With low attendance rates, low graduation rates, low student and teacher morale, parents disapprove of school board
Good afternoon! At 05:30 PM, I’ll live-tweet the @Detroitk12 Board of Education Regular Meeting for #DETdocumenters. 🧵
Our partners: @DetDocumenters, @media_outlier, @BridgeDet313, @chalkbeatDET, @CitizenDetroit, @Detour_Detroit, @freep, @metrotimes, @PlanetDetroit, and @wdet.
02:00 PM Jul 12, 2022 CDT
Join online, by phone, or in person at 3200 East Lafayette: https://www.detroitk12.org/Page/9425#calendar14864/20220711/event/63975
Watch live or replay:
Our notes, recordings, and archived materials: https://detroit.documenters.org/assignments/dpscd-regular-board-meeting-4184/
📎 Today’s agenda: https://go.boarddocs.com/mi/detroit/Board.nsf/goto?open&id=CAST8S6DAE21 https://t.co/vx6RjG5tzt
🏃 Need to catch up on the DPSCD? See our past reporting: https://detroit.documenters.org/reporting/?search=detroit+public+schools+community+district
@BakuliEthan summarized the last board meeting: https://detroit.chalkbeat.org/2022/6/15/23170113/detroit-public-schools-security-safety-curriculum-budget-reopening
Byron Keys reported live: https://twitter.com/Wilkes36/status/1536822204301811712
🗞 Over half of Detroit public school students have anxiety or depression, and nearly a third considered suicide or self-harm. Female, LGBTQIA+, and unhoused students are disproportionately impacted. @roz_edward highlights a 2021 @UMich study: https://michiganchronicle.com/2022/07/05/dpscd-students-in-the-throes-of-mental-health-crisis/
Last month, Detroit’s school board denied a resolution to recognize Pride Month. Corletta Vaughn, who voted “no”, has made transphobic and homophobic comments in her church sermons for years. The board will vote on Pride Month again today. https://twitter.com/civicDetroitDan/status/1544669227956715522
This fall, Detroit schools will use a new Black history curriculum for middle and high school students. The district contracted @BH365education for the new textbooks and educational materials. Ethan Bakuli asked students for their take: https://detroit.chalkbeat.org/2022/6/13/23163676/detroit-school-district-black-history-365-curriculum-social-studies
❓ The Board of Education decides the educational and financial policies of the Detroit Public Schools Community District (DPSCD). This includes contracts and employee terminations.
The board and their committees meet monthly.
Your elected DPSCD boardmembers:
• @MsNyckii, president
• @BishopCVaughn
• @DrHarvill4DPSCD, vice president
• Georgia Lemmons
• @MishaStallworth
• @DetroitEducator
• @Sonya_Mays
Find something inaccurate? Email documenters@outliermedia.org with the subject “Correction Request”. I’ll add corrections at the end.
Need image descriptions? Reply and I’ll describe images for you.
Those are my pre-game notes. See you at 05:30 PM!
It’s meeting time for the DPSCD Board of Education! Nothing happening yet on the live stream. #DETdocumenters https://t.co/50MDnPT9C6
Still waiting to start. I guess we’re waiting for more boardmembers to arrive.
Someone brought a baby to the stage and the present boardmembers are taking a look.
⌚️ At 05:42 PM, the meeting starts! Although the secretary Vania Moore says it’s 05:30 PM for them. Is this time-delayed?
👤 Roll call! I didn’t hear Gay-Dagnogo, but other boardmembers say they’re present. They have a quorum.
They hold a moment of silence for Velina Howard, then stand for the national anthem and “Lift Every Voice and Sing”. https://t.co/0YoVjDoMQF
A boardmember asks to amend the agenda to move personnel actions, consent agenda, and policies before public comment. All approve. The board approves this meeting’s agenda and the minutes for last month’s board and committee meetings.
🗣 The meeting chair, Peterson-Mayberry, makes some remarks. She talks about summer school starting yesterday, and asks parents to check their website for locations. …
Peterson-Mayberry also wishes well to their high school graduates. Last, she mentions an evaluation overview for teachers next month.
