[Music] good afternoon and welcome to the uh April 1st 2024 meeting of the DI subcommittee first item on the agenda is the uh are the minutes of the February 5th meeting is everybody review them and is our motion to approve I'll make the motion thank you Natalia your vote Yes Stephen yes Mariah I also vote Yes it's unanimous uh the main item on our agenda is a presentation by clar and Christie uh we discussed at the policy subcommittee on um the incidence of uh bias and bullying and the reporting mechanisms and uh the data that they have for this school year to present by by category and um I believe also by outcome and investigation so um CL or christe I'm not sure who I'm handing it over to hi there so christe's going to be our slide deck person because every time I try to do the slide deck and this something goes wrong so we don't want to take any chances today all right okay all right right so we will get started so these are our goals for this evening oops go back sorry that's okay to review and understand the psv's definition of bullying and discrimination um review and understand newly developed incident and bullying report forms and Pathways for reporting and to unpack the data and expectation of office of student services and the office of educational Equity go to the next slide sorry it's having a little bit of a problem let me see what's going on of course there we go there we go so here he has what what is bullying what is discrimination so this is right from what we have on our um PSB website for bullying the repeated intentional harassment by an aggressor um oftentimes we know that we will have reports that someone um their child was bullied and it may have been a onetime thing which is really what we would consider harassment um because we know with bullying it has to be repeated um discrimination any instance of unjust or inequitable treatment on the basis of race ethnicity religion gender identity expression sexual orientation age disability or medical condition or any other protected class um just we just want to be transparent that we know that often times that the bullying and discrimination will overlap and so those are some of the things that I think we're going to discuss um this evening and this is our bullying and prevention um this come again comes right from our site um just really laying out that you know we are deeply committed to preventing bullying at every level um that we seek to protect and ensure the safety of all of our community members and that we have some mechanisms that are in place um we've always had um bullying reporting forms but we have what we would call our new and improved I want to give a big shout out to Christy Hernandez our um assistant director of educational Equity who put a lot who on board it in November and by the beginning of December we had new forms in place um and so we're really excited about that so we have our PSB office of educational Equity um the PSB office of student services and the school administration forms that can be um seen on our bullying prevention page and then we have the PSB office of educational equity and PSB office of student services only where folks can go to um my tab which is under educational equity and also our offic of student services which you will be able to see um a tab to to report to our two officers only and when you go to the bullying prevention and Pathways for reporting you'll see this on the bullying prevention page so this is a grid that shows you know who do I want to report where do I want to report who will receive this form and who can report so these are all the different um ways that you um when you're thinking when something when an incident were to take place is it repeated an intentional harassment by an aggressor these are the forms you would use you would report to school administration um oee and OSS um christe maybe you can click on that form on the number one so folks can see that so this would bring you right to this page on the website where it says report bullying to school administration oee and OSS and as you click on each school you'll be able to go to their form so here we have the um the Lawrence form right and we will responses but just so you can see the actual form and the questions that are asked on it it's right here Claire should we ask questions as we go or I would yes please do let's why don't we have a dialogue I I'd rather do that okay so I guess I have a question on that that choice of who you report to and then how that gets tracked and and and I guess I guess it's a multi-part question how it gets tracked if it only go say to oee or only to OSS um and then also are there any sort of legal requirements that would that would require PSB to send that reporting right on from oee or OSS if there's a it's like something that's actionable right like that's criminally actionable say like and so okay so let's go over the first form the first form says report to Administration oee and OSS so that is your typical bullying and harassment form it goes to all three um um department so if you were if you go back to that form Christy I apologize can you click back one if you were to click on any of these schools and if you have a student at at at Lawrence when this form gets filled out it's it's going to go to the building leader and it's also going to be notified by the office of educational equity and um the office of student services is also going to get an alert so all three departments school and two departments are going to receive that report so that's I think that might be the first part of your question can you clarify how you get to that page from the main page of the PSB website sure if you go back um Christy can you go to the do you want me to show do you want me to get on the website and show everyone yeah that would be great okay so in the same spot that it has always been if you're on the homepage you go to student and families but see what happens if I click on educational Equity like if you click on educational Equity you go to a completely different website yeah that that um is actually an old format that was hidden but it's pop back up I see so if you were to go slide over to the left to District so under district there educational Equity there and then there's also there you go and then you see educational Equity incident reporting that this is the office of educational Equity so this is our page the other site was um more for communication it was hidden but I see that it's been released but that's not where you would do the incident reporting so I can I just jump in there sure so just to clarify with the website I think as Claire was saying this tab this separate tab here educational Equity is our own website with resources specifically for families for teachers Etc and then the page that we just showed you up here is kind of like the main contact page um that is for everyone and also if we go through this students and families tab to bullying prevention that's where you get to any sort of incident report forms so as we shared on that table we have all the forms here which is the option to report to school admin OE and OSS but also understanding that some people may not want to report to their school administration out of fear of retali a to combat that we have an option where they bypass School admin and report to OE and OSS only so that all people children family members employees can feel comfortable reporting what they need to report um and then also below we have each one defined and we have our incident reporting as well as the bullying reporting that's the grid that's actually in um the slide deck and if you go back just one more though Christie just because I think uh what may be confusing for community members is is that folks may have been clicking on the educational Equity tab is that is that what you're getting at Mariah possibly well now that I've heard that it goes somewhere else other that we have multiple places that go to educate different sites absolutely right so go back over go back over to district and under educational Equity yes so here's every Department's page and right and then you see the education yeah but you get why that's completely confusing right right and see the educational Equity tab was it was not there a few weeks ago I see it's been reposted because we put it actually here on this page so we wouldn't have that confusion so I will speak to our Communications um director and make sure that that's removed because I think that'll help um with some confusion if that's out there in the community and since um and since we are having a dialogue um I'm wondering if the committee would indulge could we look at since we're on the website could we choose a school um and just look at what a Community member would see if they wanted to report at the building level or do we need to address that I think we can go back to that that was the original if you go back over to student and families and then under bullying prevention this is where it's always been the old form and the new improved form and then report to school administration if we click there there again and then we have the list of schools and again any Community member that Cho selects a school that report that they they complete will go to the school building administrator as well as myself and as well as Lisa and actually that has been working very well um to date that that process has worked for the responses we've received um that has been working very well so that can personally review every submission that is made and