on education I hope that Durham continues to be at the Forefront and fighting against House Bill 187 and all other duplicate bills that would be coming up to ensure the safety and education of our young people as I close.

In the words of the Astound philosophy great philosopher Snoop Doggy Dog it's time for us to call 187 on House Bill 187. thank you very much thank you Kim Singletary followed by Maya's Sutherland Sutherland and I apologize if I mispronounce your name hi I'm Dr Kim Singletary I'm my Emergency Physician I'm speaking on behalf of my daughter who could not be here but she's very passionate about this subject she sent me 10 minutes worth of notes I'm sorry she sent me 10 minutes worth of notes and I will try to summarize basically she is very passionate about the need for a new track for Hillside High School she is co-captain of the team she has been on the team and went to Nationals that last year she would like for you know that she finished eighth in pole vault in Nationals and 11th in long jump she believes these were under her possibility of achievement because she says the things that's holding her back is physical pain she and her teammates.

Suffer from physical pain from the lack of repair of the track the track has is hard the surface is hard is not up to the standard that it should be for these kids to work as hard as they are working she she is concerned that this is a pivotal part of the community of Hillside the track doesn't just serve the track team it serves the football team the basketball team all of which have won major Conference titles recently she says they are family in their Hillside track team and she hurts because her family is hurting she is very very frustrated by this hold on let me just make sure I got all of her comments she's also worried about her future health she is worried that these lower extremity injuries that her knees her ankles the shin splints will lead to Future problems with the health and the activity of her teammates and so she's worried about being 20 years old and trying 30 years old and trying to be.

Active because she's been working her body very hard she let me I'll give you some of her words because she put a lot of time and she said it's a shame what do you say she's shame and a disgrace to our district she's a disgrace disservice to our ability and our effort not to have a healthy facility for them to practice on let's see I think that is it if my time I there's something she would have wanted me to say let's see she had 10 minutes let's see hold on a second and I have another but basically she said she thinks these things could be of she thinks these things could be avoided if the track was a better facility and that's what she's very frustrated about and had me come out here and do what she's because she's very passionate about this so she would like to hear from you guys that you guys are going to fix this track for her this season thank you thank you Dr.

Singletary also know that you can email her comments to the Board of Education it's b-o-e dpsnc.net okay because I know she's got a lot of notes it looks like yes yes all right next will be Maya Sutherland and then last Omar Beasley.

Good evening Dr mabenga and members of the board my name is Maya Sutherland and I'm a student at Hillside High School I'm here tonight to ask you to consider installing a new track at Hillside High School I feel the current conditions of our track has been thank you. Good evening Dr mabanga and members of the board my name is Maya Sutherland and I'm a student at Hillside High School I'm here tonight to ask you all to consider installing a new track at Hillside High School I feel the current conditions of our Trek has been the main factor of my shin splints as well as other athletes the surface is hard and worn Hillside has several student and I mean State and nationally ranked Runners and I think we deserve a track that reflects that this will benefit not only athletes of Hillside High School but also the district since we host several meets thank you for your thank you for your consideration and time.

Good evening my name is Omar Beasley I am the head coach and director of track and field at Hillside High School first of all good evening Dr wilbinga chair Bonita and the rest of the school board I bring to you I'm gonna read a letter from a podiatrist that has seen several of our athletes at Hillside High School his name is Dr Kelsey Armstrong and he's he owns Armstrong Podiatry which is in Durham to whom it may concern I have noticed a steady increase of the number of lower extremity injuries to youth 12 to 18 years old during my 22 years in Podiatry Sports Medicine such pathology as plantar fasciitis stress fractures shin splints and Ankle injuries have become all too common the explanation for this is mostly likely is most likely multifactual including coaching nutritional shoe gear but I believe one important factor is that could eliminate most of these injuries is training surface children from 12 to 18 are not miniature adults they have an underdeveloped neuromuscular system in addition there.

Are fluctuations in growth during this age in the bones they increased length of Bones also stretched soft tissue ligaments tendons and fascia the contributing increased stress upon them to top it off the neuromuscular system must find a way to navigate through the new body and allow it to function unfortunately the bodies of the youth are more vulnerable to injury than adults if you if you if you introduce a hard non-compliant surface to this body you were forcing the underdeveloped neuromuscular system to absorb the shock of the hard surface and try to adapt because of the soft tissue is already weak and compromise they are prone to strains and tears furthermore the shock of the hard surface can also be carried to the bones making it prone for stress fractures during my years of coaching track and field athletes I have always made it made sure my athletes train on surfaces that were hard enough to promote stability yet soft enough to absorb the shock of running these surfaces would include well-maintained grass and polyurethane surfaces.

With this philosophy I have seen fewer injuries from my athletes and corresponding with better performances we ask you that you would consider removing the latex track over at Hillside High School which is banned in 22 States and moved to a poly polyurethane surface not only for Hillside High School but the rest of the district thank you for your time thank you all and that concludes our public comments the next item on our agenda is cons our consent items we have a couple of different items that are listed here the board has reviewed these items in advance and I'll take this any emotion or any discussion approval of the consent internet there second it's been moved by Miss Rogers seconded by Miss buyer any other discussion all in favor say aye aye any opposed please use the same sign it passes unanimously the next item on our agenda is the Board of Education District 3 vacancy interview questions so board members at our last meeting we went over the timeline for filling.

The vacant seat that we have for district three and we also discussed having I'm using the word interview even though it won't be necessarily Interactive but asking folks to come speak before the board and addressing some of the challenges that we're facing so I sent over some draft questions to you all there's also a hard copy at your desk if you would like to review those so we'd ask folks to prepare a 10-minute speech to address those three questions and then last but not least what we did in the past I just had a jar with each one of these topics listed on it shook the jar took out a topic and the person was asked to address the topic within those two minutes so any questions or comments edits you would like to see.

So I think I submitted a question on student safety because I think it's interesting to see kind of how people think about safety as we're struggling with some really complex issues I see it didn't make the cut but it got put in one of the ones down below I'm curious as to whether people think it's worthy of being a major question or not and then I guess also chair I'm said like these ones where we pull from a jar maybe we have them do two like I mean I because there's such variety there as well so I don't think one quite gets us enough of a kind of a well-rounded perspective from someone so that's that's kind of how I was consider my two thoughts to get us started talking at least I don't have strong feelings about it I think we'll get a good these are great questions as a starting place could you say exactly what the question was on safety that you proposed.

If you give me a minute to look it up I'll buy sounds good I would say generally until you find it I think the I could go either way I'm incorporating a question on safety I like the idea of having two topics having folks speak on two topics below and I appreciate the integration of all of our different suggestions here and I think that I could see where the questions at the top are kind of Broad and might bring out some of the safety issues or other kind of contemporary concerns that folks have but yeah I wrote schools in Durham must be safe and inclusive describe what school safety means to you and what policies you support in order to keep our schools safe so I thought it was open-ended enough that people could take it in a lot of different directions and that that's how I like writing these questions and I think that's how we've done it in the past is just kind of open the door and see where.

People take the prompt. Yeah and these questions are adapted again from what we did in our last interview process and also everyone sent me questions so I tried to synthesize and put what based on what people sent how do we make sure we highlight and get some of those but again I'm open to suggestions if folks want to include that one in the top three. This maybe start there if you would like to see the safety question in the three I see a nod from Miss Rogers Miss validares Miss viadara says yes Chavez so what if we take number three and made that into the safety question no okay or what if we just added as a fourth I mean and and then that gives people two and a half minutes kind of vaguely on each topic kind of because we work through this I understand the hesitation about removing number three but as we think through our new policies and our conflict of interest form with our conflict of interest form speak to.

