(l-r) Board President Virginia De La Piedra, F.H.S. Band Leader Greg Godfrey, and Toni Doktor. Doktor was presented the Students First Award for her generous donation of a Baldwin Grand Piano valued at $10,000 to the District’s Music Program.

At the regularly scheduled meeting on Tuesday, March 1 the Fillmore Unified Board of Education in their nearly last order of business, followed Superintendent Jeff Sweeney’s recommendation to “create more flexibility [in the budget]” by learning more about the option of “embedding” health education at the high school and middle school into physical education classes. The Board requested to hear from secondary PE teachers at a future meeting, but made no inquiry into hearing from the high school Health teacher who was in attendance at the meeting. This item was listed on the meetings agenda as an “Information/Discussion” item called “Graduation Requirements”.

Currently Fillmore High School mandates that all students take one semester of Health in order to graduate. The State does not require this. In March 2008 the California State Board of Education developed Health Education Standards aligned with the mission to “encourage the highest achievement of every student by defining the knowledge, concepts, and skills that students should acquire at each grade level.” While clearly describing the health standards that should be taught at each level the bill, Assembly Bill 689, does not require schools to follow the standards. According to the California State Education Core Standards (online at www.cde.ca.gove/be/st/ss/) “Students need health education.” The description of the standards emphasizes, “Health Education… addresses the physical, mental, emotional and social aspects of health [and] teaches students how to maintain and improve their health…[skills which] foster academic achievement, increase attendance rates and improve behavior at school.” The statement goes on to say “Quality health education programs help students achieve their highest academic potential.” Some of the standards outlined by the State include; “Analyzing influences, Accessing valid information, Interpersonal communication, Decision Making, Goal Setting, Practicing Health enhancing behaviors” and so on. Aspects of these standards include education on healthy eating, reproductive health, sex education and other information geared at preventing teen pregnancy and drug use. Sweeney indicated that he would ask the PE teachers to come before the Board to report how they can incorporate the Health education standards into their classes. If the Board chooses to eliminate the separate Health classes, this will mean that the elective section will be eliminated, and thus approximately 160 students who currently take that class every day will need to be placed in other classes, further increasing class size. The Board is faced with daunting cuts in state funding and has reportedly issued “pink slips” to site administrators and is preparing to issue more to staff throughout the district although the public has yet to see any Board discussion or evaluation of District administrative positions, salaries, compensation plans or attorney fees.

During public comment Mountain Vista Principal Chrissy Schieferle informed the Board that March is National Read Across America month. She invited Board members to come and read to classes in celebration of Dr. Seuss’ Birthday on March 2nd. The Board then invited Fillmore High School Band Leader Greg Godfrey to speak regarding the recent donation of a Baldwin Grand Piano valued at $10,000. The donation was made by Toni Doktor a parent of a recent Fillmore High Graduate. Doktor was presented with a Students First award by Board President Virginia De La Piedra.