OSS can as I mean uh OE can as well so that has allowed us to have more eyes on uh the concern that's being raised so I have one question and then I'm going to go to Natalie and then Mariah just a followup to what I was asking so what H what happens if somebody emails you directly Claire with an issue or goes to a building leader um and has a conversation what what's the process in those circumstances and then how do you make sure that you're tracking all of the issues that you're you're reporting to us for example today so as soon as the alert comes in myself or chrisy see it and then we respond to it we always let the building leader know even though they get an alert on their own we always let them know so today one did come in and Christy sent it right over to the building leader and they were they responded already on it because they had received the alert themselves and then if someone sends a gist to our office and or to OSS myself Christy and Lisa are looking at those going through it typically we always respond with some form of communication that it was received we always want to make sure people know it was received and if there's a need for us to reach out and speak to them usually you know there's a field on there if they want to be contacted by someone from central office or if they don't sometimes they're Anonymous and they just have um they don't want us um to reach out to them but if they do we always reach out and get clarification as to what the issue was and then we typically we do always have to go back to the building leader but I guess my my question was what if they they're not using the form the question is what if they don't use the form what if they're shooting you an email or they're having a conversation with their building leader how is that right so how is that handled and then how is that tracked by ooss Central admin so if I were to get a email directly I'm going to log it in myself and the building leaders know if they get a report now we we realize that building leaders are getting things all the time people use the term bullying very Loosely but when it when they have to do an investigation they will actually put it in the form and some of the data that we have are actually from our building leaders who have entered the form that entered the data themselves it wasn't reported um necessarily by a parent something that they witnessed themselves or it was an email was sent to that building leader and they documented it themselves okay Natalia did you still have a question same question as yours I'm sorry that's okay um Mariah my question was that same question but I have a followup I actually have two follow-ups too well one followup and one separate question um when you and building leaders receive a direct email you're filling in the form what if like a teacher receives a report or their staff member are they filling in the form or how does like because there's so many other people who are seeing things and and who aren't just caregivers or building leaders I would say that we're still in process but we are informing that all of our teachers and and staff members when they witness something or if something is reported by a parent to them they notify their building leader so that's either going to be their assistant principal or the principal who automatically gets the alerts if they were if they were folks were putting it in on the form but we know that not all families are going to go and put it into the form they rather home school connection out it's staff doing it it's staff doing it they are chose to do it that that's part of the new process I don't know what was happening before I um I know in former districts that I worked in we've always tried to make sure that folks if something is reported to you often times our teachers and staff you know they they're pretty confident they can handle some of these issues on their own but they do need to report it to the building leader so it's actually we can track our data so that was my next question is is this data considered the tracking source for all data like is the are you is there some other place that we're tracking the data or is this form the resource the place where all of the reports are being collected right now this this is where we are collecting our bullying data and this is where we're collecting any kind of harassment and or discrimination data I can also jump in there too as well so I think one of the main things we wanted to do with the system is Ensure that it's automated that it's coded that way so that it isn't open to human error so every single time a form is submitted automatically the way it's coded an email from me goes out to every building the building leader associated with the incident as well as Lisa mat Claire and I also receive it as well so that no incident gets kind of lost in the shuffle of emails or gets lost in oh maybe I wasn't at my computer at that point so it's automated that always happens and also the data is automatically populated in each school's Excel spreadsheet of every single bullying incident for that school so it's easily reportable and easily accessible and it's also automatically populated in every school's Google drive folder that is only accessible by that principle and VP and all those incident reports live there as well so that no matter who so that we create a system that outlasts us also if CLA leave if I leave those things will live on and that data will always be accessible for years to come I think that's something that leaves and I can both speak to that it's been challenging um coming into the district and not being able to access some data that we've had previous so that was my next question was if you have any sort of ability to compare across years or is it kind of hard retroactively but you're hoping that going forwards you'll have data that's comparable across years is that and I spoke about that today because it's been kind of like in cyberspace and so we just recently we were looking for some data for for a family and we just found it and so that was great but it's been challenging because you know we've had you know lots of changes and so things were you know in in various places I do think um in talking to superintendent Giller we do probably need to be thinking going forward is there another place to house this um I think um right now we feel this is a safe mechanism but with transition people coming and going I do think we will probably need to speak with our Tech Team and you know um the folks who are handling our data right now to see what is a long-term way of trying to collect and and hold that data christe when you were talking about all the auto replies that go out is there one that goes out to the person who reported it and if so what does that say so right now they receive an auto reply but it's like the generic one from Google forms that their submission has been received and then the investigation and the response to that comes from either our office or from the building lead and that always occurs there's always closing of the loop yes yes I mean I think also this it takes a while to figure out how to code things now it is occurring every single time okay that personal response is something that's different though so the automatic reply is the submission but typically within 24 hours we always try to make sure that we respond to someone so we received a response yesterday and they that resp uh a receipt was sent out immediately that's automated but a personal response was sent out um the my last comment was just that on the educational Equity website there's a page about reporting which is different than the bullying and prevention page and so maybe it would just be nice to have that one link that menu link just funnel over so you have one place where all of this is going to right I think the one that is the one that's just for oee so you're suggesting that we would have the bullying on that page as well I would just have it go right to that bullying page right people can make that distinction I guess but without knowing that there's even a distinction if you were to start on the educational Equity page it' probably be good to know what your options are thank you for that no we going to have that taken down that other link that tab does not need to I mean it's good to have it on the menu but just have a bit of the but I don't think it needs to be on the main menu as educational Equity no no that one from the main menu should go or it should go to your educational Equity page not just the website right right like there there but then you have on the side of the educational sidebar of the educational Equity page something that says it says um I lost it now I know what you're talking about it says incident reporting which takes you to a different page than the um than the bullying prevention page right because there are there three forms so there's the bullying and then there's incident reporting because some people are just reporting there could be a form of harassment a form of discrimination and that's how they've been reporting and some of some of it's been staff some of it's been community members well whatever it is I think it should all be in one place as opposed to having it scattered on like not that you shouldn't link to it for multiple places but that people should be able to understand what their options are in reporting okay um if it's okay with everybody I'm going to go back to sharing the slide deck you can and then Mariah when you when we go back to that page could you