Some of that to number three about how you'll work with folks well I don't think so okay so we want to keep number three okay are we gonna ask them to share about any conflicts that they might have that's a form a good question the Forum it's the way the policy is written is for board members and I don't know Mr Malone if you have thoughts on if we want to get potential conflicts in advance of the yeah I was pondering that I certainly think you could let's say when you're notifying people of the time of their interview you could ask that they forward to the superintendent a couple days before the meeting a list of anything that would be a conflict under the policy you could theoretically send them the form that I think staff developed and that's ask them to return that as part of it so that you'd have that ahead of time I would probably do it that way instead of asking it as a question so.

They'd have time to make sure that it's pretty accurate in their response that'd be my thought if you wanted to address that ahead of time otherwise you can obviously once they are on the board they'd have to complete the form at that point thank you Mr Malone so we can do send that out to folks who apply and so we can get that completed before so if we add a fourth question on safety any other that will take that out of the bottom any other.

I'm just wondering if we put in the question about safety then which I support that the question the topic at the bottom seems to get at mental health generally so is there something do we want to incorporate the wellness part suggest mental health to me so do we want to incorporate that into the safety question or leave it as a like mental health supports as a topic at the bottom I think leaving it open is probably the right way to go so that people can take safety in the way that they want I think we also know we're very committed to mental health support as a board already and so I I think I would like to leave it open so that people can go where they need to it doesn't maybe feel like we're being prescriptive about what we think safety means what do you think about the idea of them the things at the bottom them choosing one and then we draw a different like so they have some choice in what they.

Choose to talk about as one of their things is also interesting what do you think that would be worthy of consideration I don't I mean it's gone by me.

I support that yeah I'm just watching the public can't see but I see head nods from our board members on the and miss vaidar so she supports that Miss Rogers yes so they would choose one and then we would give them one at random I like them that's fine I have one other little minor thing can we put lgbtq IA plus let me just put the plus that's it and the gender part kids genders in the title right I wasn't putting the policy I was just okay kind of leaving it open open okay that's cool how long did we think we want to spend with each candidate because it's getting a little lengthy now yeah so we have we have the speech under under 10 minutes we could shorten it if we want it to say under eight minutes but with what we've laid out you're looking at about 15 minutes per candidate when we did this in the last round some people didn't take all that time a.

Lot of people didn't take all that time it also will depend on how many applicants apply we'll have to think about that as well but I would like to make sure the time is set it will start the whole was 30 minutes and I think we had like eight applicants so all right so can you remind me the other dates that we also talked about are we going to do that in a minute yeah yeah I want to make sure we're finished with this part first and then move to the date question so we feel good about those edits to the process and I like the conflict of interesting the conflict of interest form here so I'll work with Miss Smith to get these edits up on the website these complete and edits up on the website the next thing I want to bring attention to was the dates on the timeline we have we looked at March 7th and 8th is the dates we did in case there were a lot of.

Applicants so I would hold both of those dates on your calendar starting with the seventh that will be the hopefully we may have one day but if we need two we can have the eighth as well what time I would say five minutes could that work for you okay I would need you to do 5 30 on the 7th 5 30. okay so we'll do 5 30. all right. We'll do hold that for March 7th and 8th and then March 16th was the other date that I listed here and that would mean that we need to do another specially called meeting we have 60 days to fill the seat and so if we wait till March 23rd we're cutting it really close on the actual full amount of time that's 60 days so this would be a new meeting on March 16th who would come we would vote on the applicant and that would be the end of the meeting so that's the proposed new date.

That'll be the only agenda item 5 30. So I'm looking at everyone that looks sounds good all right you shut on the more than March 16th oh that wouldn't work for you yeah is there another day that week Miss validaris. Okay yeah so let's do the 16th I'll we'll make sure you are there whether virtually or in person we'll make sure we'll get there all right I'm sorry are you expecting me to be at any of these meetings Mr Malone should I don't I don't think so but what do you different boards do it different ways I mean I'm if you don't feel what you need me that's perfectly fine I'm just wanting to know your account I just do I need to add it to my calendar or not that's all I think we should definitely be okay in the interviews I think the vote should be okay too that'll be our only agenda item okay perfect thank you all right so I'll work with Nicole to edit this.

Input make sure these times on our calendar and we'll notice these meetings and excuse me yeah are we voting March 16th yes so we need to set up a system if she's going to be on Zoom we yes okay we'll do that and we in the past it was all on Zoom so we can do that.

Mr Malone can you be there on March the 16th when we vote. I'm sure hold on yeah you or someone from Barrington Smith for the vote is this going to be in the evening is that what you said yes yes I'm available thank you so much all right and can I just go over one thing so for the process we're not going to ask candidates questions they're going to present to us and then we're taking what they give us and that's it okay 15 minutes a piece so they'll have about 10 minutes for their speech and then we'll have an opportunity for them two minutes to address a topic that they choose another two minutes for us to give a topic okay if I'm allocating 15 minutes move to the next person all right sounds great thanks and I will say when people submit their information you will have contact information so there'll be email addresses and phone numbers if there was something you want to follow up with a.

Candidate on and have more of a dialogue that's possible I think we don't want to do too much dialogue back and forth in the in the board meeting space all right all right thank you all so we'll work on these edits we'll get everything posted and we look forward to welcoming a new member to our board I'm sorry what time on the 16th 5 30 5 30 signs all right the next item on our agenda is the capital project Amendment I think I'm gonna pass this to Mr larsor is that correct yes thank you chair Olmstead tonight we bring to you though late the capital projects that we want to add funding to to be able to get some completion to some of these projects and get them rolling this is the kickoff I would say of your 2022 Geo bonds that was passed by the by the community in the fall so we're at a point now where they're going to allow us to start spending some of this.

And this is the project breakdown we're showing you the increases in the projects for the purpose of getting two schools built and then other projects along the way we met with the county on Monday they gave us some information and had us revise what we were sending to them previously so this is a scaled down version we'll come back to you more with more information I can bring up Mr Davis if you'd like to go over the projects a little bit otherwise we ask that you do this so we can get it to the county for their 27th board meeting.

Ares thank you so much Mr sewer what you were mentioning is like the kickoff from that General Bond right that means that we haven't spent any money from that bond yet or when you say kickoff I just yeah that's correct they the county had to have time to plan on how they were going to develop the overall plan because it's not just Durham public schools and now they're ready to be able to allow us to utilize the funding to move our projects forward many of the other projects were utilizing previous Geo Bond dollars or lobs dollars so this is adding those dollars in to get the projects going big time.

So I'm so appreciative of this voters in the community supporting this work and getting these projects started they voted overwhelmingly in November I just want to clarify at least from my understanding this line that says DSA new school that is not the entirety of the project budget and I don't want anyone to think that it is gone are the days when we could get a school from an entire school for those prices and we've talked in other meetings and and folks have heard us cost of construction in North Carolina and across the country has escalated and is out of our control but we look forward to working with the county and in Partnership quickly and thoughtfully move forward on all of these projects and we have another eight elementary schools and other projects coming just behind as well as renovating some of our existing campuses so I look forward to ul's leadership pushing us forward with this important work and thank you for that any other comments or questions some board members.

