Meeting was adjourned to closed session at 4:22pm.

No action was taken in the closed session.

Meeting was adjourned to closed session at 4:22pm.

No action was taken in the closed session.

Meeting reconvened to open session at 4:45pm.

No Action was taken in the closed session.

M. Michalowski via phone call asked the Board about the information item, Teacher Credentialing Report. She asked how far along the teachers were in getting to the next steps of their credentialing process. 

M. Dodson wanted to speak to the Board to give his support to the proposal that S. Feleke has brought forward of building a similar school to OMI in Ethiopia.

S. Feleke mentioned that he had all of his five children attend OMI and successfully get accepted to college. He mentioned that Ethiopia was not in a good state due to the civil war and the education system suffered. He wanted OMI to help in his efforts to open a school in Ethiopia to bring the OMI advantage and ideals.

J. Brown asked S. Feleke to send him an email explaining and outlining in further detail what he plans to do.

J. Breckenridge asked D. Baldwin if Ethiopia is a partner of a guard state. D. Baldwin looked for more information about that.

M. Mares asked S. Feleke how OMI could market itself to the Ethiopian community. S. Feleke mentioned that there is an Ethiopian community center on Telegraph Ave and churches that we can explore.

N. Rivas was given a chance to speak after the ordering of the agenda. She expressed her content that OMI is implementing more changes in terms of the academics and is motivated to seeing the improvements. She also extended her hand in being able to help whenever needed.

The Student Showcase will be rescheduled to the next meeting in February.

M. Streshly started by explaining that there were issues with the amount of failing grades (F letter grades) when she first arrived and how OMI conducted the credit recovery program.

M. Streshly mentioned that the OMI administration team will be monitoring the student grade activity and decide where to place the students who need extra help.

M. Streshly mentioned that there is a trend in both middle and high school of failing in Science and Math, so those are subjects, along with English Language Arts, that will be focused on. Changes to the bell schedule and the teaching staff have been made to further help the students that need extra help.

There was a discussion about the effectiveness of homework and what OMI can do for the students to increase homework turn in rate based on the new 2 week policy implemented.

Read 180: M. Streshly mentioned that there has been improvement in student lexile levels in both middle and high school and shared a rubric for lexile measurement scaling.

M. Streshly mentioned that the teachers create complex differentiated lessons that engage every level of student at the same time, no matter their lexile.

M. Streshly explained that the CORE contract needed to be extended because teachers need the extra help with the multitude of programs that are being used. 

M. Streshly showed the breakdown of the Fall 2022 attendance by middle school and high school individualized numbers.

She showed that the enrollment as of the January board meeting date was 456 and OMI set the attendance goal of 95%.

M. Mares asked if there were exit interviews for the cadets that were no longer attending the school.

One way to maintain the ADA through attendance is to mitigate the short term independent study when some students are out of the country or not physically at the school for various reasons. 

M. Streshly mentioned that the tardies and the truancies are going to be monitored more closely and OMI will be implementing a different pass system for less class cutting.

V. Salazar mentioned that the spending increased in September and led to a dip in the cash flow chart but the revenue began to come in January. This led to the revenue to be at around $3 million.

The expenditures in the time frame of November to December increased because of spending for the programs that will benefit the students. 

The final payment to the after school program was also slated to be paid in the same time frame.

In January, the expenditures increased because OMI will be paying for the new ELA and Math curriculum, Savvas. 

T. James gave an update on the recruiting and gave praise to the team that J. Brown provided for helping with the recruitment effort. 

The team that J. Brown assembled mailed out information that has helped with the recruiting effort by increasing applicants by 24.

6th grade was the highest interest in the pool of applicants, followed by the 9th grade. The OMI recruitment team is working on getting more applicants for the 7th grade. 

The OMI recruitment team engaged the public in high traffic areas over the winter break like Lake Merritt, Scott's Market on Broadway, and Emeryville's Public Market, while also conducting open houses at the OMI campus.

K. Wong explained that there are steps to the credentialing process. Teachers need to follow certain steps to advance their credential and finally clear it.

K. Wong mentioned that a large amount of military staff that work at OMI have their preliminary credentials, increasing from last year.

J. Breckenridge asked to have a summation of what credentials OMI currently have and what credentials are needed. 

T. James was looking for a ratification of the e-rate discounted program for switches.

T. James explained that he was seeking ratification because the possibility of these figures coming back with a discounted rate at the end of January.

M. Streshly explained that there is a way for the Superintendent to get the go ahead from the OMI Board to proceed with the contract and then have the contract ratified at the next meeting. 

There was no objection from the OMI Board to continue with the plan of entering the contract to purchase the switches and then bring the contract to the Board. 

J. Breckenridge mentioned that OMI and the Board are due to discuss bonuses for hiring and the strategies that OMI will use to recruit staff/teachers. 

J. Breckenridge also mentioned that the OMI Board will have to evaluate the Superintendent and for the Superintendent to provide a list of her goals.