take a look at the grid just so this is what we have right here yeah I wanted I had comments on it but I wanted to wait till I understood it more because I was like super confused by this but okay yeah but I also hadn't had time to process it yet so I wanted to look at it more closely here so that number one oops sorry that's okay so that number one where it says report to school administ so we just went over that that's the list of all the different schools and also myself um I'm sorry oee and OSS would get that alert and then if you wanted to just report to us independently and not report to a school leader now what we found with um number two that has been a few staff members who have reported to us and they did not want to notify their building leader and then the next one we're this is where we're really talking about um you know um I would say more of um harassment based on race ethnicity um gender where folks are just reporting directly to the office of educational equity and that's that form that's also on the website that you're referring to so but if I think I hear you correctly you're saying that you would you would want all this data to be collected in one location is that correct or would this grid have a du I I think it's helpful for people whichever page they land on to see what all their options are for reporting whether they land on OSS or OE or wherever they land that they know what all of their options are and I guess I I'm curious would you want more detail on this Pathways reporting grid here for folks to know or does this look like there's enough information because it does say say who will receive it what who can report it whe there's more information we need to list here please let me know well I also like the the word bullying doesn't appear on the grid and the word harassment and discrimination don't appear on the grid well harassment does but but isn't the bottom box discrimination sorry discrimination right yeah I think right that's like discrimination doesn't appear and bullying doesn't appear you're right harassment does yeah isn't the bottom row discrimin rather than bullying because bullying is repeated and discrimination could be a single event so yes so I think what we're saying is that under the first in the First Column it would be repeated intentional bullying and or harassment by the aggressor I guess what what confused me is that the title for this slide was bullying and the the bottom one was a discrimination rather than bullying right so go you want to respond I was just going to say I was just going to say on the website right before this table the terms bullying and discrimination using these definitions are defined right above it and then the first Branch would be bullying and the second branch is covering those incidents that are more discriminatory with the understanding that they at times overlap bullying can also happen on the basis of a protected class as well so then we're inviting community members to report as they see fit I think you need to have it in this table like you do on the website it needs to have the word bullying in that first box in the below yeah exactly that's an easy fix thank you I think you'll get confusing when you're defining bullying using the word harassment and not saying that the other what the other is and but I guess my other followup on that clear that we didn't get to was if somebody says they don't want to report it to school Administration or what have you what happens if there's something that you perceive as actionable on an employment level or you know some other way okay Leisa and I just spoke about this today too so often times you know when there's something that's happens with a staff member and let's say a building leader or two between two staff members but they don't want to reported to the building leader they will um reach out to our my office or they'll reach out to um leisa's office we have a dialogue about it but typically I I do remind folks that I'm not HR so sometimes this is a conflict between two staff members or even let's say a building leader and that has really moved over to HR for them to resolve that that is not something that um the office of educational Equity would handle um okay sorry coming in the clean um so that's typically how that would be handled um Lisa do you want to chime in I know know um you might have some comments about this as well oh I think um what you're what you're sharing is very accurate so if uh this is directly pertaining to staff um that human resources is directly involved and we know that human resources nest with Administration and finance OSS will absolutely step in on any and all student issues so sometimes a collaboration is required in terms of pre-investigation and then procedurally what direction to go in um if there was a staff member and a student involved for example um but those would be procedurally how that would be handled and oftentimes there been situations where you have two um people from the same bargaining unit that's that's Haven had an issue and we've reached out to Justin Brown and asked him to please take the lead on it Mari for the Discrimination um area is there a reason it goes to oee only and not to the school administration at the same time and and how is school administration looped in on an incident of reporting of discrimination so like I said typically what will happen is if a staff member reaches out to us if it's just a staff member we will have a conversation with them we will ask if we can speak to their building leader or we just pass it off to HR if it's between two bargaining unit members we have passed it off to Justin if there's a discrimination issue let's say a family a Community member in that way um has indicated this something around discrimination we usually have a conversation with that um so we've had a situation with one family they felt like something took place around discrimination we had a dialogue they initially did not want us to reach out to um a staff member but we indicated that for us to do a thorough investigation it would be important for us to to speak to that office and we were able to do that why isn't there a choice where people can report it to the school administration for example if there's an incident of a student with another student like why would there just like you have above two choices so that would be under harassment but if it's not harassment it's not repeated it happens once a student says a sler to another student it happened once I think we I think bullying is repeated harassment could be one event so that could fall under how can repeating events they only happening once so repeated but I guess what I'm saying is when if we when we update this form this would need to be repeated bullying and or harassment would be one and then we would need to add one um for discrimination I think I hear but I think the question is on discrimination why doesn't whoever the reporter is have the option of of reporting to the school administration OE and OSS they have used that um report to school administration and oee and OSS even if it has been for discrimination they just haven't but are they doing that because you haven't given them the form to report for discrimination well in the form it indicates that it asks you what what is they ask you maybe you can pull it up again Christy it asks you what it what is the reporting for and asks you whether it's race ethnicity it goes through all the categories right but it says to OE only right so what if I also what in Mariah's in Mariah's hypothetical where a student says a slur racial slur an ethnic whatever it is and it's the parent that student views it um wants to file a discrimination claim why is that only going OE I think is the question why why is it in that grid not the option to report to all the parties that you can report to for bullying can you click hold on one second can you click on the form for number one because I do believe it's covered in there maybe we just need to change the language on the side I think it's the Discrimination that we're talking about not not the bullying form it's the it's the bottom it's that bottom part of the grid that we're asking about yes I'm asking about discrimination s so it just looks like in that column Claire you have two ways one two in the harassment and there's only a one there's only a one why don't we repeat the same option below we can we absolutely can so are all three forms used for both bullying and discrimination so initially yes um and number one that would be used for discrimination and for bullying the way we were looking at harassment that that harassment could be one incident not necessarily bullying but using the same form okay I I do think that clarifying in that lower box that who you can report to and the different ways you can report um would be helpful because there there will be folks who do want to make sure that they're building leaders are hearing about it Andy I don't know whether this is even possible legally but it does seem to me like it puts a big burden on the victim or the reporter to decide whether something is discrimination or bullying like we might have trouble deciding that so like is it possible just to have a single type of reporting and then somehow it would be categorized by the experts in PSB rather than leading it up to the victim to have to figure that out I think our old our previous form um was just one form and was only bullying and harassment it didn't have anything for a category for discrimination other than