This is for Action tonight mrsor did want to add we have this up on the screen so the folks in the public can see it and you all presented this a little bit to us but just illuminate these numbers around the increases in the budget and while we have one of the largest bonds of work so thankful and appreciative to our community the cost of construction is is quickly eating at that so if you could just illuminate some of where we see the increases are and what that revised budget number looks like sure and so just to be clear the current budget represents limited obligation bonds those are funds that we use to begin these projects through design the amount that says increase in budget that is money that we're using from the 2022 Bond referendum okay so it's not the entire budget for then for the project this is just saying that once we add for instance for Murray massenburg 72 million to the 10 million that we already received in different.

Type of funding then it's total revised budget will be 83 million dollars we would do something similar with Durham School of the Arts as we go through the design process with Glenn Elementary School the reason why it's going to have its entire budget of 59 million is because we're done with that design process as a matter of fact we're going to bid it in April okay the rest of the projects are a little bit staggered and where they are with design as because they're in priority order so as they complete their design process we will go back to the county and ask for whatever budget we need for construction and then you'll see their total project budget will be in the revised column thank you Dr Monk helping illuminate kind of what these numbers mean I think that's really important any other comments or questions from board members.

Right this is for action move approval of the capital project Amendment it's been moved it's Roger's second Obama Inspire any other discussion all those in favor please say aye aye any opposed please use the same sign it passes unanimously will this be added to the packet online for public consumption yes this will be added to the packet online I think it it might not already be up there but we'll add it to the packet online the next item on our agenda is academic Services DPS it update I'm gonna pass it over to Dr Hardy thank you so much chair Umstead Dr rabinga board members so I know we have folks out in the hall and I know the presentation is coming.

I want to go ahead and get started I know they're working on pulling that presentation up so that we can keep our meeting going. Perfect this evening we are going to provide an infer an update regarding our information and technology department tonight this is before you for action regarding funding for our staff devices and the amount of over 4.5 million dollars for Esser Federal funding and for administrative staff in the amount over 1.7 million dollars that will come from our state and local funding we will have time at the end of our presentation for questions next slide please tonight we will intentionally talk about a few items we want to make sure that we provide an overview of our department the support metrics known as our key performance indicators our infrastructure update project plans and we will make sure that we provide an update regarding next steps so you can anticipate what's on the horizon I would also like to take this time to acknowledge Miss Giovanni chief of staff.

And Dr Julius monk Deputy superintendent for operations for their leadership and support in our District's technology Journey over the past several years at this time I will turn the presentation over to Ms Joy Malone executive director of Information Technology Dr Hardy first I would like to welcome members of our. Okay okay thanks Dr Hardy first I would like to welcome members of our DPS it team who have come to participate in our presentation this evening can you please welcome our DPS it team members.

Thank you.

Awesome this this is actually over half of our team I often tell our team members of I come to board meetings every other Thursday night many of them have never actually attended a board meeting or have watched a board meeting so they are Live In Living Color tonight so thanks so much team. So DPS Information Technology we are the team behind the creation the integration and support of all staff students and system accounts that is nearly 40 000 active accounts we are also the team behind procuring inventorying supporting and decommissioning all it Hardware when it reaches its end of life that includes but is not limited to laptops desktops bright links and voice over IP office phones that is nearly 83 000 devices our team Vision if we can go to the next slide it spells out DPS it D is for dependable P is for partnership s is for service I is for Innovation and lastly T is for transformative next slide please alignment to the DPS strategic plan is.

Critical and our team's understanding of how we fit and why we matter to DPS our work is directly tied to Priority One increase academic achievement goal 1D is our current Target to ensure by 2023 all one hundred percent of our teachers leaders and staff will use technology as a tool for accelerating and personalizing student learning we have two strategies in which we focus on number three to implement a process to standardize technology devices for every certified staff member and strategic and strategy five to ensure that our technology and infrastructure are supported for sufficient network capacity as a reminder from the priority One board update in 2021 2022 we exceeded our Benchmark goal of 80 percent on the gold D1 survey the survey for 2022 2023 will be conducted soon next slide please so now we'll take a look at some of our team's key performance indicators so in 2019 DPS purchased a tool called Fresh service fresh service is a cloud-based I.T service management solution that enables organizations in the public and private.

Sector to simplify their I.T operations when a customer and we consider our customers as DPS staff members students parents and Guardians if they have an I.T request or issue they can submit a ticket via fresh service to our team in one of three ways they can email it support at dpsnc.net they can access Us online at our portal at itsupport.dpsnc.net or they can call our DPS it Support Center on this slide you can view by school year the total number of it support tickets are DPS it support team has received Additionally you can see by school year the average First Response and average resolution time the average first response is the average duration between a customer requesting support and the first non-automated reply from a technician the average resolution time is the average time taken by a technician to solve an open issue or a request so during the previous two school years our team's average First Response and average resolution times are nothing to be proud of however I am excited to report that.

Currently for the 2022 2023 school year we have significantly reduced our average First Response and average resolution times and we are achieving our service level agreements to the district these results were made possible by the following and as I call your job titles I would like our technicians to please stand 11 I.T support assistants and be. Thinking you may be seated and these are Esther funded positions we have 10 tier one technician. We have five tier two technicians. And we have two team leads.

Next slide please when DPS purchases student and staff devices each device is procured with a warranty our current warranty on student devices is four years unlimited accidental damage protection our current warranty for staff devices is five-year accidental damage protection with one claim allowed per calendar year DPS it currently partners with cell tech a vendor based out of Hillsborough North Carolina to complete our warranty repairs on this table you can review the number of devices sale Tech has repaired for our district by school year next slide please cyber security we've seen and we've heard the headlines school districts across the country are being hit by hackers and some paying Ransom within our I.T Department we are continuously working to ensure we have the right programs the right processes and the right people to manage and mitigate cyber security risk for our entire District some of the items our team has accomplished is updating our district password standards implementing multi-factor authentication for all staff members and we have deployed Noble four which is a security.

Awareness tool combined with simultaneously sorry with sorry combined with simulated phishing attacks that was funded by the state next slide as we take a look at some of the information Noble 4 has been able to provide since its implementation in DPS so this table shows the fishing exercises performed within DPS using Noble form the exercise sends emails that can either be that sends emails and can either be an attachment to be open or a link to be clicked to calculate our District's fish prone percentage our work in this area will never be done because hackers are becoming more sophisticated in their attempts to prey on our students and our staff to interrupt our Educational Systems as we continue to educate our staff and students on how to be technologically Vigilant and responsible not only in DPS but also outside of DPS now I will turn it over to our director of it operations Mr Palmer jumbi and he will provide an update on network availability as well as infrastructure update.

Evening board members this slide highlights that this. To all DPS sites over the past 10 years we have upgraded our bandwidth capacity from 500 megabytes in 2014 to one gigabyte in 2019 and currently we're upgrading all sides 10 gigabytes of bandwidth capacity this is bandwidth is sufficient enough to accommodate all outbound and inbound traffic as a one-to-one district if your computer is slow definitely is not a bandwidth issue right now the table below shows our average Network availability across all sides for the last six months our goal is to always have hundred percent availability but power outages card fiber lines and other factors to hinder us from the Perfect Score next slide please this next slide highlights some of the technical technology infrastructure Works being carried out by the I.T Department before I go through this slide I would like to First recognize the operations team that helps support this infrastructure we have system administrators Raymond and ajish Cherian I don't think they're here I think we have a g-share in here.

