Welcome by President Emily Mathews

 

 

Lage Andersen led us in the pledge

 

Marilyn Orr shared Mary Murphy’s invocation. (Mary had prepared an invocation, but couldn’t join us.)

 

As we go about our daily lives, which have been dramatically changed through this pandemic, we are mindful that respect for others has benefits for us, the people we meet, and, ultimately, the whole world.

 

Respect – How can we bring respect to our life?

 

 

Question: How can you change the world today?

 

We had one guest a lunch this week— fellow Rotarian and our Assistant District Governor Mateo Rizzo.

 

Emily asked John Delaney to give an update on the golf tournament, since he was “there all day.” OOPS! John was in Georgia and NOT at the golf tournament. Marilyn stepped in to save the flailing president. She told us that the golf tournament was a success. It had over 90 golfers and raised more than $41,000.

 

Sheryl Young told us about the Women of Courage Award. It is inspired by the lifetime work of Congresswoman Jackie Speier. The award is granted to young women between 18-30 years old who live, work or serve in San Mateo County and who have demonstrated courage, compassion, and integrity in their efforts to make the world a better place, in the spirit of Jackie Speier. Awardees receive $25K and networking and mentoring opportunities.  Nominations are due December 1. More info here.

 

Flockings continue—District Governor, Mary Bates, ordered a flocking for a friend this past weekend.
Order your flocking here.

 

Message from Alan Test, who is a member of the Rotary Club of NorCal Gateway. He is conducting a clothing drive for the Bay Area Rescue Mission in Richmond. As winter approaches, he is asking Rotarians to look in their drawers and closets and see if there are any clothing items they no longer need. He will come to their home and pick it up while keeping an appropriate social distance.

 

He reminds us that the Bay Area Rescue Mission has been serving the homeless and families in need since 1965.

 

Please return your foundation raffle tickets to Bill Tiedeman. Check your email for a PDF of the tickets. If you need tickets, please email Bill. 

 

Cary Koh gave an update on the very successful Annual Golf Tournament held on Monday, October 12, at Green Hills Country Club.  In spite of the short notice and planning time period, there were over 90 golfers who participated in this scaled-back outing.  Many of them commented on what a great event it was and will definitely join us next year. The Club raised just under $42,000 (NET).

 

Jennifer Pence “delved into the mysterious past of Lage Andersen.” A look at the Carr McClellan website revealed that Lage had practiced tax law for more than four decades. In college, Lage earned a BS in education. While going through college, he thought he was going to be a high school teacher. He went on to earn a master’s degree in education. For his thesis, he wrote a study of the history of physical education in Chicago from 1880-1920. Jobs were scarce for experts in turn-of-the-century PE. Lage joked, “What’s the difference between an associate professor of history and a pizza? The pizza can feed a family of four.” At a tricky spot, Lage decided to leave education as a profession behind. Lage told us, “Since law school is the last hope for liberal arts majors, he took the advice of his wife’s uncle, who’s a lawyer, and he went to law school.”

 

In addition to practicing law, Lage has a long history with blood banks. No, not for money. He has been on the board of directors of several blood banks. It all started when he gave blood while a student at Northwestern. A generous soul, Lage liked the idea of giving to someone you don’t know. He kept giving blood. While giving blood one day, he met a doctor and asked if he could help. The doctor called Lage a week later and asked him to be on the board of the blood bank. As blood banks merged, Lage joined those blood banks.

 

Jennifer asked if Lage was the class clown in school. He said that he was a “bookish lad.” He said, “There are no funny lawyers, only funny people who made bad career choices”. Lage always loved to come up with funny notions and share them.

 

Jennifer asked about Lages’ caffeine consumption. He tries to limit himself to “one big ass cup of strong coffee in the morning.” Caffeine is Lage’s drug of choice. He noted that he has also been known to enjoy an Indian Pale Ale.

 

Jennifer asked if there is a secret Lage recipe that has a go-to home-cooked meal. He jumped right in, telling us that he browns a couple of pounds of chuck roast, put it in a crockpot with beer, preferably Guinness, throws in a ton of carrots, celery, onions, etc. then turns on the crockpot. The finished product is a delicious beef stew.

