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Home My WebLink About2022-01-20-DIAMOND-min RECEIVED Diamond School Council Meeting Minutes January 20, 2022 022 22 111:� u ,&03 ipiii T WIlkLER Members in attendance: Jennifer Turner, Chhandomay Mandal, Joyce Dvorak, Ye Tong, Rachel Harrington, emy Coombs, Stephanie Burroughs, (Liz Sharp, non-voting member) LEMNG"rON MA A. Approval of Minutes (No December Meeting) B. Updates Principal 1. Covid Business a) Covid has taken all of our energy since coming back to school in January b) App. 20 teachers were out from that initial testing in January c) Questions on why we are asking students to stay out 10 days, students are often still testing positive d) Links have been provided to students to listen in, however we are finding that this is not ideal, recommendation is that students are looking at google classroom for work and using the link to sign in to class. e) New mask"policy" - reporting form teachers have been using to notify the main office when students are found to not be wearing their masks correctly, multiple notifications from the same student has meant a phone call home f) Higher participation rate in pool testing on Wednesdays than prior to break g) Kids are going outside if they want to after lunch h) Lunch requires assigned seats, 6 feet apart, in classrooms and the cafeteria i) Dr. Turner has reassigned principal responsibilities, making Ms. Sharp now in charge of all student related responsibilities 2. Cell Phone Policy a) In the Fall, communicated with families that cell phone policy will be more strict b) Policy says cell phones are left at home or in lockers, if its on your person it needs to be turned off c) Admin has to confiscate cell phones when students are not following the policy d) Children have been filming tik-tok in the bathroom with cell phones, tightening up policy has helped with mitigating this e) Brooke - asking for clarity on the policy, if students are allowed by their parents to bring their cell phone in school but must be in the locker or off, students do not have permission to use their phone for any reason, this includes lunch 3. Restorative Justice Training/LEF Grant a) Training on tier 1 practices for restorative justice b) Dr. Turner was able to obtain an LEF community grant to fund training, LEF is eager to talk about expanding on the grant if necessary and is thrilled about the focus c) Remy- we really want to do the program correctly, which requires us to build from the ground up building capacity with staff and admin to use restorative justice language in their conversation before using this approach with students. This is to help staff build working knowledge on the approach and use a train the trainer approach to build capacity. d) Dr. Turner- Within restorative justice, there are different tiers. The first tier is building community and prioritize staff conversations before moving on to tiers 2 and 3. Clarke is also completing this training as well, and this will be a multi-year process. Hoping to build a leadership team this spring consisting of teachers and administrators e) Working with Johnny Cole on building a DEI student group, they've met once this year already and are working on an additional meeting. 4. Innovation Plan a) Energies have been taken elsewhere, but hoping we can delve into this at our next meeting b) Plan is to have the plan put together this Spring and that the Fall is our first year of implementing the innovation plan c) Have begun elements, including the restorative justice Parents A. Ye Tong - What is the participation rate? a. Anecdotally, the "bins are more full" but do not have exact numbers b. No way to require testing because it's a public school, sometimes students forget but participation has been good Staff A. Remy- all covid all the time, there's nothing else right now. Trying to figure out the balance between SEL support and curriculum B. Suggestion for brain breaks in the classroom. Still concerned about behavior of students, students not quite behaving like middle school students and adjusting socially C. Dr. Burroughs - Teachers are accustomed to pivoting in this way, working really hard to balance SEL and curriculum, and their own health. Teachers are working very hard to keep this balance, but its a lot on their plates and patience is appreciated. D. Dr. Turner- averaging 20-30 staff absences per day, not always classroom teachers, students averaging between 100-150 absences per day. Asking families that minor symptoms should mean staying home C. Meeting Adjourned D. Next Meeting February 17, 2022