We have Network Engineers Omar Perkins and Scott Williams and our Junior SQL Developer deep teacher required next slide please with approval from the board and administration we're able to refresh and upgrade our backup environment pending right now is the refresh and upgrade of the production environment this environment contains the district servers and Storage we're in the process of putting out an RFP and we should bring a recommendation for approval very soon again with approval from the board and administration to apply for e-rate funding we embarked on refreshing and upgrading our wireless network we have so far completed our pilot phase of installing 129 access points at Durham School of the Arts and with the performance feedback that we received we're going overboard we are currently embarking on installing 800 additional access points in 15 schools this should be completed next month we also with the application for e-rate funding for additional 100 1 341 access points to fully upgrade all remaining schools was part of the consent items that were approved earlier.

This evening 320 the 2023-24 applications also include an additional 380 switches we should make all the switches at all School sites current and upgraded we continue to collaborate with our colleagues in the maintenance and construction department and with that collaboration Lions Farm Technology infrastructure was procured and deployed successfully and in the painting projects we do have the Northern High School Murray massenburg Elementary Glen Elementary and Bethesda Elementary other completed projects include a new account provisioning at the provisioning tool which will further improve our staff and student onboarding processes we have also installed a logging tool which would further assist the team with troubleshooting and managing infrastructure in a much better way to be completed soon too is the upgrade of our font systems and that should be completely also next month thank you very much.

Thanks Paul now to discuss student and staff device refresh plans next slide please DPS officially became a one-to-one district in 2020. and all schools work to assign students a Chromebook as a tool to support the facilitation of instructions inside and outside the walls of a classroom in November of 2021 DPS it implemented its first Chromebook certification process this process includes reconciling our one-to-one plus Inventory management system and partnering with our schools their principals and Tech Champions to physically validate the number of Chromebooks they have at their site the number of Chromebooks assigned to students and confirm the count of any missing lost or stolen student devices in this table you will find the results of our most recent Chromebook certification that was conducted in November of 2022. the number of missing and lost and stolen devices is approximately 10 percent of our inventory and as we work with other districts we are seeing similar numbers in this area in addition to our Chromebook certification information we have included the number of chargers DPS has.

Purchased for students and staff that so far this school year and the estimated cost next slide please when we look at a student device we are less concerned about when the device goes out of warranty and we're most concerned about how many years can a device be used to provide Optimal Performance and allow students to complete instructional and curriculum needs currently our student Chromebooks are on a four-year refresh cycle this school year we have already upgraded 8058 Chromebooks and we remove those that no longer had Optimal Performance in this chart you see the number of Chromebooks slated to be refreshed over the next three school years our team is already working with our CFO Mr Paula sewer to manage the funding of these devices next slide please so now on to staff devices DPS it has implemented a four-phase approach to refreshing our student devices our staff devices over the next couple of slides we will briefly discuss the phases of refreshing our staff devices and then go into.

Details about what is before you for action currently we are in the procure phase and we are acquiring the new staff devices and this includes identifying the right device that would allow staff members to perform their job functions and completing the procurement process next is the deployment phase which includes assigning delivering and ensuring that every staff member receives their new District issue device and it has the applications and software needed for them to perform their job functions next slide please then there is the maintenance and support maintained and support phase this is the current phase for our existing staff devices the standard Dell devices DPS leased in 2018 are approaching the end of their five-year lease many of these devices have experienced battery failures and the device itself is worn the cost of maintaining the device outweighs the cost of replacing it the final phase of the refresh plan is to retire and dispose of obsolete equipment that no longer provides educational value to our district next slide please.

So the procure phase will conclude in the April May time frame of this year to reduce interruptions into we will start with the deployment phase and that will be in the summer completion around the August September time frame the recommendation is to decrease the maintain and support phase of this plan from five years to four years on average a personal computer can last a user for three to five years based on analysis from other school districts and our internal I.T support metrics four years is that place in the middle I call it that sweet spot of being able to manage the cost of maintaining the device and still making sure that it does not outweigh the cost of replacing it this refresh plan and timeline would mean all DPS staff members would receive a brand new device issued to them during the summer of 2023 and these devices will serve our district into the summer of 2027 when they would be retired and disposed for the refresh cycle to start again next slide please.

As the strategy States we must Implement a process to standardize these technology devices for every certified staff member on this slide we have identified the device manufacturer the model and the cost for the standard device for all instructional staff members instructional staff members include but are not limited to teachers instructional assistance coaches and coordinators counselors and social workers as noted on the line item for ECF funding our department applied and was awarded one million 386 thousand dollars for emergency connectivity funding to procure these devices that is approximately four hundred dollars per device when you total that for the 3465 devices needed for our instructional staff members and working with our CFO Paula sewer and our senior executive director of federal programs and Community engagement Dr Dietrich Danner the district will use Esser and federal funds to cover the DPS remaining balance of 4 million 41 217.39.

Next slide please on this slide we have identified the device manufacturer the model and cost for the standard device for all admin staff members admin staff members include our superintendent and cabinet members principals assistant principals and directors and above again Esther and federal funds will be used to cover the DPS balance of these admin staff devices in the amount of 529 370.31 cents next slide please on this slide we have identified the device manufacturer the model and cost for the standard device for all support staff members support staff members include functional staff and departments such as Finance I.T and operations state and local funds will be used to cover the DPS balance of 1 million seven hundred twenty one thousand seventy two dollars and 85 cents next slide please so this is the final section of our presentation agenda we can go to the next slide and it is technology Equity sustainability and next steps as we close I just want to provide some updates and some more information about next steps.

In partnership with Safety and Security we identified a need that 550 phones were needed to ensure all lockdown spaces in our schools and admin offices had access to call the front office and 9-1-1 these phones have been ordered and we are awaiting their arrival so DPS it can work to configure each of them and ensure its connectivity to the desired location additionally we have been working with Safety and Security to implement an emergency call center and we will be conducting a drill soon interactive display and bright link refresh DPS began purchasing brightlink projectors for classrooms in 2018. upon my arrival in 2021 there was no refresh plan in place in April of 2022 DPS it hosted an interactive display showcase and we invited our schools our families and community members to join us in test driving some of the latest technology and interactive displays we have analyzed the feedback we have received and we're currently working to create a three-year and A Five-Year Plan to refresh the nearly 3 200 brightlink.

Projectors we have in the district student technology device care so earlier we provided you data related to the number of student and staff device repairs we've had our warranty only covers accidental damage this evening we would like to share with you some examples of damage that our warranty does not cover.

So first here we have a staff device this is a staff device that has been damaged all repairs come into our it warehouse and we work to be able to work with our repair vendor but however again it's very clear that this is not an accidental damage and they will not repair. The next device here is one that I personally got frames it was actually pulled out of the river by one of our high schools and was brought by my office.

We have some examples of Chromebooks for students I'll let Crystal quickly show those you will see primarily on these Chromebooks actually this one this was one that a police officer brought by my office you can bring it up here just a little closer so this is one where police officer found alongside the road you can kind of see how the corner of the device is damaged there where it was scraped alongside the road several other of our Chromebooks our most common damage is the LED display and so you can see on some of these where again it could be whether maybe a student has put something on the keyboard and close the Monitor and it cracked the screen or other things might have happened to it that damaged the screen.