the fact within the bullying and harassment that we just showed you could say it was based on race ethnic eth ethnicity and gender I think also too just some context as well the way that bullying data has to be reported by a school admin is different and so I think part of that was to offer two Pathways so we're not having administrators make the choice upon receiving reports about what is actually bullying and what is discrimination I think that having the two Pathways is to provide a clear mechanism for collecting and keeping our bullying data separately and then for our discrimin our discrimination data as well and also I think to one of the reasons for the OE form only is I think to the time when this was made we were generating these reports when very shortly after October 7th and I think at that point um it was still a work in progress how each school was handling these incidents and so I think we chose to have them directed to one office so that central office could be the decision maker and how those were handled so thank you for that that um Chris but I I guess I'm still puzzled by um the question that Andy raised which is I understand that for school um build for building leaders who are trained on what constitutes bullying this makes sense but I'm I'm still not understanding um why we can't make that pathway perhaps a little bit simpler for someone who isn't an expert on school policy to report and then have whoever it is OE the building leader whoever PSB admin determines to be that the Arbiter of which path or both paths um an incident goes down I I don't totally disagree I think Valerie I think you make a really good point we could make it um we could go back to a simpler form I do think we'd have to consider technology though I think and that's just something on the back end that we would have to consider um with the Google form I don't believe we'd be able I'm not sure that how easy it would be for us to be able to disaggregate that data but the older form did work in that way I don't know much much about that technology um but we could consider doing that um we would still have one for each school um we would still get the alerts on our end um we would just have to parse out the data in between it's really easy in Google forms you can just edit the Google sheet that it goes to you could edit a new column and you could note what you think it is Stephen yeah I I guess I just wanted to say that I was having the same excuse me I had the same uh my my mind was going in the same direction that Andy's was and that I was thinking that if if I was reporting or if I wanted to report I might not know the distinction between harassment bullying and discrimination and I might just just want to report um oh my my zoom is saying looks like you're done talking can you all still hear me yes oh okay maybe Zoom just thinks I'm not saying anything useful um and so it it might I I I thought it might just be helpful to have a simplified harassment discrimination and bullying reporting form that gets uh sorted by someone with expertise on the back end but for the purpose of having a a single simplified reporting form on the front end that didn't require any burden on the reporter right so I one I think we can oh I'm sorry to cut you off it's a little delay I apologize I think one of the things we have to consider also so even in the titling if we were to go back to just one form all the forms would what the one form would have to say bullying would have to say bullying I know that's U required by the state that that language be listed there uh we'd have and then we could include other language as far as the title I think I'm correct on that am I Lisa yes that it has to say that but we could combine um I think also to what Christy was saying I think early on when we were doing this we were trying to pars out to make it a little exra to make it a little bit easy even for the reporters but um your perspective is noted that it seems like it might be actually more challenging for them to have to pick and choose the definitions on the website are listed there but it still may be difficult for families so I I I'll take a note on that I think also it's important to note too that there was previously a report mechanism for discriminatory incidents available through PSB but it was only hard copy and so if we're talking about the the burden on the reporter at that point they would have to fill it out and come in person to submit that to central office and I think when we're talking about how does that protects people how does that create a safe environment to report I think this is a second iteration where they can report anonymously and they can report from their own home from wherever they are as well um and I think also to just one thing that I wanted to put out there is I understand that Google forms like it's easy to do some things on Google forms but the coding on the back end that has had to go into this to make every single part of this system go to generate the responses in the Google Sheets for the ease of principles and for reporting to generate this in the Google Drive folders that are confidential to only those School leaders and to central office leaders so that we can have this data for years to come all those things it isn't that easy it takes a lot of work to make it happen so I just wanted to be clear about that because it's not just something where we like drop something in on Google forms and the whole system works Mariah um on that point it seems like Christie it's easier to have one form as opposed to having to maintain all the different coding and access on three different forms um and I and I do definitely agree with everyone who said the um putting the burden not on the reporters but on the experts um the other question I had is like with this data um how do we ensure that it's secure in Google Drive and I I think that's what I was getting to and when I said that we you know we have talked um with Dr Giller and and thinking about we need to start to consider another mechanism I think in the um short term this was really good in the beginning I mean we started doing this christe came on in November we instantly started working on these forms and they were released in in early December um and as we get into how much we've collected you know we haven't had many um incidents that have been reported we've been we have enough to manage but as we move forward I do think we need to have something that's a little bit more secure Ure what we had before as far as reporting bullying seemed to me from my understanding that it was it was Secure we just had no way of getting having access to it so I do think we need to consider another mechanism I don't know what that technology looks like but that's something that we have been talking about and thinking about what we need to do going forward so it was so secure you couldn't get the results out of it is that what happened well yeah I think because no one knew where where it was literally out there in cyberspace but we were able to access a few so going forward we don't want that to happen I think to what Christy was also saying having you know having it in one place has been great in case people do leave but I think there's other mechanisms out there we just have to figure that out with our team because it's a such sensitive data yeah I don't need to say anything else okay no absolutely so here we have some of the um the actual data that we have received so this is the PSB bullying incident reports received we've had a total of 14 what time frame clear are is this starts from December the first week in December to today and this was bullying but it's really bullying and discrimination correct well no we have some another slide that we'll go to so this is um General 11 we had two bullying where they were actually using that that language bullying based on race and ethnicity was two and then for religion it was one and then so can I ask what con General bullying is just targeting a student typically you know what what what we would call bullying in regards to you know kids Hing around I won't say horsing around kids feeling as though they're being victimized like on a playground without any racial epithets or anything like that or things um anything around gender no racial slurs or discriminatory language and so that we infer or imply that based on based what was reported based on what's reported and investigated okay I mean I guess I'd be curious to understand the breakdown of the students who were bullied at some point whether they identified as students of color students disabilities um the ones that are categorized as general whether they identified as queer what whatever the case may be I think also too with general like without breaking any confidentiality I think in those instances it's um from reading through all the reports it is and from knowing the people who submitted them and the students who are associated with them these I think are like Claire said it's more of those um like things that occur between kids um that it does not seem and the people have named it as they don't feel that race ethnicity religion any of these categories factored into that who who has named it the people that are reporting the incidents or the people who are involved in the incidents if it's a witness reporting it okay we're not relying on sixth graders to identify because they're all being investigated by the building leader so again so we would receive this report but the building lead is receiving this report and