DPSCD REGULAR BOARD MEETING

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Here’s today’s agenda!!
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https://go.boarddocs.com/mi/detroit/Board.nsf/files/DGMMUY5CFEEF/$file/DPSCD%20RBM%20Agenda%205.13.25.pdf

Waiting for the meeting to start now!
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I wonder why they only stream to YouTube and not zoom?

Been about 20 minutes! Still nothing, the screen says that the special board meeting is in a closed session- so mayhaps they’re just taking their sweet time.
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I’ll keep refreshing the page to see if anything changes!

Alrighty! Finally they’re here with an apology for the late arrivals! Let’s get this party started !

This meeting is called to order at 6:10pm!

Aww the color guard is giving a performance after the moment of silence!
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This was always scheduled in the DPSCD meetings I previously covered but this is my first time seeing them!

Item number 10.03 is moved to after their closed session (otherwise, to be part of item 15.)

On to the chair remarks, Madam chair now speaking on a some social media scandal concerning a Principle Perry
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She apologizes on behalf of the board, and says that there is no illegal activity on his part.

She was probably referring to this here:
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https://www.wxyz.com/news/region/detroit/office-of-inspector-general-report-alleges-financial-mismanagement-at-detroits-king-high-school

On to the Student Report in which DPSCD student Naomi Babatunde shares that over 300 students attended an event featuring many skill building workshops, and peer learning/leading exercises.

Student Mi’Kah West talks about the transformative experience of having encouraging teachers who go the extra mile to show that they believe in and support you!
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Absolutely beautiful speaking on her behalf!

Four aforementioned teachers are now welcomed to the stage, each handed a card and bouquet of flowers.
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This is the sort of heartwarming thing I love to see happening in the community!!

Lovely little rounds of applause after taking pictures, and before everyone returns to their seats - they announce that Miss Mi’Kah is going to Howard!!! Giving her and her co-student member some bouquets of their own!
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You go girls!! 🙂‍↕️🙂‍↕️💕

A round of applause and award for Rev. John Phelps, as well as Matthew Bracey.

More accolades and an award for an OUTSTANDING culinary student at central high school, Edmyer Malone!
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Two more astounding young pioneers, Ciana Carter and Jaya George take to the stage as well!

Let’s Read volunteers are all receiving plaques themselves! You can read about that program here!
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wwhttps://www.detroitk12.org/letsread

I might be interested in volunteering for this myself, caring very strongly about children’s literacy rates and all.

These slide show presentations are so small, but in recognizing the top 5 schools with the highest percentage of students meeting at least one year of growth within the bottom 30% of students.

Nichols Elementary
Flics
Bates Academy
Neinas
And Trailblazers

This part is moving too quickly for me, but as always I’ll be sure to include what I missed at the end of the thread.

There’s a round of applause for all the schools and principals celebrating the growth of their students!
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It’s now time for the finance report!

Having technical difficulties! Resetting my device for a moment!

Here are the slides from the financial report, it was very short sweet and to the point! Pretty much exactly what’s shown here!

Dr.Vitti’s report consists a lot of talking about how the percentage of chronically absent students has gone down by 7% from last year- as well as talking about growing success in English testing results.
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He seems to be expecting very good PSAT/SAT results for English this year!

He reports an increase in the percentage rate of students eating breakfast and lunch at school, saying that the number seems lower than last year because the system used to monitor it changed from counting trays to tracking student ID’s.

He completes his presentation, and a question is raised about chronic absenteeism asking about the window for truancy, and how that’s calculated.

It’s clarified that the 59% truancy rate is cumulative from the beginning of the school year in the fall.
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She then asks about the number of students (or sample size) that were given a survey discerning if they felt loved, challenged and prepared.

Vitti says that there is absolutely a correlation between the two, and that the percentage is well over 90.

Another question is lobbied about if there are any advancements in attempting to cater to the homeless population of students.
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Mentioning that letting the media stir them about resources and then going back to normal is unacceptable in terms of caring for these children.

The response being: No advancements have been made.

Board member Peterson-Mayberry brings up scheduling troubles with high school students, concerned about access to college & career readying courses.
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She asks how we’re going to accommodate students who don’t end up in these programs.

Vitti says that the highschools are now incentivized to send students out for dual enrollment and career readying courses with full transportation.
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He also says that their partnership with Wayne county community college just isn’t expansive enough to cover everyone.