And then lastly as we talk about Chargers so we had a a couple of chargers but here's an example of one where the casing was taken off the charger and again that's that's what happens to our chargers thank you Crystal so next I.T staff professional learning similar to the teaching profession our skills are as only as sharp as we continue to learn our DPS it leadership team we host weekly internal trainings for our staff technicians we have also began working with Miss Terry Phillips the director of classified professional development to facilitate professional learning for our entire team student I.T internships last year our team hosted nine DPS high school students who completed a six-week paid internship with our department they were making 15 an hour thanks to the North Carolina business committee for Education sponsored by our governor Roy Cooper this is our first semester partnering with Dr Julie pack and the CTE team to host in-semester it internships for a course credit and currently we have four students at Riverside.

Three students at Southern and one student at Jordan next our role of the tech champion the role of the tech Champion has changed in the 2019-2020 school year our Tech Champions were asked to maintain a focus of serving our teachers helping them to integrate technology in the classroom and in their lesson plans serve as the liaison for digital learning teams and also serve and co-lead the media technology advisory committee at their school in 2022 and 2023 we updated the responsibility of tech champions the accountabilities of tech Champions have changed and which now the tech Champion should direct all first-line technical support for schools to the DPS it Support Center they also must execute the Chromebook certification process that we discussed earlier and then they can provide feedback to our teams and then they are invited to participate in the monthly IT Tech Champion meetings which are hosted by our teams since 2016 the tech Champion compensation has been based on ADM a tech Champion that serves up to 350 students receives 75 dollars a month.

A tech Champion that serves up to 650 students receives a hundred dollars a month and a tech Champion that serves up to 651 plus students receives a hundred and twenty five dollars a month and lastly on the list is gaggle two weeks ago I stood before you presenting an update on gavel your follow-up actions were noted and we are already working to ensure you receive an update in May so this concludes our presentation we are truly thankful for your time and your interest in the work that our team does and now I'll turn it back over to Dr Hardy thank you Miss Malone Mr majombi and our I.T team behind us we appreciate your work at this time I'll turn it back over to cheers to Dr marbinga we're open for questions and board this is before you this evening for action all right thank you Miss Malone and the IT team thank you for staying here late tonight we appreciate everything that you're doing to keep us really moving the district forward but.

Before you start asking questions I just wanted to remind us that we're very fortunate to be able to add a lot of position I.T because of our Sr funds last year we were supposed to go to Board of County Commissioners to be able to fund half of those positions it did not happen and then this year we're not doing it because we didn't classify studies and that's going to impact everybody but we need to have a conversation with our County Commissioners moving forward next year that's we're going to need to sustain those positions I know at some points as we all know that as we get to the pandemic everybody went start using one to one but if you're looking at the move that's our state is taking pretty much all the assessments now they're online so which means whether or not you would like to continue with one to one with all those assessments we have to have those devices for our students in order to have those devices we gotta have those.

Technicians being sustained once we pass Sr funds so they're going to be a financial cliff moving forward once we're done with our Sr fund on September 2024 and I just wanted to bring this up as we're looking at the white lift that we have to replace in all our classrooms it may not happen in a year maybe two or three years that's all those are really financial responsibility that we have to take to County commissions the reason I wanted to make these comments yes we're losing about 10 of our devices I know other districts as well but other dishes they're putting some measures there to start holding our students accountable for those devices what happened here we have some students that have three devices they keep on losing them they are no safeguard when can we stop that yes we've been really lucky with under 50 million dollars that we're able to receive with Sr funds pass that we have ready to start really watching what we do with our devices so at some.

Point in the near future our I.T team or we've been talking about some recommendations we understand that all our students and staff they gotta have devices but we gotta start putting some safety gold to make sure that we're not losing as many devices as we've done in the past I think you've seen the example and paying about half million dollars just for the charges that's a lot of money I think if all of us can be really responsible I think we can start minimizing those costs that's pretty much my comment back to you chair Umstead thank you Dr mabinga for those comments and for the presentation from the team appreciate you all being here board member if you have any questions or comments Miss buyer first I want to start with thanking the it leadership and the IT team for being here and for your work on a daily basis it is you who are making these ticket requests go down and the and everything making everything run and taking the work.

Off of our teachers and our Tech Champions to some extent I guess I'm still hearing from them that they are still actually doing Abby gomen's work as well but I don't know why we rewarded You by making you come to a board meeting I thank you so much for spending this evening with us and I wanted to like cut it short so y'all can go home but I also want to I heard Dr mabinga's comments and I want you all to stay with us some of you haven't been with us a year yet some of you haven't been with us two years yet but you know that serving children and teachers is like one of the hardest things you can do but also I hope fulfilling to you all in some ways because you see how technology is used as a tool and we will go to the county and fight for your position so don't think that we're coming to a financial cliff where we won't fight for you and.

Actually we're evaluating positions and getting you up to Market rates because we we know that is so so critical so I just can't not look at you all and tell you thank you and and be appreciative of everything you're doing I I also miss our former board colleagues who are I.T people could who could ask you really techy questions because I don't have those what I do have is like a device that's 500 more for our downtown central office people what does that do that is above and beyond what the ones we're buying for everyone are like that's when I if I I see a 500 Gap there and I want to know kind of do we need that extra are they gaming I don't think so but you know what I mean like that's the that's the one of the first questions that comes to mind they they are not gaming we have worked with CTE to to help provide devices for their department but when he comes into.

Looking at the specification for an admin type device the magnitude of spreadsheets and things like that that they're using it pulls them the device memory to be utilized a lot of our instructional staff they are using you know web-based instructional type tools and so that's where that lower power device comes in so that's that's helpful I want us to have the best that we can afford and and stretch them four years seems reasonable to me I want to understand and I've had some questions from folks on docking stations and how you've surveyed people to actually know whether they want them need them would use them so that we don't buy things that aren't needed and I know sometimes when you tell teachers do you want a documentation or not and they've never had one well sure yes in schools you check yes because if you don't say yes when the it's presented to you you won't get it again new chair new right I mean so that's a big line item and I want to.

Hear from you all how you're thinking about it and and how we're not being wasteful in that planning yep so again the docking station is an optional type thing if the teacher identifies if they need it or not that also goes with like the monitor as well and so a lot of times when our teachers are in the classroom and especially some of our classrooms now where they're actually kind of doing doing dual monitoring they have to have that docking station to be able to do that so but you're saying you will have some way of surveying folks to see whether they want both of those that we will just not just blanketly ship them out to everyone oh no we we are not and so again as part of our I.T ticketing system if a staff member need they may not have a docking station today but if they def identify that they need a docking station to be able to better perform their work they submit a request.

To Our IT team and then we deliver a docking station to their school one thing that I would like to say is again docking stations are that type of equipment where it can get damaged or broken more easily so again being able to have some of those devices readily available in our warehouse so if a teacher or someone does request it and we can get them to them fairly quickly that kind of helps with their instruction and as things are breaking bright links are breaking do we have any budget or plan as those die because they are very very very old we bought them with the 9 million we had from the high school we weren't going to build a long time I mean they are very old what what is going on with those now because I there are some bright links components and those components are very difficult for us to procure we are actually working very closely with Mr lesour to make sure that we can not only identify.

Funding source but also think about what technology is expected and required in our classrooms for our teachers so so know that that is definitely something that we're working on as those requests come in so as teachers are having any challenges or difficulty with their brightlinks they do complete a help desk ticket and then we're working to make sure that they have what they need at this moment even though we know some of those items are difficult to procure but we will be making sure that we have a long-term refresh plan that was not something that was initially part of the bright links deployment system and just how employed in schools on emergencies on we're doing Wi-Fi spots this week and we're doing VoIP stuff I made something up you know like how how do school-based people see these folks helping them awesome great question and so our org chart is actually kind of divided into two teams our support and our operations team our support team are the technicians I.T.