Peterson-Mayberry has a high school ambassadors speak, who graduated from Detroit School of the Arts.
Public comment registration closed at 05:52 PM.
📝 At 05:53 PM, the board proceeds to a finance report from chief financial officer Jeremy Vidito. https://go.boarddocs.com/mi/detroit/Board.nsf/goto?open&id=CASTA46DAE4B https://t.co/diucTFowCX
A boardmember asks about a budget surplus related to the school nutrition fund. Vidito says he expects it to balance out as they go through the year.
Peterson-Mayberry asks about the tax mills. Vidito says the city withholds their tax collections before they receive them in June. He expects $20 million to come in.
Peterson-Mayberry asks Vidito to file away the report. That’s it on that.
Now a recognition of the district-wide chess team, the All-City Chess Dream Team. https://t.co/SIHsJuMAuK
They’re presenting Certificates of Excellence to the students and staff who are part of the All-City Chess Dream Team. Massive applause. https://t.co/ms7T2GTPyG
📝 At 06:02 PM, the board proceeds to the Superintendent’s Report. It includes the school district’s newest hires, promotions, and transfers. https://go.boarddocs.com/mi/detroit/Board.nsf/goto?open&id=CASTAK6DAE5A https://t.co/0n5W5oDVA3
Superintendent Nikolai Vitti says they’re still waiting on M-STEP data.
Now he reviews a proposed state funding increase for their K-12 education in 2023.
Vitti projects a $400 increase in per-pupil funding, starting fiscal year 2023. “None of this happens without the right kind of compromise between the legislature and the governor.”
Vitti expects a $29 million increase compared to 2021.
The slide notes there will be no funding increases for their mental health and school safety grants.
Vitti says there will be no layoffs this coming year.
Vitti mentions that they’re down about 2,000 students since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. He compares DPSCD to suburban school districts, saying that the gap has “narrowed” but there’s “still inequity between DPSCD and other districts” in Oakland County.
Superintendent Vitti goes over “blueprint 2023 metrics” which include enrollment and staffing numbers.
I’m streaming this meeting at the highest quality possible but I can’t really read the slides. They should be on BoardDocs though. https://t.co/PqeknnkcEJ
Chronic absenteeism has increased, which Vitti attributes to quarantining practices during the pandemic.
He says they’ve finished conducting student surveys.
Vitti notes that in 2021, employees were “unfortunately” happier working from home instead of in-office.
Vitti continues with blueprint 2023 metrics. He says again they don’t have M-STEP, PSAT, or SAT data, but they do have “I-Ready” data.
Fewer enrollments in college-ready courses, which Vitti attributes to course recovery and difficulty placing students in advanced classes. https://t.co/29BajKqx6S
Vitti says they’re trying to keep teachers at schools they chose, but DPSCD may have to move them around. They have more teacher vacancies. Vitti remarks that teachers found it easier to participate in professional development online. https://t.co/mwhPWYsyUo
Vitti says their “greatest challenge” is cafeteria staffing. They increased wages.
Boardmember Mays says “this slide really frustrates me”. She says, “I’m really outraged by the numbers on this page”, pointing to their graduation rate. Mays says it’s “something we should be ashamed of” that hundreds of students leave the district without a high school diploma. https://t.co/AtkPBrjCcS
Superintendent Vitti says earlier graudation rates were “inflated” as students were removed from the roles when they dropped out. He says this was a “state process”, alluding to the state’s emergency management of Detroit schools.
After changing how they measure graduation rates, Vitti says they always expected the rates to decline. But he expects graduation rates to climb from this point.
Vitti points out that they pay teachers to do extra preparation and after-school programs.
He says the emphasis this year will be high school students. “The high school experience […] has to improve.” …
Vitti says he expects the graduation rate to improve, but it “won’t happen overnight”.
