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don't i don't know what to say but it's fine it's thank you all right so we're about to go live uh good afternoon board members uh there's a loan district staff here president and extended uic family time is now total 2 p.m on this the 26th day of january 2021 and i call this emergency meeting of the united independence school district board of justice to order by council board members president and online uh recite your full name for the record oliveros [Music] and let the records show that requirement board members is impressive that this feeling has been doing callers as long as this meeting has been pulled in accordance with the texas open meetings act agenda item 2 or pledge allegiance under god indivisible with honor i please listen to this members of the board in the audience uh really on behalf of war trustees and united uh family staff uh condolences to mr juanita molina and also to all the other employees parents uh community members that have passed uh our condolences on behalf of the united family i i would like to present this in public before you all go into executive sessions good afternoon members of the board members of the audience and uh members of the public out in the our community wanted to share this information as to uh the emergency media [Music] with regards to um a closure right or a change of shift uh to a remote learning environment for our students and so what we know now is we the radio community leads the country the number of other public cases on a per capita basis and that was um shared with us on friday of last week the last two weeks and her unfortunate related uh positive cases as for our local health authority our professor at the hospital is critical uh the governor has prioritized resources to our community he did send out uh that also on the over the weekend medical staff equipment medicine ppe medicine supplies and vaccines we do know that some campuses have had difficulty securing staff to teach or monitor our students and so in some cases we've had to pull in substitute teachers to cover those particular classrooms because when you have a teacher who has been positive and then the teacher either exposed so it has been difficult to to safely monitor those particular students in those classes today we have 2 622 students who are receiving on-campus instruction and you see the breakdown there elementary we have uh 2100 students middle school 323 and high schools 122 students and to date we have had 11 employees who have passed away during cove at 19 and 5 employees who have lost a spouse or immediate family member to covet 19. with regards to the student intake next slide please these are positive exposures or exposure to positive individuals since august 24th since we started our first day of school we have had 8696 intakes but what i want to see is our last bullet in the 15 days since our return from our winter break which is january the 6th we have had 2342 student intakes which is an average of 156 intakes per day now these are students who may be at the campus who may be at home participating in remote instruction or individual students who are participating in extracurricular an intake is anybody when there is an exposure to a student who may be positive or a family member we do an intake so that we have that data this is the student side then on the employee side next slide please we have had 2 460 employee intakes and the 15 days since our return from winter break we have had 621 employee intakes again that means that there was some exposure or they were actually positive and they exposed somebody else mr chairman uh just want to report i'm president thank you mr castillo mr franklin president send any more vaccines to uh to laredo or to united uh we are the city we just had a meeting with them sir they are looking forward to additional shipments but we don't know when they would be arriving and how many specifically thank you as far as preparations and dialogue that we've had um since um since yesterday with regards to this agenda item we met virtually with texas education agency yesterday uh to explore options for having all students take part in remote or virtual learning from february 1st to february 15th we also met with our sister district the right of isd reps to ensure that the two largest school systems in our community are on the same page and options were discussed we discussed moving asynchronous date to monday february 15th and discuss that on-campus instruction would resume on tuesday february 16 21 2021 for those students whose parents want them to return that is a possible option for you all to consider which would give us a 10-day system next slide please but this is our current calendar advice our county right now we have uh 70 days left if we remove those two uh the ten week the ten day period in february from first through the d12 70 days of instructional days for our students right what about work day your purples are your holidays all right so when you start looking at uh january is where our last week so there's nothing there uh the last week of january when you look at february you see february 15th that is green day and a professional development day and then on march you would have our purple days that is a week designated for spring break april 1st is a is designated as a professional development and april 2nd is a holiday for our staff and our teachers and then our students would finish on the 27th 28 i'm sorry of may and our teachers uh would have a professional development slash work day on the 30th 31st those are required well they are actually required 187 days for their contract for teacher contract you see june 1st there as they designated um your work day where they were closed so the calendar reflects 187 days of employee teacher dates that's what it reflects currently so the option that we would propose and