Sangamon Sun

Ball-Chatham Community Unity School District 5 Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, Belonging Committee met March 26 

Here are the minutes provided by the committee:

Those in attendance:

Laura Calderon

Andrea Rediger

Becca Lamon

Agenda:

Latest Federal Guidelines

The March 21, 2025 update from Robbins Schwartz was reviewed. While some of the items in the update do not pertain to BCSD, a discussion occurred about the Title IX investigations in Illinois addressing access to facilities based on gender identity. Illinois and federal orders are in conflict with each other. We will continue to monitor changes. 

Foreign Exchange Students

A discussion occurred regarding the recent emails from a community member about our cap of two foreign exchange students per year. Laura Calderon suggested that while we should be conscious of class size implications, the district should recognize the benefit that a more robust foreign exchange student program could provide, specifically providing our students with exposure to different cultures that they otherwise may not have. Calderon stated that in the district's Portrait of a Graduate, we specifically say that in order to promote civic responsibility, a graduate should understand and respect other cultures. She suggested that expansion of this program would be directly aligned with that goal. Dr. Lamon shared that we still do not have adequate ELL services for our 160+ ELL students and her desire to ensure that we are meeting the needs of our current students before adding more students who will have access to services. Foreign exchange students must be screened and offered services, if eligible. Several board members would like to see an expansion of this program, including Laura Calderon. Andrea Rediger posed the question that we may be creating a conflict in policies in that we restrict access to local students to our offerings but are advocating to bring students from a further distance to utilize the same offerings.

Bussing for State-Level Extracurricular Events

The question was posed that it appeared inequitable to provide fans buses to the boys basketball state championship games. Dr. Lamon shared that the boys’ basketball championship location and timing allowed for a fan bus because it did not require a driver to be pulled from a regular school day route, did not prevent extracurricular bussing for other events, and did not create a situation to encourage absenteeism. In addition, we have a 50 student minimum requirement for a fan bus. We have offered fan buses in the past but not met the minimum. Dr. Lamon will provide the Board with a list of those opportunities. The district will create an administrative procedure outlining when a fan bus will be utilized.

Student Discipline - Suspensions In-School and Out of School

The committee reviewed the ISS and OSS data to date for the 24-25 school year. We have utilized ISS more than OSS. There are differences at building levels as to the usage of each intervention due to staffing. GMS and GHS have a dedicated person to supervise students, whereas GIS does not. The elementary buildings have not had any instances of ISS this year and also do not have dedicated staff to supervise this type of intervention. The question about equitable use of OSS was discussed. There are certain student infractions that are addressed through ISS and others that are addressed through OSS. Every discipline case is unique and is addressed with guidance from previous events but also independently at the same time based on previous history and the unique details of the situation. Setting strict guidelines would not be effective since each event is slightly different from another event. Dr. Lamon will provide the length of time data for the ISS and OSS events to the Board.

https://go.boarddocs.com/il/cusd5/Board.nsf/Public