they're doing a thorough investigation on their end perhaps when you come to policy with with this data we could maybe see a breakdown of the um the bullying victims and if if we know any data regarding their race ethnicity disability status any of these other categories that we're talking about sure thanks you're welcome and I think to see patterns right and be able to identify patterns to see if there is really something happening that we're just not um as good at identifying and also just so that everybody knows most of the people that have submitted these reports are caregivers on behalf of their kids um so I think it's to your point it's not just like sixth graders or second graders determining what's going on and filling that out it's I think think they're largely it has been their parents um labeling it as general but I think the point is that people who are vulnerable may not be the words people are saying to them may not be explicitly racial epithets or religious epithets but they are still being targeted for some reason for some reason no I I understand what you're getting at we can get that breakdown for you thanks you're welcome and then here we have the um the Discrimination incident reports we we see 15 um so seven based on race and ethnicity six based on religion and then we had two other what does other mean in this context I mean that have you listed all of the protected classes across the bottom other was just in case there was something that people felt like was not included in one of those classes that they felt they were being discriminated because of you know I like if people want to excise discrimination anything like that so it's included there I see can you go back to that slide yeah let me just pull it up a little there you go now would you want the same breakdown on this I can get would you like that breakdown for policy for all the slides I think it would be helpful okay I just want to make yeah I mean this one is a bit different right because there isn't that General category being the there there's no General category that's the largest number of reports I mean these are fairly specific I am I have to say surprised that there's no sexual orientation gender identity disability or age at all reported in that time frame um I'm not sure whether to be pleased with that or um perhaps wonder whether people are reporting and so this data just just to clarify all of this is gets investigated and gets reported back to the person who identified it not necessarily the details but that it was investigated and whether something was determined to be discrimination or not yes if if they if they wish there are some people who be put anonymously and they do not want they they I they literally indicate they do not want to be contacted okaying us um two quick questions one I'm sorry if I missed this does this reflect only the um incident reports through the uh the the form on the website or does this include um other submissions through say teachers to principals to uh other building administrators Etc it's a collaborate a combination of the the form as well as um building leaders okay thank you and two I remember Christina you talked a while back about um a snapshot that that Oe was taking in advance of the uh the larger survey I'm wondering if there's any qualitative data that you collected alongside this that could help us understand um the frequency of reporting um so yes the form that when we talked about that snapshot before that was something that went to all adults in the building so all Educators par professionals principes Etc um for them to fill out about their own experiences with belonging um within their individual building so a little bit I a little bit connected but a little bit different I think because of course like we want everyone reporting especially I realize that's not quite the same right I think to one thing just though to your point and also with what Val said there is this question raised about like who feels comfortable to report and what are they reporting because is it is it true truly as we all hope to believe that there is nothing happening with these that nobody's experienced any sort of discrimination on the basis of these categories or is it that they're not reporting and if so why not and I think that's where our next the next iteration of our work lies and I would also just say that you know in regards to the couple of cases that we refer to here with our staff um that would be somewhat related to um some of the feedback the snapshot feedback that we received um I I think there's perspective on it but this is experiences that people believe they've had um and so we don't want to ever dismiss that and I would also say that um as we think about um students who feel comfortable I mentioned a couple of weeks ago when we did our residency at the high school students are very Frank with us about not feeling comfortable um reporting um we've been encouraging um Christy spending a great deal of time over there with some of our um students and we are encouraging them every day to feel comfortable to report but some of them just are not willing to do that and so it's something that I think we need to work on around school climate um District climate and culture and here we have the bullying incidents by school so you have we have BHS at 6 Lawrence at three and then the following schools beat trisco frr hay and ronl all at one and nothing at beg or linkoln or Pierce and I also just wanted to share one thing when we look at this data too I think it's important as CLA had mentioned before we have administrators that are reporting incidents that have come to their attention as well on this so a school having a higher number of incident reports doesn't necessarily say anything about the culture I think it also says something about the proactivity of those administrators in reporting things that come to their attention as well and then we have the Discrimination by school SCH unnown me mean it was I don't know in the broader PSB Community or what what does that mean exactly so this is the incident that um we emailed about a little bit earlier today um this is an incident that was reported by a Community member but did not directly involve any PSB student staff member or known PSB member of the community I see oftentimes if there's something that that's out in the community that's that's will get notified that this is happening this is a discrimination it could be something that feel appears to be linked so with this particular incident there's a survey that was out in the community in regards to the schools that wasn't put out by us but was put out by a Community member and there's some things that are on that that were um reported on that document that they reported to our offices as discriminatory and then in some of the instance we we've heard about um or issues that have been raised at say events that are happening in one of our buildings what how are those handled where something is reported as occurring in a building but not during the school day where does that show up in this data if anywhere so typically um what we have received is we have received um a complaint in regards to um like public forum which is um is a a public um Forum that's used like Municipal folks anyone on this particular public form with a PSB email has access to it um people go on to this particular site they have goods and services and they advertise events and from time to time there's been something on that particular site that someone has had issue with and they have reported it to us and does that where does that show up I guess is that school unknown no that that is actually not collected in this particular data here so how do we track that kind of issue of whether it's race based religion or so I'm collecting that data we've actually only had two I'm collecting that data trying to determine do we create another form for that um given it's something that we don't have control over but keep trying to keep track of it and here you can see where um we've had 13 non-anonymous and the one Anonymous for the bullying and discrimination um 10 non Anonymous and five Anonymous bisa you were around for last school year how how does the at least the bullying data line up with how we were doing last year we can't hear you it's consistent I have to be honest and say I was relying on my own reporting um you know recording of data excuse me not reporting but recording of data because um Claire and I have really struggled with trying to recreate uh old data um so but this is consistent with uh what I was seeing last year and responding to thanks all right so you've been good about having us ask questions along the way anybody else have questions Mariah does this include the title n reporting it does right it's all one thing like if someone were to make a complaint under Title 9 to the title 9 coordinator it does okay and so based on this it means that we haven't had any Title Nine complaints all year you're on mute Lisa we have had only two uh complaints and um they have not been determined to be Title Nine but more of bullying uh behavior in that slide yes yes yes but I think that that is something we're really thinking about you know in terms of um just as you know we've talked about this evening in terms of you know the advantages of just one reporting form and having a um a knowledgeable administrator codes something correctly we've wanted to be responsive to all complaints someone may think uh that something is a Title Nine but pre-investigative