The Board heard from all Department Chairs from the high school. In attendance were: Lucinda Francis, Social Studies; Linda Beylik, Career/Technical Education; Mark Sebek, Math; Matt Dollar, English; Tim Waddell, Science; Trina Tafoya, Special Education; Rosalind Mitzenmacher, Visual and Performing Arts; Lourdes Juarez, Foreign Language; Kari Appleford, Physical Education. These teachers presented information regarding how they are using the RTI (Response to Intervention) schedule to improve, collaborate and meet their goals. Dollar spoke first commenting “one of the things for the English department… we never had enough time to meet.” He explained that the RTI schedule has allowed for the entire department to meet and address issues as they arise. Dollar emphasized the importance of “9th grade teachers meeting with 9th grade teachers… and so on.” So that “anchor papers” can be created and all students assessed against the same expectations. “[We value] the time… [This schedule] provides the time to look at data … really break it down.” Board Clerk Dave Wilde asked “What [is the English Departments] most pressing goal?” Dollar responded “Most importantly we really spend a lot of time with the 10th graders before they take the high school exit exam” He explained they use the RTI time “to work with the students to prepare.” Board Member Lucy Wilde inquired as to whether there will “ever be time that you can get together with the 8th grade teachers to go over some of the things you see that the incoming 9th graders might be lacking…?” Dollar replied “We’ve been able to do that in the past [when the schedules matched, this year they do not match]” He indicated they are communicating via email with Fillmore Middle School Vice Principal Scott Carroll. Assistant Superintendent Katy Hadley commented “[In the past] we’ve provided money for a half day sub, we still have some money [for that] release time… if there is a need you just need to let me know.” Board Member Tony Prado inquired about what kind of emphasis the English Department is putting on writing. Dollar explained the grade level standards are emphasized and writing is a big part of that. He reported, “We have shied away from one of the standards for a very long time… speech. Which is very important…this year [in the 10th grade] we are going to have a [unit] on speech.” Prado continued the questions asking “[What is the number of] D’s and F’s in the department?” Dollar responded, “When you are here long enough you see peaks and valleys... you see some very exceptional classes come through and others that aren’t. That makes it really difficult to assess that. I know that we’ve had a D and F problem, in our department it always comes down to this, they just don’t turn their work in…” Prado inquired, “How are we going to solve that problem?” “That is what we have RTI for.” responded Dollar “We can put those students in a class…work with them…you can press them into at least getting started on that.” Each department head shared the view of the importance of the time provided for collaboration to focus and align the curriculum and to target help to students that need it. Francis reported that World History CST (California Standardized Test) scores have gone up 40 points. She explained that the History department is also using the time for enrichment, inviting local college professors to come and speak to staff to “give us some of that content knowledge to dive deeper into the curriculum.” All departments indicated their focus on bringing writing into every class. Beylik informed the Board in the many ways that writing is brought into classes such as woodshop and agriculture. Sebek commented that similar to the English department, the Math department also focuses on preparation for the exit exam, as well as aligning the way Math is taught at the middle school and high school. A struggle is with preparing kids for Algebra I. A pre-algebra class has been created, and the middle school has done an 8th grade assessment test to help place students in the correct class when they enter the 9th grade. Wilde asked “[Some] teachers [report their] students sense of apathy and lack of willingness to participate… what are you doing to combat [that]?” Sebek responded “What I am trying…getting these kids to just bring a book and do something is hard…I have gone to these workbooks, with the new group of kids at least in the second semester [it seems to be helping].” When Wilde pressed about how supporting math across departments has been handled, Sebek explained “We’ve discussed it… it usually goes back, no offense to English, to AR [Accelerated Reading] everything goes back to English.” Indicating that the focus is always on English rather than math. “So you don’t feel really anything has been done [to support math across departments]?” questioned Wilde. “No, not really” Sebek responded. Waddell jumped in explaining that “Science [classes, may] be in the perfect position to [incorporate more math in lessons].” He explained, “It is painfully obvious that we should be doing more of this.” (For the complete conversation with department heads see: www.fillmorgazette.com/school-matters) During her opportunity to speak before the Board Juarez from the Foreign Language department informed the Board that the Spanish textbooks used in the “non native speaking” classes are now twelve years old. She continues to hope for new books.

Issues in the PE department include waiting for phones that are reportedly in the mail so that instructors can contact parents, as well as installing a washing machine and dryer for the loaned PE uniforms. Due to recent renovations in the PE area, all drains are no longer connected and the estimated cost to install the machines in that area is $6,000. Fillmore High School Principal John Wilbur is reportedly working on locating funds for that.

All but one action item was approved. A request for a field trip in April was moved to a future meeting pending more information on the number of parent chaperones that will accompany students.

Director of Human Resources Todd Schieferle presented two possible calendars for the next two school years. The Board has authority to pick the start and end dates, and will vote on their preferred over all schedule with details being worked out in negotiations with the classified and certificated staff.

The meeting was adjourned with future meetings set for a Special Budget Session on Tuesday March 8, with the public meeting beginning at 6:30. The Board has set a second Governance Workshop, open to the public for Saturday, March 26 at 8:00am.