Support assistants that are going out to support the schools and so how we determine how frequently a technician visits that school is number one based on their ADM then number two based on the number of tickets that we see coming in for that school and then we also kind of look at like device damage device repairs also if that school has a tech Champion or not if that school does not currently have a tech Champion we are sending a technician out to that school more often currently right now we have two high schools that they do not have a tech champion and we actually have a dedicated I.T team member I think we have ginnica here ginnica is dedicated at Southern and then we have Brittany here and Brittany is a dedicated I.T resource at Northern the why witness school have a tech Champion perhaps because we don't pay them enough supplemental would be what I would advocate for a higher stipend because what you told me sounded pitiful yep and so again that that.

Stipend is what we've had since the 2016 school year and so again principals they work with their staff to identify someone who can complete that kind of job description for a tech champion and again it has really been like a no pressure type role from an I.T Department standpoint because again if they tell us that hey they can't find anyone we work with our team leads to make sure we're getting out and supporting those schools I guess I would just advocate for us to think about in this budget cycle whether those amounts are valid in a in a one-to-one environment and then my final question at least because I know my colleagues have questions who do we think of district-wide as our lead digital curriculum people like I think of UL as the hardware more and who are like how do we think of the leadership there and where that so digital teaching and learning sits within our curriculum and instruction office so you have a director Ronald Weyland you also have your digital.

Teaching and learning Specialists that are part of our Esser budget and remember those positions were specifically designed to ensure that we are matching what you're hearing today and regarding the the hardware and the in the infrastructure so we know that to Mr majombie's point in Miss Malone's we need these devices to work you need to be able to connect but then you need to be able to use what you have access to to not only complete your work if you're a district leader but also work with your children if you're in the classroom and connected to kids so that is the the foundation of 1D it's really making sure that our staff have the devices they need to accelerate and personalize learning our students need to have that device so that they can connect so you think about not only the assessments almost all of our courses are on canvas so teachers are using that as they are monitoring student instruction that also gives us an opportunity to extend beyond the walls.

Of school so we have students right now that are probably on reveal math completing assignments are on i-Ready or reading a digital book and so making sure that there is a device that can help them continue the learning beyond the walls of the classroom and so that sits in curriculum instruction Dr tagorean Mr Whalen Miss Malone and those teams they meet regularly to make sure that the decisions that we make match what we're trying to do for our children that we serve that was going to be my last thing and you all asked to bring us like their brilliant thinking on what we do with chat GPT and the instructional environment right where's are y'all going to bring some of that in the coming weeks months how we think about the use of some of those things so some of that will come with the renewal every year if you remember usually it's May sometimes it's early June we bring to you any renewals that we have for our academic contracts many.

Of those are a Technology based so you will see some of that then of course at any request as we work with Dr merbing our chair Umstead happy to bring you updates as needed to the board. Miss Rogers and Miss validara should be after that okay thank you all for being here really appreciative I can't tell you how many tickets I've put in over the last two weeks for my own devices at my own job so I really appreciate you but I do want to ask a few questions and the first question that I had when I reviewed the slides were about the Chargers and the Chromebooks specifically what's how do you define the difference between number of Chromebooks stolen and missing slash loss yes so for missing so I'll start with stolen before we consider a device stolen we actually have to have a police report so if there is no police report that is provided in our system it is automatically goes to missing and lost that's helpful thank you.

And I know we're talking about accountability to students in regards to these devices and educators it's been a forever kind of thing right with textbooks and the next thing and the next thing library books and it follows you for your whole career I can't get that diploma without it you know how do we ensure that Chargers are staying with Chromebooks at school and do we end up with a surplus of chargers at the end of the school year at schools for you know like in the lost and found or whatever no we we have we have since I've been here there has not been a surplus of chargers and a great number of those charges that were included in there were for students who did not turn in their charger at the end of last school year and we had to purchase those Chargers during the summer to make sure when we redeploy devices back out that every child got a charger with their Chromebook perfect thank you and then my question was about this.

Slide and I guess in the refresh plan do we have any data in regards to what level of students are damaging slash losing devices more often so Elementary versus middle versus high yes and so in partnering with the vendor sale Tech we actually have monthly meetings with them and they provide us the reporting that tells us that else that led screens are the most frequently to be damaged and then it also breaks down where we can see by what school those damages are being reported from and we see that sure I mean I mean like maybe annual or something like that I don't know I'm just thinking all this through it's like real quick and a whole lot of money the docking stations that are currently in use have we done a survey that talks about how they're being used or how many are actually being being used so we know that we need to refresh those so we have not done like an official survey.

Okay can we can we talk about how we if we do that in the future before we so one of the things it is before you tonight for Action we and I know that you are looking I think my slides have different numbers not necessary so on that side it I think we're talking about the 30 the 3465 docking stations that we're requesting at a cost of 177 dollars you know we can work if we do need to adjust the motion from Rod we do want to make sure that we have access to ensure that we have the tools that are needed and one of the things that we can make sure that we're doing is not only monitoring the use of those and the requests but to make sure that they are being used very similar to the loaner devices that we have at schools to ensure we don't want there to be an interruption in Access and productivity so if a teacher's docking station is not working and they have children that are.

Getting ready to be there we don't want to then need to put in an order that would impact instruction the same as when a child's device is not working and they need to be able to access already we have loaner devices at the school so that young person can continue with their instruction so know that those are primary we want to make sure that we're solution oriented and we're not delaying so that is why that request is there before you tonight and we would appreciate your support I am not suggesting we delay I am suggesting that we spend the extra funding this way and agreeing with that request but I'm suggesting that it it will come to an end the extra funding and we'll have to find funding for that and we want to make sure that we're using our local and state funds in the best ways possible and therefore we need to know in the future before we have to order more that's it for me thank you.

Thank you so much for this presentation I have some comments you know looking at the presentation yeah you provided what I would call just the framework of how you're thinking about devices in terms of a life the life cycle so I'm going to keep saying I'm gonna it's not redundant because we've got going like the life cycle the life cycle right so starting with procurement you know and then you're talking about how you're Distributing that piece of this distribution I know it was a challenge during the covet pandemic I remember and I just I just have a lot of gratitude because when folks are waiting for their devices they're you know there's there's a level of you know Rapport and just you know folks want their devices right and I have just watched this department navigate all the complexity of the pandemic how to distribute devices you know how to approach challenges and just overcome challenges I.T the work that all of you are doing I really want.

To give you all a hand is that okay I really you deserve a hand. We're talking about a community that faces a digital divide a community that you know in many in many homes the parents don't operate computers and in some homes they do but the reality is that I have heard of even requests your department gets interesting requests too like can the parents use the device of the child you know this is the this is the kind of environment we work in where we're currently and every single day having to Grapple with the systemic inequalities the inequities that our families face and how that comes to us as a system and you know how we have those conversations about well we can we need the student to have access to the device you know we need we need to make sure that the charger you know and and and the devices is together there's so many considerations and there's so much complex complexity with this and I have just you know watched this department.

Just you know and have and I'm also seen the presentation the level of transparency about your key performance indicators you talked about you know the the tickets and you don't you didn't you know maybe we would have asked or who knows but you know just the fact that you decided to include those years prior and just saying this is where we're working from you know it is just a testament to number one this department as any I.T Department grappling with really complex things but at the same time having you know just no shame in the game no shame and I tell everybody there's no shame in the game because this level of transparency is what people come to appreciate and they're like when you see the number of tickets on there they thought they thought maybe they're only 10 tickets how many you know we're talking about orders of magnitude beyond beyond that so just a whole level of gratitude for all the tickets the other thing I wanted to talk about.