Boardmember Gay-Dagnogo says they need to “change our relationship with the district as a whole” including union and non-union staffmembers, the latter of whom “should have a union”.
Gay-Dagnogo: “How do we improve relationships with our students without improving relationships with our staff?” Mild applause from the audience.
Gay-Dagnogo: “Are we really going to move the needle on instruction? I’m not going to sit here” and pretend things are okay “when they’re not okay.”
A boardmember asks “how far behind are our students, really?” when it comes to reading and writing, while accounting for the pandemic.
Boardmember Vaughn says she’s concerned about non-graduating students, especially those who fall behind on reading comprehension. She asks what support DPSCD offers these families.
Superintendent Vitti says that while other states have literacy tests, Michigan does not and “there is no objective way to define that”. He says the SAT is not a substitute nor a good indicator.
Vitti says they need to focus on college-readiness instead of just literacy. He says DPSCD could add a literacy test but it would be costly and unpopular among high school students.
Vitti says he’ll bring a literacy plan to the board in August.
Vitti says there isn’t a significant increase in principals leaving DPSCD, but that principals rate the district “rather high”.
Vitti says about the district’s former emergency management: “We inherited what we inherited with the graduation rate.” He wants to emphasize a four-year graduation rate, instead of a five-year period.
A boardmember asks if DPSCD can predict if a student will graduate, using profiles and analytics. Superintendent Vitti says they do have early-warning systems, but they lack the right intervention tools for students who may drop-out.
Vitti: “Most students would fit the profile of needing intervention in ninth grade.” He estimates that 70-80 percent of neighborhood high school students would fit the profile.
A boardmember says, “to graduate and have a third grade reading level is a failure on our part.” The audience applauds.
Vitti says neighborhood high schools are mainly preoccupied with maintaining attendence, since students can easily fall behind when absent. “I’m not arguing your point. But what I’m laying out is the challenge” of students passing courses.
Another boardmember says she appreciates the new fencing at some of their schools, to keep students from leaving mid-day.
They’re showing slides on the student survey.
Another another boardmember asks something… Vitti says they don’t need individualized plans to accomodate students with special needs, as it is a “workload issue”. https://t.co/FfvxzXx5CI
The same boardmember asks if they could use “I-Ready” data to make individualized plans.
Vitti says “there are more data conversations between staff, students, and families” thanks to how much data they have.
Boardmember Stallworth asks if DPSCD can look at test scores and track student literacy, despite the lack of literacy-specific tests. …
Vitti again says PSAT and SAT tests are not good indicators of literacy rates, as they’re geared to college preparation. He also attributes the lack of literacy tests to a nationwide trend favoring college-readiness tests.
Stallworth clarifies, asking if they could use mid-range scores on PSAT and SAT tests to determine literacy rates. Vitti says they already do this, and goes back to his earlier response that college-readiness tests aren’t good indicators of literacy.
Ah, now to the student surveys. Vitti says they’re emphasizing the “Loved, Challenged, and Prepared Index”.
Showing feedback from grades 3-5.
Vitti says elementary, middle, and high school students reported feeling safer, despite a number of mass shootings that happened nationally.
Vitti also says they see fewer suspensions, fights, and arrests. He insists that this is not due to lax enforcement or intervention, but that this is a real change.
Showing feedback from grades 6-8, and high school grades.
Vitti says “some of the rigor in the classroom seemed to decline in the pandemic.” https://t.co/blxGZVFzO3
Now the “Loved, Challenged, and Prepared” index.
Most students feel “challenged” but fewer feel “loved” or “prepared”. https://t.co/ze9VkinyQx
A boardmember asks why there is a drop for elementary and middle schools in the Loved, Challenged, and Prepared index.
Vitti attributes some of this to the “challenge of being a middle schooler”. He says “this data is not unique” but also says “this has to get better”.
Vitti proceeds with chronic absenteeism, saying a large portion of students have been chronically absent.
He says those who are frequently absent are less rigorously engaged in the classroom. https://t.co/KZ8fhQZpcO