process and a phone call might lead us in a different direction so we want to make sure that we're not minimizing or dismissing any concerns that that a person may believe can be categorized in one way but really needs to be categorized in another but so um I guess I'm still confused Lisa because ostensibly that would be based on gender or gender identity expression even if it's then determined to be bullying and not a legal Title Nine violation but on the bullying slide it said zero for gender identity or expression so well I think you're making my point that the that the the comp the complaints that I received misinterpreted and I would not expect um there to be necessarily understanding that they thought that something was uh fell into the umbrella of Title 9 but it fell into another category so with all Title 9 um I I see title six or Title 9 we do an immediate Outreach to um the person if we're able to really explore and clarify um the specific situation that a person is concerned about I'm going to on that for a second Stephen th this is off topic so if you want to pursue that point I can wait oh I I guess just in that instance Le if we stick with Title Nine could you just give an example of what what was the bullying that wasn't then gender based so I'm trying to not violate um to give the specific situation um there was a a concern that uh a staff person um might have made a gender based comment towards a student um but upon exploration it actually did not happen nothing but I guess but I I guess my understanding of this data that we've been looking at is that it's allegations not necessarily substantiated allegations am I incorrect in that Claire in what we've been looking at yes yes am incorrect or I'm correct no no no no the allegations okay so that's not what you said earlier because you said earlier that um there was something you said earlier about how you were logging things in and then investigating them I'm pretty sure that's if a principal receive something if a family Community member staff member doesn't put it into the form themselves when it's reported to an assistant principal or teacher they have to then bring it to the building leader the building leader needs to upload it into the form themselves because I guess I think it is valuable to understand the allegations whether or not they're substantiated later on is a different question exactly right so I think I just want to because I I I think we're all talking around this so are those 15 or 14 are those allegations or are those substantiated allegations allegations all allegations okay so then Lisa I'm confused at what happened with yours would that still not have been logged at the time as a gender-based allegation it was not a form that was completed it was a phone call and so it was not recorded um in this data I thought Claire said that we were recording all methods of data collection this this particular example that I'm giving was not um was not recorded how come Lisa well because there are right at this time there's we're still you know answering questions and going through a pre-investigative process so I will need to enter that data um but we're still trying to clarify some information and there are some concerns about um whether the person who made the initial Outreach wants to remain anonymous or uh whether um we will be recording it as is our typical process so more information might be available at another isn't isn't there a difference like when we think about the data there's the data of the allegation and then there's the data of the investigation and the allegation was a gender and there might be separate columns in your thing that you know as you fill in the Google sheet or whatever your data collection tool platform is that say whether or not it was substantiated or not or what you determined it to be like because otherwise we just have a weird mix of we just don't have a complete understanding of what's going on right mhm can I change the subject a little bit but not really sure to what extent do we think that staff and the community are actually using this to what extent do we think that this reflects a complete set of data and to and how are we giving making sure that staff and community members have access to these forms so we reminders out I'm sorry it's a little bit of a delay um so we've sent reminders out um we've expressed to the building leaders to remind staff members about it um so that they know that they can um anytime that we you know christe and I have an audience with anyone so we're doing our residencies we are reminding folks um as things bubble up please feel free to reach out to our office but also go to the main website if there's anything around bullying so we are letting them know that we're collecting this data um you know um on the other hand I will also say that you know when I look at the data um the forms went live in like the first week of December if I look at what was only sent into us we had we had 10 in December which makes sense to me because you know at that particular time we were still in in in a very high crisis mode and and trying to figure out how to respond to things that happening in the district we had two in January and then we had three this week and one for sure doesn't relate to the district at all um then when I look at what um what's been reported to the schools um so take the high school for instance they had um seven allog together one in December two in January two in February and two in March so um there hasn't been a lot um I would say that on on the side that you know um kids are feeling pretty well adjusted and feeling safe and that thing good things are happening but we also know there's other things that are happening I mean I've tried to be really transparent in regards to having real conversations with specifically young adults the our high schoolers and even some of our middle middle schoolers have been transparent so um it's I just think we have to get to a place where people feel comfortable and safe and again when Christy and I have had an audience with um parent groups um staff meetings we are let letting folks know that you know we we want to collect this data it may be tough to receive but it's the only way that we can work and um work to um to make things better so can I just make one followup just sorry yeah go ahead yeah just that um I'll give one example um which is as being a Lawrence parent and we had an extensive message about um bullying in February from the principal but there was no link to report bullying so as a community member like that's not that wasn't something broadcast to us and I'm not sure I I think that given what we know about um how important the community sees this as a direct message going out to everybody and would be one step to um help people understand what the resources are and I'm not saying that message should have gone out to the principal with the link but it could have gone out um with the link no that's so again I just I don't I wouldn't have even known what to do until this meeting oh okay we have put it in the superintendent update I can make sure that more frequently it's listed there um but think it deserves maybe its own message Claire I mean I think that these things are get buried and I remember that Maria latas in previous years used to put out like messaging around um like Title 9 policy there was like some sort of I think they were like um mandated messages honestly probably like she legally mandated to push out as oneoff but there's something to receiving a message that's not one line buried in L's 20 Pages if you print it out Weekly Newsletter so um just say absolutely do that I think that's a great suggestion Claire has there been and now I'll go to You Stephen has there been any followup so for example at school committee you know we'll get a report through the student rep to the school committee with um you know videos of Jewish and/or Israeli students students Arab and or Muslim Students expressing their concerns about issues at the high school when that comes up in that way where there I don't remember how many students were interviewed on those videos several is that followed up on by oee is that just taken as a report if they don't I guess if they don't file separately how has that been handled when there's sort of a um a grouping like that so initially when those reports were coming we went um directly to Anthony um to discuss with him and get an audience with the students some students were open to seeing um us and some were not um and then many of those meetings that took place were with um reparing caregivers and then that's when we had our listening sessions and things like that um however Christy can speak to some of the work that she's doing with some of our community members too I mean I think you all raised such a good point about like well with everything that we're hearing about why are the report numbers as low as they are and I think to me it gets at the whole purpose of the office which is well who feels the power to report and what do they feel the power to report and so I think part of the work that we're doing is we know that many incidents are coming out of the high school because of the sheer number of students that it has so I'm now there as the adviser for the Muslim and Arab Students Association because I think there are pockets of students that we've come into contact with that have said they they're aware of the report but they don't feel comfortable because they're afraid of retaliation if they report on these