of course it's open for discussion next slide please the state requires that districts who do not comply with the requirements stipulators or correspondents only be entitled to claim half the operational minutes they would normally claim on each encryption date that they are out of compliance and so we need we can elaborate a little further on that basically what they're saying is that for the 10 days that we would be out and i shared with you a document with regards to the number of minutes that we would have right now and how many days that we would have to make up in order to receive the uh funding from the state level uh to make sure that our that we pay their bills and our employees get paid all right so the option that we were looking at uh for your consideration is to offer remote instruction february 1st to february 12th which is 10 days we would change february 15th which is a monday to the asynchronous day instead of it being on february 12th and then we change to professional development day of february 15 to an natural asynchronous day of instruction we would change the professional development day of april 1st to an actual instructional day so our students would not lose out and then we will continue working with pa to comply with the requirements so that we can maximize our state funding um and and meet the letter of the law with the minutes required by the state which is 75 000 and so then your calendar would look like this if you would um adopt those those changes you look at february the 12th was designated previously two weeks ago as an asynchronous day we would move that day to the 15th we would have remote instruction from the 1st to the 12th which is now your blue day so our students will go home our 2100 students will remain at home our teachers will teach from home and then february 15th would be the asynchronous day so our teachers can still uh remain at home that particular day and upload their lessons then our students will come back those who want to choose to come back and return to school on campus setting would return on february 16th there is no change in march april we do lose that professional development day and we would our our asynchronous days were already designated as the 23rd of april and may 23rd so that is basically the the only changes that we would have um with regards to the the proposal that that we would like i have a question mrs i can address the makeup days or the ta was required to go over your notes um based on the sheet that i provided for you and and i can share that in further detail during the executive session if you would like um they are required because we our calendar the way it currently says that if we only have um two extra days at the elementary level six extra days at the middle school level but if i go uh remote instruction for 10 days i owe eight days and they're saying you can get half of that so i owe four days at the elementary level and at the middle of the high school level two days but i have already taken care of my two days when i use the professional development days and i convert those into instructional days so in essence i only have to make up uh two additional days at the elementary level four minutes so that would be that wouldn't interfere this proposal that you're saying would not interfere with our graduation uh tuition starting college summer courses or anything else do you only affect your elementary school it affects everybody in the sense that the teachers would instead of having professional development days they would uh have to have instruction with those students on the 15th and the first february 15 and april 1st that's that's one change so our students would come back to school and have instructions they would not be off on that day and then work continue working with the agency on those additional meetings we're still going to finish the last day that we have on the calendar this allows our senior current seniors to be able to start college uh in june and the same thing for our freshmen sophomores and juniors that go to lc that you know post about 2000 students that take classes so we need to make sure that give these students the opportunity right and obviously it's helped us doing something to the parents so i think we can work work around all these schedules to be able to accommodate as best we can oh we're at it can we address the option of look like if it was a complete operation if we choose to go complete operation shutdown we the state basically says that we have to make up those dates this year so we would either leave spring break which is five days and it's a day per day right at that point if you're you're not offering anything else so i i have to make up 10 days in this calendar year or i can do spring break and add a week to june right uh actually till june 7th because i cannot have school on may 31st uh because it's a state holiday and um or have all the first two weeks of june which then would interfere with of course graduation and would interfere with the summer programs at laredo college and towney u because their calendars are already set so your proposal is to shut down the whole district for two weeks or uh just provide remote instruction for students from february first through february 12 as the option uh the instructional model for those 10 days so it's not a shutdown and then of course we would have a modified work schedule for our employees and that modified work schedule includes staff auxiliary staff support staff as well am i correct yes we would assure you know obviously the board has to approve a resolution that we have here to be able to accommodate all those employees and still continue to allow them to earn the 40 hours or whatever number of hours that they're employed and we're looking at possibly doing a shift meaning you know people will be on call but be able to reduce the number of employees at the campuses