 

Cheryl Fama introduced our very own Christopher Mount-Benites, superintendent of Burlingame School District (K-8).

 

Chris told us that Cheryl was one first people that he met when he came to Burlingame. He told us that this is an interesting time to be doing this job. The school board asked him to join and wanted him to start in two weeks, which was very fast. He was excited about the opportunity. Chris told us that school employees swear an oath, which includes a commitment to serve in a time of emergency.  This is why educators are referred to as essential workers. Most people in education have said that they signed the oath, but some are not stepping up to serve in this time of emergency. Chris finds this to be a fascinating paradigm as we go through the pandemic.

 

He remembers March 13 when schools were closing and that he was told that he was in charge of everything, from education to the well-being of children outside of school.

 

Chris explained that education has been highly politicized. The reopening of education has become a politically influenced discussion. Pre-COVID, they had board meetings with no members of public. Now, school board meeting attendance has been up to 800.

 

Chris talked about the safety concept related to public education. He told us that school districts are tasked with creating a roadmap to reopening schools with little to no direction from the state or county. Each district is on its own. And, each district is implementing its own plan. San Mateo County has 24 districts and 24 radically different plans. He noted how the disparate plans highlight how different each district is—even adjacent ones.

 

He went on to tell us that there are incredible union and state politics around how schools will operate. When Burlingame K-8 schools open, there will be testing and contact tracing for all adult employees as well as all self-reporting parents and students. Each of the 24 districts must come up with a plan for how to do this.

 

Chris told us that part of the stress facing educators is that the state is putting all of these non-education responsibilities on top of all of the instruction responsibility.

 

An upside that Chris noted is that they have far greater interaction and impact with communities than the municipalities.

 

Chris highlighted a rather alarming trend. San Mateo County public schools’ enrollment is down 15-20%. Families are moving or moving children to private schools or home schooling. Of 3,500 students, Burlingame School District has had about 150 students leave. They don’t know if or when these students will be coming back. This makes it difficult to budget for expenses and staff.

 

He also emphasized that new modes of learning had to be adopted with no notice. Teachers and parents had to figure out distance learning.

 

Chris told us that across US, 90% of students are in the public education system. This new paradigm of learning will have a long-term impact on public education. Of primary concern is the impact on students and the long-term learning loss for some students. Other concerns are related to social-emotional issues. All of the things that parents are struggling with at home will be the issues that the schools will face when the pandemic is over.

 

Chris expects big changes to public education.

 

Bobba asked why we’re not bringing schools back now. Chris explained that Burlingame School District’s schools would be coming back after Thanksgiving break—for the start of the third trimester. This date was arrived upon through negotiations between the District and the teachers’ union. Teachers felt that they needed time to prepare for in-person learning.

 

Burlingame School District is a pilot district for COVID testing and tracing through Stanford Medical Center.

 

Some students have already been back in classrooms. Administratively, Chris has the authority to bring students who had significant barriers to education or disabilities back to schools. There are bubbles of students on Burlingame School District’s campuses. Everyone wears a mask. Also, between 30-100 students go to daycare on campuses daily. Since the start of the year, there have been no positive COVID tests among the students and teachers.

 

Christine Krolik asked about issues with teacher retention. Chris told us that a couple of teachers left, because they felt that they would not be able to meet the needs of the children. The biggest hurdle is parents watching their children fail on a regular basis. Teachers are used to this and have processes to work with it. The biggest issue for most of our teachers is the lack of energy. They’re used to feeding off the energy from the students. With distance learning via video, they feel more like actors without an audience.

 

Chris wrapped up, and Emily told him about the polio vaccinations that will be donated in his name and that we’ll email his PolioPlus certificate.

 

The meeting adjourned at 1:23pm.

 

In the banter, before the meeting officially started, a few of us were lucky enough to meet the fabulous Miss Hannah, Jay Miller’s granddaughter.

 

 

Adjourn

 

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