Though he has hope that the plan to revamp high-schools will improve this issue.

Now this is interesting, he talks about student fraud- students getting their money stolen from their perfect attendance cards!
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Of course these students are reimbursed, but in order to prevent the fraud going forward- some changes will have to be made.

In asking how has this program affected the chronic absenteeism, Dr.Vitti says that when the incentive is removed the rate of chronic absence spikes up about 9%!
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That’s kind of hilarious to me. He also says that he sees a great affect in students that were ALMOST chronically absent.

Also saying that students who were extremely absent were not particularly swayed by the incentive, and in being asked about it- says that his hypothesis is that there are ‘deeper issues’ concerning students getting to school.
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Offhandedly mentioning poor public transport, suggesting a pilot for-

East English Village and Henry Ford High-school to fund yellow school busses- but that he doesn’t want to say anything too publicly yet because he needs to fact check the situation at hand.

Superintendent report is now over! It has been adopted.
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Item 10.01 is approved, as well as 10.02.

The entirety of 11 and 12 are moved, with a little bit of discussion surrounding 11.17!

*Moved as in Tie-barred

Public commenter speaks about Catherine C Blackwell, who spent decades of her life traveling and bettering education for students, her collection was given partially to the DIA.
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They request that with the closure of the Blackwell institute- another school be renamed in her honor.

Next commenter talks about the need to raise awareness about skill trades, and that she’s disappointed to know that there will not be a Career Technical center on the East side of Detroit.
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“It hinders our growth as a District.”

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Saying that without proper Detroit transportation, students are at a disadvantage and loss trying to go to the west side to get into trade apprenticeships.
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What a powerful speaker!

This next commenter says that our educators and child care workers should be properly educated and trained on how to behave before they step foot near the students.

She has a sincere concern about the lack of training, and the unfair disciplinary actions taken against undereducated support staff.

An older woman speaker voices her fear about Trump Destroying the public school system, stating that the board is at this meeting pretending like nothing is happening.
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“We’re going crazy out here, it is something happening.”

She continues to speak after her microphone is silenced, and I believe the entire room echoes her sentiment because after she leaves there’s decent applause.

This next woman speaks very strongly about ESE (Exceptional Student Education) professionals getting in trouble for being sent to do jobs they’re not supposed to be doing- because other people aren’t doing theirs!
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More about ESE here
www.https://www.detroitk12.org/Page/7160

Another commenter says that we have a lot of physically impaired students, and that he would like to see an independent agency come and inspect the building- feeling that it’s unsafe currently.

Another ESE paraprofessional talking about how multiple people working don’t understand the special needs of students- and asks that the district stop hiring people without training them!
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Asking for a bare minimum of two weeks training for new hires!
wwhttps://www.detroitk12.org/Page/16616

One more Paraprofessional comes to the microphone to say that she was hurt doing her job and not compensated for it.
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“There’s no I in team but there seems to be a lot of M.E’s in it.”
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Asking to be considered as a worker with the district for over 30 years.

Another commenter laments the defunding of the department of education, and the way our community is handing this presidency’s threat on the future of our youths.
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“We need real action, not performative outrage.”

A fourth grade teacher comes up to address the lack of libraries in DPSCD schools, and how is the board getting information on this issue- because she feels that Dr.Vitti has made a wildly untrue statement about how all DPSCD schools have libraries.
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She also asks about how schools are spending federal money allocated towards accommodating parent input in schools with no PTA or school advisory councils!
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Stepping off the microphone in style with a peace sign!

Yet another speaker on Catherine Blackwell, and the importance of history as a learning tool and how amazing and worthy of accolade it is that her works made it into two wonderful museums.
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She also says that her name deserves to be engraved forever on a school.

This next speaker has a translator, who asks not to be cut off at three minutes due to the time it takes to speak and translate.

She goes on to talk about how her 10 year old child is being accused of wanting to hurt someone really badly- despite going to multiple therapists and doctors to prove his behavior is acceptable.
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She wants to know who these social workers are making decisions on children’s mental health.

With the three letters she’s already presented, her son has still not been allowed to attend school. It’s been since April 14th, and the school is insisting he do therapy with them- but she as the mother feels much more comfortable sending him to a private therapist.