and the departments the whole purpose is to be able to bring down the numbers in all the areas where you have less employees you know be susceptible to gathering and obviously get this infection okay i just wanted to be sure on the terminology once again that we're using shutdown closure uh it might mean different things to different people that's why i want to be correct so i think we uh i think from my perspective i'm not talking for the rest of the board members i know ramiro and avisa joined them on this this discussion and i'm glad we're having it uh really probably one of the only if not the only isp quote except for radio isd that is experiencing recent numbers in our community our campuses in our district uh how does if we move it for february the first that's really not recognizing the emergency why don't we just shut it all down right now and everybody go home that's probably the only way that this pandemic is going to clear our communities everybody stay home the only reason is is you know we've got over 2 600 students on campus that we need to make sure we allow the parents the opportunity to make arrangements that's the only reason why we looked at and doing it the monday it was difficult for parents at work don't have child care and all of a sudden you know tomorrow you say your child is down home so we want to give returns an opportunity and i know it's three days and three days obviously are extremely important that it increases the affectionate allows parents this opportunity to say all right monday i've got to make arrangements with my child you know you've got you've got some self-contained special needs students and and just regular students you've got those pre-kinder tinder that's one reason to find this before we move into monday here's enough to get those parents and so i guess depending on what the board discusses and agrees to even a one-week complete shutdown could be a could be an option as well on the table we just have to look at making up those days you know i don't know i mean we had like eight deaths yesterday alone um our community is is you know apparently at the city council uh i may have heard that somebody indicated that almost half of our community could be infected as well uh there's no more ventilator they're opening up tents everywhere and just the remote instructions that we already have i think what 95 of our students are are pretty much already on people yes so the teachers sending 2 100 students home it's you know really not a huge amount it's just you would also send half of your teachers home and yeah and so within an essence of teachers working remotely with the teachers also who are already working remotely be working a little extra more days than yeah yeah yes yes you're correct yeah but the other is where we have we have close to about 4 000 employees they're also coming almost every day so this would allow us also to split and be able to send also those employees home and and work with spaceship i mean that's also part of the yeah cnn has as there are people there full time you've got to run over 220 bus drivers as an example you've got all these people like the campuses that we you know would do a shift that's again i'll go back i mean we'll we'll do whatever the board feels that we need to do to take care of our employees and our students if we if we go full remote for two weeks what would be uh a campus uh what employee will we have at a campus if any yeah basically what we would end up doing as an example we would do like two shifts where one shift works a whole week half of the staff the other half is home ready to do some remote or help then follow week with flip flop this allows us to bring down the numbers same thing about the drivers same thing with our custodians we referred to staff very printed just teachers or maybe no i don't know about all staff i'm talking about i think this was a question that mr uh castillo was asking right this is for all employees this could be your as an example your campus principles all the way through your custodians or half works one week you'll have the other employees come forward halfway is there a possibility we can do complete shutdown on the campus level and still offer remote instruction is that something that's feasible uh the only issue and i guess how would you talk to mr perry is on technology if there are some issues that something goes down i mean we obviously if we shut down we shut everybody out right but that's the only thing that we probably have to work out you know can you tell me really quick uh the meals program yeah the uh yes athletic program all right meals what we want to do and we talked to mrs ben amis and she's talking food services we want to do the same thing run it in shifts still be able to provide the drive grab and go at the sites on athletics american nations we continue i think the athletic trainers and the coaches have done a really good job in testing our students we test them almost weekly and we have and they've been able to work with the on their district gains as an example if they need to postpone a game and push it and another weight has worked out good right the tail end of the season and we'd like to continue you know allowing our students to participate that's our thought there in that area [Music] who would have to continue working our cafeteria personnel our some of our buses will operate those wi-fi buses um and of course um administration yeah and we rotate i mean i don't think we need the whole crew there but this allows you know as an example you've got several directors could be home uh very virtual or available you know when we need them and then next week we flip flop and the whole idea is to keep the numbers down as best we can in all departments in all campuses yes sir uh yes i have a question how about the uh if they would take like the 16th to the end of the month take the whole month and make