Chino Valley Unified School District Board of Education Meeting

March 3, 2016

About this page

No official minutes are on file for this meeting, so this recap is drawn only from the publicly posted video transcript. Because transcript speaker labels carry no reliable name-to-voice mapping, no statement, comment, stance, or vote from this meeting is attributed to any named individual here — public commenters, board members, and staff alike. Viewpoints are described namelessly; counts of speakers are given where relevant.

Overview

The board convened at 7:09 p.m. following closed session, where it acted on a certificated-employee dismissal and on strategy in the district's ongoing federal lawsuit over prayer at board meetings. That litigation, and the board's practice of opening its own meetings with prayer, ran through the whole evening — from the closed-session report, to a contentious stretch of public comment, to a legal-fee figure invoked repeatedly by speakers on both sides. Outside the litigation, the meeting also carried a full slate of program business: the year's first LCAP baseline-data presentation, several new summer-school offerings, and a staff travel item tied to the district's international student partnership.

Closed Session: A Dismissal and a Litigation Decision

In closed session, the board adopted a statement of charges for the immediate suspension and dismissal of a permanent certificated employee 1. The board also acted on the district's federal lawsuit over prayer and invocations at board meetings, voting to pursue a timely appeal and directing staff to bring recommendations for alternative, pro-bono or reduced-cost legal counsel to a special board meeting scheduled for March 7 2. Press coverage around this period reported that the district was contesting a February 18, 2016 federal court ruling that its meeting-opening prayer practice was unconstitutional, and that the case had already run up roughly $200,000 in costs and fees for the district 89.

Public Comment: A Meeting Defined by the Prayer Lawsuit

Nine speakers addressed the board on items not on the agenda 3. Two speakers urged the board to keep defending its prayer practice in court. One framed the fight in religious-liberty terms and said the surrounding community would organize financial support — a "war chest" — to help cover legal costs 4. A second speaker described having personally contributed a token dollar toward an outside legal organization's offer to provide the district reduced-cost representation 5.

A different speaker took the opposite view forcefully, quoting language from the federal court's ruling that found the board's prayer practice risked coercing students given the board's authority over discipline, awards, and school policy 6, and argued that board members' personal religious views had improperly shaped official decisions on the litigation.

A student speaker also opposed continuing the legal fight, but on cost grounds rather than constitutional ones: noting that the district had already been charged roughly $200,000 in legal fees, the speaker argued that continuing to appeal risked far larger costs and diverted money that could otherwise go to infrastructure, teachers, and programs — calling further appeals irresponsible 7.

Other public comment ranged more widely. One speaker praised the district's expanding GATE (gifted and talented education) program and its inclusion in the LCAP 35. Another urged the board to approve a five-year renewal of a local charter school's petition, describing it as a strong option for students who had struggled elsewhere 36. A speaker conducting an independent financial review of a district booster club urged the board to set guidelines ensuring nonprofit booster organizations comply with IRS reporting requirements and standard accounting practices 37. And a speaker described a young child's roughly three-mile round-trip walk to school along a stretch of road with no sidewalk access, while thanking the district for progress on installing campus-entryway security hardware 3839.

LCAP: First Baseline-Data Presentation of the Year

Staff opened the year's LCAP (Local Control and Accountability Plan) process with an overview of how the plan is developed — an annual report on the current year paired with a draft plan for the following year, informed by outreach to site councils, classified staff, teacher representatives, an LCAP parent committee, and the district's English-learner advisory committee 10. Staff described taking that outreach directly to school sites this year, with meetings tailored to each site's specific needs 11, and, for the first time, running student focus groups at several comprehensive high schools 12.

Baseline data presented for the district's four "support" goals included: a teacher-misassignment rate reported as low, and below state and county averages 13; about a quarter of facilities with fully functional wireless, alongside more than 1,600 technology devices refreshed that year 14; roughly 1.4 million student data views and about 28% active-parent usage of the district's online parent portal 15; a district attendance rate around 97%, meeting the state goal 16; a graduation rate the highest among the county's large districts 17; and the lowest suspension rate among large county districts, at roughly 3.3%, with an expulsion rate near a tenth of one percent 18.