Her son has told her that he is scared of the therapist at his school, and that this situation has affected her entire family and her son’s mental health.
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She’s pleading for a deeper investigation because she wants her son to be able to continue schooling.

She was present at one of these meetings with the therapist and her son, and she feels like the therapist is asking her son leading questions.
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They were then cut off after receiving about 6 minutes of time.
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Hopefully the board can do something for her.

Another mother comes up with the translator, saying that last year in September her child had been a victim of physical assault in the cafeteria- with video footage of the entire incident.
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Two of the assailants did not go back to school, one was charged, and one is still in the school.

She’s made the police report and she still doesn’t have any news to this day.
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She doesn’t understand why only one girl was charged, and what happened to the other two and the one that’s still in school.
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Which has been making her daughter suicidal, the mother seems to be on the verge of tears

She doesn’t have insurance to seek treatment elsewhere, and her daughter doesn’t feel helped by the therapist at school.
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Pleading that her case be resolved, and that the student code of conduct needs to change because she would have never been assaulted if it was caught while they were threats.

An Academy of the Americas student who is too afraid to show his face (spoken for on behalf of the translator) says that he is repeatedly assaulted.
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Even going so far as to have a black eye right now. And that he is not being protected.

The translator seems very moved by this, as she recounts multiple instances of parents being too afraid to come before the board and address the bullying of their students.

I would just like to say that these families and this woman are very brave for speaking up about the injustice they’ve been facing.
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The applause they gave her was extremely deserved.

There is a virtual public comment, and then the public comment is concluded.
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Dr.Vitti is now addressing some questions.

He says that Career Tech programs used to be embedded in the schools instead of in a separate facility, and that he’s still trying to do that with trade/skill learning classes.
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But that long term he is not closed to having/building vocational sites on the east side.

“We’re just as confused as you are.”
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Vitti says concerning the federal budget changes, although he assures that congress will not be changing much about next year’s budget, as it was decided upon two years ago.

He says they’ll talk about more in the Finance committee meeting tomorrow.

“I want to be clear, we do train ESE Paras.”
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He says that the training is not exactly uniform, and that they also cannot be pulled out of class to train- but most of the trainings happen after school. Unfortunately a lot of the ESE paras aren’t in a situation to stay after school.

Vitti puts an emphasis on protecting children from abuse, saying that the challenges are multifaceted and that it’s not just newly trained paraprofessionals.

In terms of the abused children, for one unspoken parent he says it will be handled privately for the comfort of the family- for another student who was afraid to come up and speak, he says that the students that jumped him are pending expulsion.

He says that the virtual option of schooling is more accessible to people who are bullied. Which, I’m not a fan of but alright.

One question for Vitti by Peterson-Mayberry is about the concern about the rising number of suicidal or self harming students.
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Expressing a desire to problem solve instead of stopping the mental health hotline, because the students who need help are getting younger and younger.

Miss Gay-Dangnogo speaks out about the mother who doesn’t have insurance to take her daughter to better therapy- saying that they need to absolutely get some resources to her to the best of their ability.

She also mentions that a number of our Labor programs are trying to be more available, and asks how to get more CTE programs in east side schools.

CTE stands for Career Technical by the way! It’s been brought up a lot this meeting and I don’t think I clarified so here’s this!
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www.dehttps://www.detroitk12.org/Page/16970

Miss Gay-Dagnogo talks about the poor marketing for these programs, and how there needs to be an internal shift in order to provide access to students who would be otherwise interested in the program if they only had it.

The board is now moving into closed session.

Goodness. I didn’t hear anyone adjourn but this closed session is so long I’m almost assuming the meeting is over and no one told me.

It’s been an hour… perhaps it’s time for me to call it quits…

Oh my god! They’re back!

They’re returning now to items 15.01-15.03 on the agenda as well as 10.03
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Vitti modifies his recommendation for 15.03 from a 30 day suspension without pay to a 14 day suspension without pay.

15.02 has an item that was amended that cannot be shared publicly, but nothing else is changed and the motion is carried.
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15.01 goes through without a hitch .

This meeting is adjourned at 10:09pm!

Here are the slides of what I missed earlier about the school’s performances

If you believe anything in the coverage today is inaccurate, please email us at documenters@outliermedia.org with “Correction Request” in the subject line!! Look over at https://documenters.org ❣️