up at the end of the year because right now it's when it's the epidemic is booming right now and and yeah i think i think the one of the reasons why we wouldn't recommend that mr williams is we've got as an example we've got over 3 000 seniors that will graduate in in may and a good number start charter school right away start their first session in june then we have about almost 2 300 2400 students that are currently freshmen sophomores and juniors that also start going to college and this is a obviously a big support to the parents where i mean tuition is free to the students that's one of the items that that that we've been looking at now i know we've got that week of spring break in there that we can flip-flop and trade we looked at all areas and we don't know what what a week from now is going to be or two weeks from now whether it gets even more work so i mean well in my view uh in my view what we're having to deal with is a is a critical uh situation with a pandemic i mean to me i think we're gonna have to take some action because no one is immune right now to anything and all these options like two weeks or a month i i'm very much in favor and secondly uh yes i do you want to be inclusive of all employees and i like the idea of modified work schedules where you have different shifts i think that's a good way to go because that works with other offices you've got counselors and pair professionals right now that aren't aren't working in shifts they're not they're going every day right to the campuses we go shifts we do shifts for all our employees you all spoke to ta what if anything do they recognize as moreno as i mean it's all over the news i'm not sure what the what it is that they can't they can't digest you know in their brains but what is it that they don't recognize us as a critical area the only thing i can say is again i can't speak for ta but i think it follows what the governor the director of what the governor is wta and and telling the cities and i think ours we're trying to to do as best we can to deviate still meet the needs of our students we have tsta at the lsd building you know talking about having their teachers working shifts and things like that that's where they need to be over there because i'm trying to convince the governor that hey you know this is critical now they didn't indicate anything about a waiver they didn't say hey you know yes if you we will consider it thank you are they ready to be quite honest i think their response is that they probably don't accept any waivers that's ridiculous i just i don't believe that i i concur really i agree but [Music] yes um well i i agree with the makeup of time and and i agree that we obviously we're doing something about this but in the beginning of the pandemic when we initially reacted to our situation i believe everybody with an exception of a few maybe mr santos glory and a few other administrators i believe everybody stayed home for a while and worked virtually i feel like we're even in in an even more precarious situation today than we were back then because our numbers the proof is in the pudding look at our numbers so why could we not continue virtual instruction and just close down the district physically but remain completely open virtually is that is that not possible from what i understand back then it's the governor is the one who ordered the uh the feds and the governor are the ones who ordered that particular shutdown so at that point there was um the funding was available to us at this point there are certain criteria that has to be met in order for us to get fully funded so it's not necessarily the same um outcome that we would have if we were to shut down completely and and i agree with you in regards to instruction but i don't think that applies to who's in an office if i'm correct you're correct on that that's our call today well i think it's probably looking at the option of doing remote and trying to have the minimal amount of absolutely that would be our intent for at least for the next two weeks to be able to if we do remote then we modify the schedule to try to get as few employees in the site trying to get them home and be available i do want to say that pa i mean it's very they they took our call immediately they did offer options um some reports that we don't want to hear uh but there are certain options that that were placed on the table and they were willing to to work with us uh we did not move on the spring break option um because we don't know what's coming and today you heard that the variant there's another variant already from from brazil and so we kind of want to leave those days of course if you all agree to that uh but that was our our i guess in case we need those particular five days that we will use those five days that are at another time in case we have to shut down uh i want to elaborate a little bit on what alisa's did say i know that you said that uh the state i mean that we there was revenue is coming back but that we get all the revenues back from the kobe deal to the district i had heard that we weren't didn't get fully funded well okay let me let me okay we're talking about school funding when the uh governor shut us down the answer there is is yes or i think right now we're working hard obviously we submitted all the expenses that we have because of coving and my understanding is state federal property equity versus maybe 78 of what we requested so we're working on that the other item that didn't happen absolutely you're correct the federal government uh initially was going to give us or the districts a certain amount of money a large amount of money to be able for us to utilize for for the pandemic and all these other expenses what happens ta remove those funds they kept it at the agency and then all they did is is use those federal funds to replace state funds so we didn't get a single amount i think we only got