things and I think there's so much that creates the environment where people feel that and so I think where I'm concentrating myself is being on the ground with the people that are reporting the most um hesitant to report and figuring out why that is and creating the supports for them so that they know that they are backed up thanks Stephen um thanks so first of all I just want to acknowledge that I feel like the this oee has done a lot of work in pushing us forward with all this Christina thank you for creating the Google forms thank you for centralizing this thank you for making this a creating a digitized version of this so I feel like we've been interrogating you guys but I just want to just take a moment to acknowledge that you guys have pushed us forward so thank you you for that um randomly I feel like this is one of the few areas where I have just a little bit of expertise because I've worked on a lot of programs that work with students and have been required to have safeguarding policies with those students and it's been a it's been a common practice for our programs or for programs in my field to uh to do two things and and they both seem able here one is to have a a single message to the students that we work with about what they need to do if they feel at all vulnerable or if they feel harassed discriminated against or or or bullied and to me that that squares with Andy's initial comment that it would be simplest if they had one reporting form or one place to go and in my mind that means one URL that is widely broadcast and the second is that there's always a poster or quite simply one simple um piece of branded collateral that's that's broadly disseminated and that becomes something that students uh can can becomes part of the wallpaper but they know where to see it if they need to find where to go to actually do the reporting and both both steps of that safeguarding policy seem like a good part of an Outreach strategy so although I I think the work that you both are doing to to collect um specific qualitative data to help understand what are the obstacles to student reporting that I think is necessary to really get that nuanced view I think there're also just some good practices that could overcome some generic obstacles like putting out um posters and all the schools saying are you being harassed bullied or discriminated against tell us go to www.brooklyn.com report dpsb or whatever the URL is a single form maybe on the form it says something about the the kinds of um harassment that that person might be engaged in or not depending on what you think is best maybe that's coded on the back end by an expert or not but that that there's a simple reporting um opportunity but that the person just knows it's easy and Anonymous and and the real critical thing is just to get the data and what we do with the data is the is the next step so I think that I think that Outreach step would really really beho us to to to to step up right now now that we've taken that first step of digitizing this and starting to be more aggressive about collecting and pushing out an information form so those are my thoughts right now thank you so much I like that idea the poster we can do with a QR code make it simple for students yeah and usually there's been some some arresting graphic nothing explicit just something that has like a picture of a kid in a room or just something that shows that there's that the kid is somebody that the kid can relate to or or something that and they go to a place and they could do an action that's it and there's one place to go and that place is constantly repeated okay I'll stop thank you thanks Stephen other questions I just want to endorse that idea and endorse putting it places like inside bathroom stalls or you know what I mean like in like we have those we have our those forms in all of our bathrooms at work and it's very effective to see them in those kinds of places so yeah I I agree um I endorse it as well and you know I think that everywhere right gy gymnasiums and places where students are are um changing and you know whatever it may be that they're in locations that um where students will find them and where they may have a little bit of privacy to look at it any other questions thank you Claire and Christie for for this um we had public comment on the agenda but um I asked Betsy just before the meeting and nobody had signed up is is there anybody in the attendees who wishes to make public comment if so please raise your virtual hand give it a second is the hand raising function definitely turned on that's what I'm gonna ask Betsy is the hand raing function on it's on yes okay all right give folks a second I can I just while your doing the public comment waiting for people I also think that there really is um more education probably needed too about like some of these terms so to the extent that we can do more public education on you know some sometimes I don't even sometimes like short clips of like this is not okay someone does something this is not okay you know whatever it is like there's a whole bunch of things that people um tolerate even for themselves that they should know is not appropriate they shouldn't have to tolerate it and I'd love if we could do more education I know I know that the there's plenty of people working on that still but just I know that a lot of people need to hear it more right this needs to be more than already I agree and to the extent we have little PSAs that we can put up on the electronic um you know the the message boards at some of the schools that have the electronic um message boards that would be great too we can put these up there Natalia and then we'll go to public comment I think a big picture question for me is how often should school committee be receiving this data in what format and you know when would something rise to concern and something that for me was difficult in this presentation is the merging of data around staff and around students and families and i' if I were to be seeing this regularly I'd like that disaggregated by those two communities at least that makes good sense do we have a policy on this I thought we did have a policy on this being the STA or is it not a policy on this it's some further it's a policy on the hiring data on the retention H that one is once a year but we don't have data on seeing or we don't have policy on harassment reporting I I'll check with David I actually think that there is something I think but it only but it might only be annual so I think if we want annual would be yeah you know yeah I I believe it's annual um and right and so once we have this collection mechanism going well with you able to access the data we'll be able to do that maybe on a school year or July 1 to June 30 or however makes sense for reporting purposes um I I mean I'm sure again when you come back at policy David will know what the date is in the policy that is um set out there um Carolyn Betsy can you move Carolyn all over please thanks three minutes Caroline hi go ahead thank you you're muted Carolyn uh she's rejoining now as a panelist okay great thanks hi um Carolyn Salam a town meeting member um thanks for all this information which I admit I'm sort of peripherally listening to but I like to try to tune in um just going back if someone wouldn't mind clarifying there was a moment a while ago where um two things were noted one reported one not reported and one was described as something I think that didn't involve a student or a staff or a parent and didn't happen in school but it was reported and then something to do with an email or you didn't say email or Facebook I don't know what but it's some kind of electronic communication among staff and there was a complaint um and that wasn't reported so would someone mind just kind of clarifying there a little bit kind of what if it's not sort of an in school what gets reported and counted or addressed and and and not and also the addressing question like and just forgive me if I'm really naive about all this but I'm try that's why I'm asking like so sometimes you just want to report something even if there's no mechanism for any kind of addressing like if it's out has nothing to do with school so just I wouldn't mind a sort of review on that if someone doesn't mind thank you I I'll take a stab at it so in regard to the forms that we have online they are for reporting any kind of incident that takes place with a a student um Community member um and or teacher staff that are related to the schools so for instance um even if something were to happen on a playround uh with two students or something like that we've had um in in the past someone's reported that like at after school on the way home they see kids fighting or something like that and it's a it's a bullying situation that's something that in the past has been reported has not been reported this year but I know has been reported in the past um something that we typically wouldn't do a full investigation on is um we have recently received a report that came in um it was a report in regards to a um online survey that was put out by a Community member that was in regards to the schools not a survey that we put out um somebody then made some um really in inappropriate comments like horrible comments on that particular survey they reported it to us for us to investigate we don't have the purview to investigate an outside survey um it's not it wasn't our survey um so that was something that that came in under the unknown I'm not sure if you had a chance to see that