The Dec. 1 meeting of the Windsor Unified School District Board of Trustees started and ended with some monumental changes.
The meeting started with a dedication and farewell to longtime board member George Valenzuela, who did not run for reelection. Dec. 1 was his final meeting as a trustee.
Valenzuela has been on the board for 12 years, and has served as president three times, most recently in 2019. As his fellow board members paid him tribute, it was his experience that many of them referenced.
“George was very welcoming when I joined board and having so much institutional knowledge has been really reassuring,” said Stephanie Ahmad. “You can reference things that have happened, what might be a good idea or what might not be.”
“I think, brother, you have been voice of conscience, which is good and helpful and particularly helpful when (having) the hard conversations, and we need to get our head and hearts around where we’re going,” said Bill Adams. “Six thousand kids came through our schools on your watch, that’s tremendous. We will miss you very, very much. Thank you for your service.”
Valenzuela will be replaced by Malinalli Lopez who will be sworn in at the next meeting on Dec. 15. A tree at the newly installed redwood grove on the quad at the high school will be dedicated in Valenzuela’s name.
The big change that bookended the meeting was the proposed change from the districts having two meetings a month to one. The change was proposed by Superintendent Jeremy Decker, who came to Windsor from a district that generally had one meeting a month. After deliberation, it was decided to go ahead and make that change for 2021, with the new meeting dates generally being the third Tuesday of each month. However, Decker also suggested that board members and staff continue to keep the first Tuesday open so that they have those dates available as needed.
The meeting dates for will be finalized and published on the WUSD website shortly.
SPSA struggles
The annual reports on the School Plans for Student Achievement started at this meeting, but due to the COVID pandemic and its related shutdowns, most of the reports could be summed up as “unable to implement due to COVID.”
In a normal year, the reports consist of a review of the previous year’s goals, how successful they were in implementing them and what their goals are for the coming year. While the format was followed this year. The presentations themselves were significantly shorter.
Mattie Washburn
Mattie Washburn Elementary (WME) principal Julie Stearn had set four goals for 2019-20:
1) The recently purchased iReady universal screening tool will be implemented for the 2019-20 school year. By the end of the 2019- 20 school year, 75% of our Grade 1 and 2 students will demonstrate increased proficiency in both reading and math by making an average of 2% increase in scale score from their initial baseline diagnostic assessments, to their end of year diagnostic assessments.
2) English Language Learners will demonstrate an average increase of 3% on their Accelerated English (AE) Benchmark assessments from their first benchmark assessment in October of 2019, to their final benchmark assessment in May of 2020.
3. MWE will implement The Power of Being Seen, a District Wide attempt for our Social Emotional Well Being of our students. 100% of the 4 boxes will have one set of initials by the end of the year. 100% of the first 2 boxes will have two or more set of initials by the end of the year.
4. MWE will have a school wide decrease of 4% from 16.9% to 12.9% with Chronic Absenteeism on Dashboard
But they were only able to implement goal four, but the decrease was not down to 12.9%. We did decline in chronic absenteeism from 16.9% to 15.6%.
For 2020-21 Stearn has set three goals, removing the absenteeism goal because of the inability to do an apples to apples comparison between in-person numbers and distance learning numbers.
1) iReady universal screening tool will be implemented for the 2020-21 school year. By the end of the 2020- 21 school year, 75% of our Grade 1 and 2 students will demonstrate increased proficiency by making an average increase of 2% scale score from their initial baseline diagnostic assessments, in both reading and math to their Spring diagnostic assessments.
2) English Language Learners will demonstrate an average increase of 3% on their Accelerated English (AE) Benchmark assessments from their first benchmark assessment in October of 2020, to their final benchmark assessment in May of 2021.
3) MWE will implement The Power of Being Seen, a District Wide attempt for our Social Emotional Well Being of our students. One hundred percent of the 4 boxes will have one set of initials by the end of the year. One hundred percent of the first two boxes will have two or more set of initials by the end of the year.
Brooks Elementary
Brooks principal Annette Zucconi has set three goals for the year, but like Stearn, had been stymied on most of them due to COVID shutdowns.
Goal 1 was for 5% more students would meet or exceed the standards on the ELA portion of the SBAC test. However, the2020 SBAC administration cancelled due to state Shelter in Place order. Goal 2 was for 5% more students, to meet or exceed standards on the mathematics portion of the SBAC summative assessment in Spring 2020, but as mentioned the 2020 SBAC administration was cancelled due to state shelter-in-place order.
Goal 3 was the only goal which was achieved, which was that at the April 2020 faculty meeting, the following information will be known collectively about 100% of the students at Brooks: name/face, something personal, personal/family story and academic standing.
North County Consortium
Few groups of students have been more negatively affected by the COVID shutdown of schools that the students with disabilities. Therefore, North County Consortium (NCC) principal Vicki Long has faced on challenge after the other since the spring.
Goal one which stated that by October of 2020, the North County Consortium will adopt the Unique Learning System online curriculum program for all grades TK-12th grade with all teachers accessing the curriculum for Reading, Writing, Math with 100% of teachers utilizing the curriculum consistently, was implemented because when the district shifted to distance learning they had the Unique Learning System ready to go and teachers were able to access this curriculum quickly with trainings and support.
Goals 2 and 3 were not implemented due to the fires and pandemic, but had been planned that by May 2019, 100% of NCC Bridges teachers will teach behavioral expectations for every area on the NCC PBIS matrix and using a common data collection tool created by the NCC staff as measured by checking and dating the lessons taught and that parents of all students in the Bridges program with relevant and useful resources to address student needs such as, Speech and Language, Behavior, Literacy, Civil Rights Advocacy, NBRC services, Conservatorship, through evening events from 26% of 23 families to 30% participation of 49 families at each event, increasing attendance from six to 15 and including all families instead of just the middle and high school families.
Other items approved
- A reduction of 10 English credits in the graduation requirements for 2021 seniors at North Bay Met Academy and Windsor Oaks Academy. This change will be permanent for students at WOA but not at North Bay Met, because students that enroll in that school are universally deficient in English credits and they are still within the California minimums. The move is aimed at lowering the stress level of current seniors and helping encourage future students.
- An annual contract with TerraVerde Renewable Energy for the “monitoring, performance management, analysis and reporting services needed to mitigate risks, optimize performance, drive down costs and capitalize on revenue opportunities” for the newly installed solar systems throughout the district. The price tag for these services is $24,000.
- The annual item for approving Multiple Subject credentialed teachers to be assigned with his or her consent, to teach a single subject (departmentalized) class in which he or she has 12 semester hours of coursework or six semester hours of upper division or graduate coursework. This item helps manage a shortage of a specialty teachers but must be approved every year.