Board questions probed the presentation's methodology more than its conclusions. One question noted that a slide listing roughly 88 administrators appeared to exclude site-level administrators and asked why 19. Another questioned why the reported count of districtwide LCAP forums seemed low given how many site-specific stakeholder meetings principals had actually held, suggesting the metric undercounted the real level of engagement 20. On school safety, staff noted that suspension and expulsion figures are only the quantitative side of the state's safety metric, and that student focus groups were being used to gather qualitative input as well 21 — input that, staff said, suggested students felt safe from their peers but were more concerned about how open and accessible some campuses were to outsiders 22.

Summer School and New Enrichment Programs

Staff outlined the 2016 summer school plan, which expanded course offerings for ninth- and tenth-graders in response to a new NCAA eligibility requirement for student athletes 23, continued the ELD Summer Academy at elementary sites 24, and — for the first time — offered an on-campus academic enrichment program, including honors and AP coursework, funded through the district's international student partnership rather than requiring students to pay outside universities for similar courses 25. One potential middle-school site was ruled out because it lacked gym and pool facilities needed for the program 26. Staff also clarified that the enrichment label, rather than "remedial," was deliberately chosen because the courses serve honors- and AP-track students as well as students needing to make up credit 27. A separate makeup-course item will notify affected students and parents beginning March 10 28.

China Travel Item

The board also approved an item connected to the district's international (F-1/B-1) student program, sending a group of teachers and administrators to China in late March 29. Staff explained that participants were largely selected based on existing relationships with visiting Chinese educators from the district's international partnership 30, and that the trip could also open a formal partnership with Chinese education officials worth an estimated $30,000–$300,000 annually to the district 31. Board discussion focused on transparency in how participants were chosen and whether the benefits of the trip would reach the district more broadly.

Recognitions

The meeting opened with the Pledge of Allegiance 32 and performances by elementary students on emotion-management themes, followed by recognition of a high school art program's collage honoring a local historical figure regarded as one of the Chino Valley's founders 33. Presenters noted the piece also incorporated the program's credo of service, scholarship, and character 34.

Employee and Union Comments

A representative of the district's teachers' union opened by telling the board that a teacher at one school site had died the day before, and asked the community to keep their colleagues and students in mind 40. The representative went on to report survey results showing members average about 14.2 unpaid hours a week 41, which the union translated into several hundred thousand unpaid hours districtwide over the year, worth tens of thousands of dollars per member — presenting the board with a symbolic novelty check and asking for a contract settlement that reflects that value 42.

A classified-staff union representative thanked the district for sending four instructional aides to a statewide conference this year after several years of requesting it 43, and separately asked for additional custodial staffing at a year-round school site that the representative said was operating with only about two and a half custodians for over 1,100 students 44.

Board Comments and Routine Business

Board members reported on a range of district events and outreach: one trustee described meeting separately with families connected to the charter school under discussion and reviewing input from across the district ahead of any renewal decision 45; another cautioned that anonymous letters sent to the board carry no weight because there is no way to verify who wrote them 46, and separately raised concern about the district's process for selecting class valedictorians 47. A trustee also noted that a district student had won a regional recognition for the first time in several years 48. Staff, responding to a board question about when board-meeting video would be viewable online, described a regional internet-bandwidth bottleneck shared with several neighboring districts as the cause of recent delays 49. Another trustee reported on a Sacramento advocacy trip focused on state funding issues, including a proposed early-education block grant and a scheduled increase in the district's teacher-retirement contribution rate from 8% to 19% over several years 5051. Board comments also noted that a district junior high's competitive song-leading squad had been named a national champion 52.

In routine action items, the board voted for six incumbent candidates in the California School Boards Association's delegate assembly election for its sub-region 53, and approved a compensation increase for fully credentialed substitute teachers who teach within their content area during summer school 54. The board also approved several changes and deletions to consent-calendar items, including the removal of one human-resources item from the agenda 55.