about 100 thousand more so ta controlled all that and i know we we express that interest in that concern to henry uh but kendrick gray and va has been working the wrong things absolutely and i'm sorry to say that but i mean we're talking about it was a large amount of money i know that we were supposed to be getting about 15 million dollars and we only got 18 about 800 000 i mean i mean they really he was even listening but you're right we should have gotten a large amount of money to help us take care of those needs but i i personally i you know personally i understand the need you know our kids are at a uh they're suffering an educational loss here especially you know our hispanic community you know we don't have a lot of access to some of the the remote learning in some areas of our community you know uh math and reading are probably going to be affected the most we're going to be behind and uh you know it's just this pandemic is not a good situation the city has gone down to what 25 uh county went down yesterday with 50 employees at their at their building i think we need to we need to do the same thing but personally i i would propose a full shutdown and you know we'll come back and start the board consider us looking at are you making up those days in in spring break that's possibility because shutting down uh you would be making updates per day yes yeah we're going to make up days either way it's either half the time or full time it's just i just don't i mean i don't trust where the community is at right now or the number that we have i don't i don't i think we're exposing our employees and our students i mean we'll make it work whatever direction the board gives us i mean we'll make it mr santos uh question regarding uh i know earlier where there was a decision about the budget and how much money we were supposed to get and didn't get do you have numbers what to look at for if we shut down or closure rather um you know 15 days versus a 30-day period do you have a comparison in that probably our expenses um per day is my uh the order is just sure that it was born it's about a million dollars a day those are our expenses that includes obviously our salaries and and all the other things that come around you know like crazy and so on and so forth and from the state from the state we ended up getting about 60 uh of our salary or our budget so uh i mean it would be a couple million you know that we're going to be short can we survive without the state's funding i guess we can survive probably you know i think we have a cushion of about maybe 20 20 days our fund balance but our fund is just like our savings it's here uh we would have to hear a fund balance uh on that amount and that's the case that we go to to shut it down and we don't get any funding or we can't find a solution to be able to try to well that'll be the point there'll be a situation that arises that we don't decide to make up the day that's correct right that is correct go that's that route we make up the days we make up the days and then we'll be okay right financially all right paul there's another one around just to let you all know that uh after this uh when we come out of spring break you know that numbers are gonna probably pick up a lot more you know uh and so we have to be prepared for after that also [Music] somebody's calling yes mr santos i think uh uh if we we take the i think uh the governor's uh austin is not number one in the nation on phobic cases that's why he's not that worried but we are worried because of our people here you know like they say nationwide we're number one and and uh we're talking money how about lives for the kids the employees and all these people that we represent you know that's another that's another top topic topic that you know lives uh if we take the uh to the end of the month and we don't take spring break i think it'll be a benefit to united because spring break they're going to go all over the state and they're going to bring ba bring back more kobe cases than we have already you know and and i think it would be an advantage to take those spring breaks and give the whole month so we can get our employees vaccinated give them the the chance to get vaccinated try to get uh people try to get the vaccines here that those that spend where we can get our kids our employees vaccinated and you know look at all that stuff and and give give them a chance to recover from because if they get uh copic you'll be 10 days if we give the whole thing maybe we can we can cut down on the cake mr ramirez sir you mentioned in regards to having 20 days only on our on the we can fun for 20 days we've got we've got we've got a little more than 20 but you always want to make sure that you have enough for other emergencies so i think we have close to 60 million in our fund balance that's why i said we probably can use at least you know and you're asking we do have some funds here that's what it is emergencies right did we uh approve years back sir in regard emergency rainy day did we put any funds or collected any funds for for something an emergency like this that's that's what our front door is this or that's our rainy day fund you know that's what we we call it fund balance but it's the same as the rainy day fund that's what it's that's what it's here all right okay i have another comment um i know we're talking about money here but if we remained like i said virtual close down all the offices everybody stays home and works from home so we basically like i said we're we're we're closing if you will physically continuing services virtually we lose no money everyone's safe and the days that we make up are minimal i don't understand any other discussion beyond that we can do that also then right we can also do that i think just uh taking a a focus on as far as minimizing that employee yes at the campuses we can handle that it's the moving everybody to virtual