F.W. Parker Charter Essential School

Minutes

DEI Committee Meeting

Date and Time

Tuesday September 9, 2025 at 7:00 PM

This meeting is hosted online.  http://parker.school/deicommittee

Committee Members Present

L. Hayner, M. Silva-Rosa, S. Razzetti, T. Testa

Committee Members Absent

B. Harrigan, C. Beasley, E. Moura, J. Green, K. Grabarek, K. Kintzing

I. Opening Items

A.

Record Attendance

B.

Call the Meeting to Order

II. Diversity, Equity and Inclusion

A.

Provide feedback for proposed Board PD on Sept 12th

  1. Brian shared the PD presentation and previewed the plan for the board on Friday. 
    1. What do you see?
      1. Dip from students of color for incoming 7th grade class - 2026 
      2. Multiple realities in the agreements
      3. The # of BIPOC students compared to two years ago is also a dip 
      4. Slide 9 - student wellbeing, white and BIPOC number 
      5. Chronic Absenteeism is improving at Parker 
      6. ‘25 was a better year for withdrawals 
        1. Fluctuations from one year to the next 
    2. What questions does this raise for you? 
      1. What is the student and staff diversity; is there a reason why it’s unaligned? 
      2. Chronic Absenteeism - what’s happening and is it true? 
      3. Slide 5 - 7th grade year was a blip and an outlier? Is this year more comparable to what we see each year? 
      4. Is there some type of ratio between applicants and enrollee in terms of race? 
      5. Wild fluctuations? What do we have control over? What will happen a year from now? What will happen with the 8-9 retention? 
    3. What are the implications for our work? 
      1. What do we need to do to retain our BIPOC students, knowing that mirrors are particularly important for enrollment? 
      2. Simplify the graphs. 
      3. It raises a million more questions. 
      4. What’s the framing before the data is shown?
    4. Reflection on other slides 
      1. Multiple realities 
        1. Keeping all categories in mind. 
      2. “Today is not a one and done.” 
      3. Identity Iceburg 
      4. Framing 
        1. Purpose 
        2. Skills as a board 
        3. Functions of the board 
    5. I am From…Poem 
      1. What identities do we not hear?
      2. What identities do we prioritize? 
    6. We discussed flipping the order of the presentation
      1. Start with I am From
      2. Discuss
      3. Learn about DEI
      4. Apply learning to looking at data

B.

Develop PD feedback survey

This agenda item did not take place.

III. Closing Items

A.

Adjourn Meeting

There being no further business to be transacted, and upon motion duly made, seconded and approved, the meeting was adjourned at 8:10 AM.

Respectfully Submitted,
T. Testa