slide that was the unknown document piece um can I ask us pull up to that sorry I'm I'm confused though this outside survey used was sent to PSB families or it's completely unrelated it's unrelated it was it's about the schools so it's on change.org somebody put a put together a survey on change.org someone responded it wasn't a student and or Community member with a PSB email that we could see um it could have been AI I don't know but it was wasn't it wasn't it was a nasty response had a PSB email attached did not it did not no right and so that is reported as under that was reported under it wased it was reported under discrimination and then sorry not to now I'm a little interested so like when you talk about and I know you were this was anecdotal and you were saying it was I think you said it was not this year but somebody observe fighting and then that's reported as bullying I mean I don't like fighting and that's troubling to me but how does that fit the definition of bullying um I'm not saying that it would we'd have to do a full investigation but oftentimes if students were walking through the playground as they were leaving school and appearance saw let's say a larger child really p in a smaller child they may reported as bullying or if they heard a racial slur they would reported as bullying and or discrimination and or harassment so and what I'm saying is in the past those are the types of reports we have received from community members what we're receiv receiving this year have been Direct in regards to specific students and so then if just if I could understand a little better in contrast to the survey which I don't know what you're talking about so it's hard for me to sort of get concrete on it but a survey that didn't have anything to do with the schools don't know if it was don't know who the comment was but it was an unpleasant comment or a horrible comment um then if you could just contrast that with what you described that wasn't reported that I think you said was staff advertising events and that was reported to you but not reported but not noted it's not noted I we we definitely recorded it so I have all the information it's not recorded in the Discrimination data that was presented this evening so if you don't mind me asking how is that not and then something that didn't have to do with anything that has is connected to the schools is it it was not I I so for clarity the situation with the online um survey that was not reported somebody put it in but we didn't put it in so what I'm saying is we opened it up oh oh oh I'm sorry I understand okay okay so you were reporting on what was reported to you yes online thank you I'm so sorry now that's completely clear okay apologies okay I I promise to pay much closer attention to the whole meeting next time thank you you're welcome Carn um just so to reiterate this is comment um period so Jesse we're gonna pull you over and um give you three minutes for comment hi good afternoon Jesse here hi Jesse go ahead to meeting member for recing 14 um I had just two quick questions one is um the data I didn't catch it when were the data started to be collected for this new Google form to Google sheet system how December December to December till recent okay so that's that's what I thought I heard and then I guess the second goes back to something Christina was talking about her residency in the school I think it's wonderful that she's spending time with the students uh you said you said you're starting now like with the Muslim and Arab students that's that's great um I guess my question was how I mean this is not only to you I mean it's it just needs some thoughtful response from from all of us I think is how can we make students more comfortable to talk about what they're experiencing so that the data that we collect with the system you've put together will better reflect the school culture what kids are experiencing I mean I think that's an incredible question I think it's the thing that we ask ourselves every day and I think we are kind of attacking that from so many various angles the piece that I can speak to I think is number one is getting into the schools and having a presence there so that the kids feel comfortable to report those the families do and so the administrators and teachers actually feel comfortable to tell us the things that are hard to say to us the things about like where do they feel that they're falling short where do they feel that they need help with setting the culture in the school and what what practices do they need help and training on so that we can actually create that environment for every kid at every school to that point I think one thing that we're doing is um I've started to take from all these instant reports and also from like informal data from teachers from principles Etc the main incidents that keep coming up right like the things that we're hearing across the district like it's these things it's these things with these slurs it's these things and then creating videos of how I would respond to each in the moment as a teacher and making those resources available to teachers and administrators and presenting on them at the schools because I think that's the first step we have to as adults we have to be able to talk about it so that we can even begin to create an environment where kids can talk about about it um so I think we're really focused on the creation of those materials the videos as well as written templates that teachers and administrators can refer to to communicate things that are hard that happened in the classroom with families such as when a student or if a student says this Le in class how are we communicating with the offending students family to ensure that we're creating a culture of accountability in all schools and that we're closing that Loop so that this actually stops happening thank you that's an amazing question thank you can can I just say that I I think um the work of getting kids to be trusting about reporting isn't really about reporting it's about having them find safe adults in school and that's that's work that's very separate from bullying harassment and uh discrimination and that goes on that's that's that's that's a culture Challenge and that's the initiative of individual Educators in the building and the extent to which it happens is the extent to which that question is answered and there's always going to be a significant extent to which it is not answered for some students which is why I think there needs to be a a clearly demarked space that is anonymous and um and that is uh safe and neutral for students to report because I think for many students who they will they will always feel vulnerable after having been harassed or bullied or discriminated against and that's why in an anonymous reporting form excuse me that's clearly made safe that that's clearly shown to be a safe place for reporting there's really not a substitute for it and that's clearly um shown to be independent of the school itself even well separate but related Stephen right when our data shows that students of color are far less likely to identify an adult a safe adult in um their school so but I my point is that it has to be independent of the school so it it they have to see the form as a place that is not going to be adjudicated by the school but some system that oversees the schools like super neutral outside the school yeah I mean to the extent the problem inheres in the system then that's a problem that is going to remain a problem but I think um if they if some students feel that they are appealing to oversight outside of the school then that will that will be that will be felt as a more neutral space Mariah on this point I think that another opportunity for Partnership if you're not already considering this as you get out the word is some of the um student groups at the high school I presume you're already partnering with them but to the extent they can also help you um to get out the word to their members and to other students um about this opportunity or even themselves be reporters um for their peers who may feel feel more vulnerable um that would be a great opportunity too no it is a wonderful opportunity I think the residents have have proven to really give us a lot of information about student experience and um you know um students also often take the lead on a lot of this work and I think you you know really trying to give them the time um and the space to actually lead and and tell us what they need is what we're trying to do I think Christina is doing a great job with that um trying to partner um being with this is an issue I want to be transparent about that there's only two of us and so um as we consider um coming to the close of all all of our entry findings and really putting together a solid what we would you know call a road map of what we how we reimagine the office it it you know there's a lot of great work that we want to be able to do um being with is going to be issue with some of it but definitely taking these pieces because we want to make sure ultimately that we stay student centered um which is what uh Christy really has been doing um with her work over at the high school and the amazing work she's been doing at frr with teachers and staff it's been pretty powerful so um we're making some Headway but um the part we hear you on the Partnerships and and we are um making sure that we're doing that right it's 6:33 I be mindful of of folks time any other questions before we adjourn all right have a great evening everybody