at least for these two weeks or if you want to show the week then if we push it down in spring break i recommend a two-week period uh is that the recommendation or proposal two-week period uh yes or for virtual at this point yes sir okay all right can we vote 30 days of the rest of the month yeah i don't think we can it's up to the it's up to the uh district right now i think when all this stuff started they the the governor said it was up to the district uh to do whatever was convenient to the district and i agree with you mr molina but you also have to look at at those graduating seniors and how it's affecting them i i think you just need the best of both worlds and and take it step by step and see where the numbers lie and right now we have on the table or and i agree i agree with you ma'am but the problem is are those uh graduates are going to be around to graduate it wouldn't take uh measures that's that's why if we do if we go virtual for two weeks shut down the district physically i believe that we'll do all that we can within our power but beyond that it's in their hands um and it's in the hands of the government to provide us the immunizations that we need but what's in our hands right now and what we're talking about is the next two weeks virtual closing physically keeping our income and keeping everyone as safe as we as a board possibly can we can the governor uh uh a request to uh if we can take the whole the other 10 days and and would they allow it because i come back and say the same thing laredo number one and kobe case not austin not the governor's uh world around him it's our world here and our radio that that's going to help right okay all right so let's move on to agenda before closed session uh we'll move on to closed session time is now 12 40 and we will adjourn uh the build session percentage for sections 551.000 we'll be back in approximately 15 minutes i have some thoughts in my head if we need to go two more two more weeks but i don't want to get in that discussion right now yeah we'll have two weeks to think about it okay will take appropriate action on items if necessary to discuss until session on the item six yes on gender item six the recommendation is to authorize the district administration to close all campuses and departments with the exception of essential staff and operations and offer remote uh learning as of monday february 1st 2021 for a period of two weeks ocean is that giving any further discussion all those in favor aye [Music] uh at this point there are some modifications other than the professional development days so we are designating those professional development days as as a student instructional base it was a motion to manifest percentage another second any further discussion also in favor hi hi the second word discussion all those in favor aye hi hi another passes at the night of the night i will review this quickly yes sir very quickly um trustees superintendent on the resolution we're passing a very similar resolution to what was passed at the beginning of pandemic authorizing the superintendent a certain authority for instance immune pay to those essential staff on the motion that was just approved for those essential steps to do that to come in uh and also certain authority regarding instructional calendar if needed to be taken after this point however the things that were modified from the previous resolution they're no longer in this one are regarding hiring practices and regarding procurement certain items like that that at the beginning of the pandemic i believe we thought that that may be needed but at this time it really addresses personnel action and this will guarantee payment to everybody uh during this two-week uh school district coaching our professionals and professional staff workers do you need a motion to approve second all those uh or any further discussion also fair aye aye aye the name of washington middle school and i believe mr david has a statement for the school board servicer uh this is a saving of washington middle school do you have a statement for the school board yes sir i am extremely thankful that my colleagues on the board recently choose to honor me by renaming washington middle school after me i am sorry for any frustration or any distress that has are written from the proposal in the campus washington camp washington is the father of our country president and one of the greatest leaders in our world history his name and legacy has been in inter part of our local traditions and celebrations since 1939 most importantly washington middle school has enriched the lives of many students who have gone to become great leaders in our community and beyond i will continue to work with the board of trustees understand to give students a supreme public school education and i thank my constituents for giving me the opportunity to make a positive difference in the lives of our students and the families for nearly 20 years thank you for that i hope we can make it work out something for better years right so the recommendation is going to resend the renaming of washington middle school for the national anthem 9th generation 2021 do we have a motion do we have a song a second any further discussion this time any board member can make a motion if you so choose to name the new school located at a ghetto property oh ricardo molina i'll make a motion second one per minute all right we have a motion by molina the second time is there any further discussion i just want to thank all the board and those involved into this and uh i appreciate everything that has been taken one time at one moment to the other and everything following all all the laws nobody can can get hurt thank you for your service all of us in favor all right all right unfortunately passes agenda before will be adjourned that time is 1 11 pm is there a motion to address stay safe stay safe everybody love you all