Is the phones you know and seeing that update on there and I know that I have I have sent you know just just the questions it's kind of the same thing where folks want it yesterday or tomorrow or like they want it and yet you know that process just the ability of also like hearing these concerns that Community brings when it comes to they'd like to have not just the phone next door they want it in where they are in every single place where there's a need for it and sometimes you know we have to meet the demand with a lot of factors including procurement which is the life cycle that we go back to the first step right procuring a phone what does it take you know getting the quote or you know well there's a couple of steps before that but then you know getting the PO the purchase order and there's all levels of how that operates in the system and so I am just applauding you all for.

All of these updates including all this that you know there's so many different pieces to it and if you care to share anything because I know you this is already in in the works in terms of the phones so I just want to provide also any any comments you all want to do I have just one last thing after after that Miss Malone do you want to share the timeline that we are looking at in terms of our phones yep so the purchase order has been issued the thanks to crystalline working with the team to get that done I think the ETA was about a month and a half and so we're waiting for that time again you know we're still dealing with supply chain and things like that but we did find a vendor that did have the phones we're already before now the phones arrive working on our deployment plan so we have the information from Safety and Security to say how many schools or what schools needed how many phones.

Being able to work with those schools to identify where those phones need to go to make sure that when we do receive them we can start the deployment process that is so wonderful and you know thank you so much because I know that you know when we convey these these these questions or the concerns and the timeline sometimes is not as clear but this this timeline is for the community to know that this is definitely something that is you know creating safety add added layers of safety because if we continue to add layer after layer after layer my last speaking of safety my goodness this is a big one so when I think about you know you go to the doctor and I just heard this today from somebody so I'm not going to take credit for this a doctor told the patient and said you know I I'm not going to quote it correctly but the idea is that you know I can I can make you feel good and tell you that I.

Think it's not a problem like what you what you're bringing to me I mean maybe it's not a problem but I'm a doctor and I've gone through and evidence is super important and the data is what's going to drive it and the reality is that I I don't want I not I'm not going to stop with just making you feel good or saying I think it's not a problem I actually think let's go ahead and get the diagnosis that is needed do that extra step because we need that data you know I can think it's okay but we need that data what are the the numbers that is most exciting about the work that you have done when it comes to cyber security that piece I mean we can make people you know feel good that you know we're not sending so many emails to their inbox and tripping them up and that that tripping piece is is also part of this because in order I I know it ties with.

Our insurance it ties with so much so much of the stability that we can have that these emails have to look like the real deal if people can tell they're a counterfeit from the get-go and don't even try it and our metrics show that they're not clicking we're not doing our job of actually making sure that every single click you know that we're actually trying our best to make it look real right kind of like money counterfeit money versus real it has to look like the real thing and so I am so grateful that you included you know the clicks and there's no shame in this game at all if you if one of our staff Falls for any of these things this is a it could be a real life scenario you know and so it's a learning experience I'm wondering about that step of like what what happens after I click on that I just want to hear like you know what happens I I made the mistake and I oh.

They told me they were going to give me I don't know and I'm like what is this who's sending this is going to give something anyways yeah so when we send a a communication out via Noble form no before if you open the attachment or click the link it gives you a prompt right then to say this was a fishing exercise and it kind of tells you like you know you failed and so again on our back end again we send out information to the district after all of this exercises has gone out to be able to State the number of Staff members who click the link or open the attachment and kind of what is our fishing prone percentage the thing is for the district we send out quarterly phishing alerts however for anyone who has admin access to our I.T systems they receive a phishing alert monthly and again that goes to they have that elevated access and again when we think about it just takes one click it just takes.

Someone sending back their phone number and then their phone number has been compromised and then they have Fishers who are then texting them personally we've seen it I just had to you know to finish the thought about the cyber security piece if I made the the reality is that there are and I've been delving into Tech and so I'm going to give lifecycle credit to those folks that are very smart from you know that are that are working on artificial intelligence I've you know I've just been checking and hearing and I've been it kind of rubs off on you so if I say life cycle again forgive me but it's kind of ingraining my head like framework you know but I will say that with the cyber security in many organizations what they're doing is they're putting it's not a penalty but it's a learning opportunity where they will have to have like an LMS kind of level here's why we don't want to click these are the kind of things.

And I'm not saying do that I don't I don't want people to think that I'm trying to implement a penalty per se because we don't we don't operate from penalties but what we want to make sure is that there's a way to you know kind of gauge whether folks are are having a learning experience in terms of like it looks so real and how can we prevent that so you're everybody's best friend right now because right now you know there's no you know LMS in having to prove that you clicked on it you have to do all these things but the thought of cyber security the ways that we have seen it with the other districts that have compromised data we have precious data Social Security numbers for you know students that are in vulnerable positions in terms of status mixed status families and right now there's so much that is happening so the data that we have is so so precious and we have not suffered a loss and that is a.

Testament of the work that every single so there is a reason why you're here tonight this is why you get another Applause for me I know that my board is probably gonna be like Alexander's being too much I'm serious like this is if we get hacked and we lose all our data you know it doesn't matter how many sorry so oh my gosh like I wish it didn't happen if it happens it is a loss and for a district that has precious I mean all our students are precious all our families are precious their information is precious and so I just wanted to you know just make sure that I really just conveyed how appreciative we are so thank you so much Miss Travis I just want to say my thanks as well for this thorough presentation I think you all are unsung heroes you keep everything moving so I appreciate all that you do every day I wanted to say it was really exciting to hear about the student I.T internships I think.

That's awesome how you're integrating you know all that you're doing with our students learning and being able to be more prepared for correctly going into the industry themselves so that's awesome I only have a couple of comments about the future presentation that you alluded to and I wanted to say I'll be interested to hear how our district compares to other districts in terms of the missing and the stolen devices and what accountability measures other districts are putting into place without being overly punitive but holding our students accountable and and then thirdly just I'll be interested to learn a little bit more when we have that presentation about how our students are learning to take care of their devices the sort of digital literacy that they're gaining around that and being accountable for digital safety and that kind of thing so weird there's an echo all right I think I would like to know who's responsible for that literacy at each school or each site whatever no apologies needed that's all thank you so much really.

Appreciate it more thanks an appreciation for you and your team I won't I'll try to keep it brief I too really like hearing about the student internships and not only the some paid opportunities but during the school year I think the more we can have students helping support all the different systems within DPS the more stories we can also have about come back and work for our school system I know we've got some DPS grads who are also working in it like how can we get more folks and students in that system I think like how can we expand that and how can your department also support other departments in doing some similar work I think it's a way again of building capacity without adding additional positions all the time I too am concerned financially about us keeping up with the one to one I wonder if we need to also consider do we need to be one-to-one for everyone are we one-to-one for third grade and.

Not are we one I don't I don't know just proposing things but considering what's the right way to go about it because I am worried about the financial commitment and want to want us to consider it was the right rotation and I think too along with what other folks said teaching students how to use devices I think it's almost taken for granted now that of course you know how to use a computer and you know how to use a phone like yeah of course but I think our students could use some skills and how to use how to have a device use it responsibly I think as we think about Gaggle 2 and in privacy the the knowledge of students this device is a DPS device and whatever you do here could be monitored like some of that really explicit instruction around digital literacy I think is important and that probably Taps into some other departments too but and then taking care of your device as well all right that's what part the second.

Part is and I'm sure you all consider this as you think about future refresh with bright links like is that the right projector system that we want to use I know some schools are using TVs at this point like I've seen a lot of TVs in places instead of bright link projectors I'm sure y'all are thinking about that but a question that I would also consider and last but not least and then feel free to respond to any of that I'm also worried about tech champions in their roles and I wonder if I know the conversation is based on idiom but should there also be more based on your ADM like you get more Tech Champions because you're in a high school with thousands of students versus just more money and is there ways as we build out the student internship program that some of those student interns are at the high school on a regular basis to help support some of that work because I think and I talked about this.

When we did this originally in 2020 going one to one is great but the support system and network to sustain one to one is a whole different ball game and we have to be prepared for what that looks like thank you so much jerem Sid I took a lot of notes I do one piece I do want to respond to know that the others will definitely make sure that we're noting all of the comments from other board members as well the interactive classroom displays and I probably didn't say that as we're thinking about right links there are multiple systems that we are considering we want to make sure that that classroom environment is conducive for the learning for all of our Learners and so we are really considering and working closely not only with it but other departments as well because we have Learners that learn in multiple different ways and we want to make sure that any of the interactivity that we're able to bring to a classroom is meeting.

The needs of our Learners so that is something that we're exploring also being cognizant of financial implications as well as sustainability which is a place where with bright links there was not a sustainability plan so as we're thinking about all of the components of Technology we're also trying to make sure that we're thinking about what sustainability looks like in those funding sources I would just say bright links are not the way of the future all right but again just to Echo with what you know with what Dr Hardy said again I'm very excited about the partnership with the students and CTE that we've started to work on it's very exciting when we have seniors to graduate we have one student that interned with us last summer he's at Penn State right now he wanted in cyber security he reached out to me about an internship and you know it's all about building connections with our students and so I work with him and he's currently pursuing an internship with another organization that can really.

Give him some really good cyber security experience and again you know I told them you can always swing by here and check on us but again those type opportunities to be on your resume in college are priceless absolutely and again I think our work so much this igniting Limitless potential right our vision is about exposing students to different types of opportunities and I really think letting them know this is something that you could do as a career sometimes it just requires certification sometimes a four-year degree all of which can make some good money I think it's really important so thank you to Miss Malone and the whole team thank y'all for hanging with us tonight I appreciate that and if you ever want to come back the door is always open you come back to another board meeting or you can stream Us online but thank y'all for being here yes all right y'all y'all ask such good questions that I thought of a couple other things and I'm sorry to hold y'all.

Any longer I didn't hear you talk about hot spots at all and I assume that we are still doing that but we still also don't have money for it particularly after this extra money runs out can you talk to that because I know the county was supposed to be working on it and I don't think they've made much progress yeah great question so again we are still assigning hot spots to students as needed along with kind of how the Chromebook certification process works monthly we are taking a inventory of our hot spots we're working with our vendor so again we have our asset manager we get that monthly report from at T we're reaching out to principals and Tech Champions if we see hot spots that have above normal usage I'm also on our hot spots we have filtering on them so again we're trying to make sure that our students aren't going to inappropriate sites and things like that on them but we are still feel.

In a good place with hot spots we have hot spots available in our warehouse so if students do need hot spots they can submit a request and we can provide them one thank you and Mr give us some idea of what the state actually provides for technology and yeah and people how about that since we yeah unfortunately not much they only give out 10 million dollars basically we get about 200 and some odd thousand dollars annually and then we get some additional deposits into our accounts for interest but it's very minimal compared to the needs I'll go back to there's 15 million dollars sitting on a table for for the purpose of fines and forfeitures that the state's holding 750 million dollars worth maybe 15 million dollars for us would put us in a good place to continue our I.T services for technology purposes as far as Staffing goes they will they don't provide US Dollars specifically for technology we use our what we call non-certified funding in our prc003 for those non-certified staff.

As part of the funding they see that as infrastructure cost and operation costs which they did not provide us a lot of money for for the purpose of these much needed positions I think that's some room for us to continue to Advocate at the state level because I'm sure that rural districts are very much struggling with with this and the the last thing I just wanted to comment upon about fishing and I understand why you all have to do that and I want us as you all continue I know y'all lead best practices in this state I want us to make sure we do it with kindness and not a gotcha feeling because I think it's also important not just how we communicate with folks behind the screen and through their email but like what are we doing to train folks if they got you know like what are we doing to have an in-person conversation or a proactive training and you talked about you're going to do some more of that like.

Nobody wants to do anything to jeopardize DPS it infrastructure but just the way that we do that I think can can go a long way in how we communicate that we care about our people and we're not trying to and you know trick them and I know cyber threats are one thing and it's kind of almost like the fire marshal and his things thinking about fire safety is the only thing like when we look at the lens of what we're asking people mostly to do it's teach children and these are tools that that they're using for that and some of them are better at Tech than others and some of them are not so I don't know I just I know you all will continue to to lead that with with kindness and Grace in your hearts for our people that are still learning a lot of this and weren't raised with it but thank y'all I have one more thing that's it I promise then I'll go home I have.

Heard constant around the beginning of the school year that folks don't have devices on day one and I know y'all have a plan for deployment I wonder if we can have some better just communication between your team and school so that if I'm a teacher and not playing for my kids to be on it canvas day one that like I don't plan that way knowing that the devices might not come on that day but I know that's caused some frustration at some schools around the beginning of the school year because they didn't have everything for every student on the first day thank you so much for that feedback sure I'm sorry is that a year-round concern also like do we need to as we expand year round be extra concerning about being ready in July like it's a whole thing isn't it it's almost like you have three different deployments right year-round schools specialty schools and normal schools which keeps y'all busy what was your career but yeah I think communication.

Will be helpful to make sure that people don't again plan for and their kids feel like they're behind because they didn't have their device on that Friday correct yeah and I would just add kind of like in that full transparency so this past summer you know we're having to sanitize devices we're also working to make sure we accommodate devices with Summer learning and so again we we had Lessons Learned and we'll definitely be applying those for this upcoming school year I think we need a motion yeah we do I'm sorry they want a modification y'all were talking was it about this or something else I'm sorry I was that's right I was just confirming that the these purchases were already bid in accordance with whatever statutes would govern such a purchase and Mr Le Stewart has assured me that that whatever bidding was required that occur so that was my question sorry I didn't know you could hear us so so with that I would move approval of the Durham Public Schools Information Technology update.

Plan second it's been moved by Miss Byers seconded by miss valladaris any other discussion all those in favor please say aye aye any opposed please use the same sign passes unanimously thank you all. Right thank you Miss Maloney all at dismiss hopefully you're gonna have some Donut for them tomorrow morning. All right thank you all again for being here we appreciate all your hard work well now the next time our dinner is.

A closed session I'll take a motion the move that we go into closed session for the reason stated on the agenda okay go ahead it's been moved by Ms value seconded by Miss Chavez any other discussion all those in favor say aye aye aye any opposed please use the same sign passes unanimously for now in closed session.

Foreign.

We are back in Open Session Dr mabinga Madam chair I'm here to seek your approval for the Personnel report as discussed at a closed session this approval of the Port dated February 20th attended second it's a move by Miss buyer seconded by Miss Chavez any other discussion all those in favor please say aye aye any opposed please use the same sign it passes unanimously unanimously we are adjourned.