Coraggio Consulting Fairfax County School Board Meeting, Thursday, October 10, 2024 Date: Thursday, October 10, 2024 Place: Fairfax County School Board, Virginia Length: 3h 49m (video) Official meeting video (YouTube): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z5_fn44geyc Official School Board page (FCPS): https://www.fcps.edu/about-fcps/leadership/school-board Machine transcript (speech-to-text) produced by Coraggio Consulting. Not an official county record. Names and numbers may be misspelled; check the video at the timestamp before quoting. Speech-to-text: whisper.cpp, model large-v3-turbo. Produced 2026-10-31. Timestamps are [HH:MM:SS] into the meeting video. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- [00:04:17] board members, please come to your seats. Good evening. This October 10th, 2024 regular meeting [00:07:17] of the Fairfax County School Board will come to order. In honor of Hispanic Heritage Month, we will have a special performance of De Colores following the national anthem. De Colores is a song that is thought to have originated in Spain and has been sung in the Americas and throughout the Spanish speaking world since the 16th century. The phrase De Colores means many colors. The upbeat melody speaks to the celebration of creation and the joy of seeing the world's many colors. This traditional folk song has evolved as it's been passed down through time and from generation to generation. De Colores is a song that celebrates the [00:07:53] beauty of life, love, and unity. Please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance followed by a Moment of Silence, a performance of the National Anthem by the Westfield High School String Ensemble under the direction of Alexandra Blaine, and a performance of De Colores by the Groveton Elementary School Chorus under the direction of Maritza Lugo and Natalie Adams. [00:08:16] I pledge allegiance. [00:12:18] Let's hear another round of applause for those incredibly talented students. [00:14:12] Agenda item 2.02 announcements. [00:14:28] If you would like to review a copy of the agenda, please see the back of the auditorium. To obtain copies of the items being presented tonight, please reference the QR code on the agenda or on the website fcps.edu slash school board slash board docs. Tonight's meeting is being broadcast on Channel 99 and live streamed on the website at fcps.edu slash tv slash ch99. [00:14:51] Ms. Sizemore-Heiser is participating virtually due to caregiving. She will be counted per the July 1st code change as a person for quorum. Agenda Item 2.03, School Principals, Administrators, and Administrative Assistance Appreciation Month Proclamation. [00:15:06] I call on Mr. Dunn for a proclamation. [00:15:19] Whereas the Celebration of School Principals, Administrators, and Administrative Assistance Month honors elementary, middle, and high school leaders and support staff and recognizes that their roles are essential in preparing students for success both during their pre-K through 12 years and beyond, and whereas these individuals work tirelessly to create nurturing and productive environments that foster the growth and development of our students, play a vital role in shaping school culture promote educational excellence and ensure the safety and well-being of all students and staff and whereas principals serve a variety of critical [00:15:58] roles such as instructional leaders community builders assessment experts budget analysts facility managers public relations experts guardians of various legal contractual and policy mandates they set the academic tone of their school by setting ambitious goals enforcing rigor and maintaining high curriculum standards and expectations for all students and whereas dedicated and inspiring school administrators work collaboratively with students families teachers in the community their leadership is second only to classroom instruction among all school related factors that contribute to what students learn at school and whereas the important work of office assistants and [00:16:37] administrative assistants is central to any school these personnel provide essential support ensuring that their office and school operations are organized and efficient and whereas these educational leaders and school support staff are dedicated in supporting and educating our students and it is through their perseverance and passion that Fairfax County Public Schools continues to produce students that meet high academic standards lead healthy ethical lives and are responsible and innovative global citizens now therefore be it resolved that the Fairfax County School Board proclaims October 2024 as school principals administrators and [00:17:14] Administrative Assistance Month and recognizes the importance of school leadership and support personnel and ensuring every child has access to high quality education. We're going to pause for a second because there's an audio problem for our virtual our virtual participants so we'll get that [00:17:29] straightened out and then we'll begin again. Don't go anywhere. Talk so that we can actually see if [00:20:03] Ms. Sizemore-Hyser can hear us. Ms. Sizemore-Hyser, she's not responding. Ms. Sizemore-Hyser, can you [00:23:38] hear me they're going to call her on a thing called a telephone for the for the students [00:24:36] watching at home a telephone and then we will continue to work to resolve this music is gone [00:24:45] so we'll just wait for a show host back after these messages things back up thank you for [00:25:30] everybody's patience while we straighten out the technical issues we will have miss eismar heiser on speakerphone and she can obviously see what's happening picking up where we left off is there a second I seconded before and I'll second again Miss Marin thank you I'll call for the vote all those in favor Miss Marin this is well the clerks put the motion on the screen this is the school principals administrators and administrative assistance appreciation month proclamation [00:26:03] all those in favor Miss Marin Miss Dixit Mr. McElvain Dr. Anderson Mr. McDaniel Miss Anderson Mr. Dunn Mr. Moon Miss Lady Miss St. John Cunning Miss Sizemore Heiser and myself that unanimous the motion passes congratulations agenda item 2.04 indigenous peoples day and native american heritage month proclamation i call miss anderson for a proclamation whereas indigenous peoples day and native american heritage month are recognized on in on the [00:26:42] second monday of october and throughout the month of november respectively across the united states and in the united states or in in fairfax county public schools fcps to honor and celebrate the history accomplishments and contributions of people of people who were the first inhabitants of the united states and whereas in 1990 congress passed and george or president george hw bush signed into law a joint resolution designating the month of november as the first national american indian heritage month in two in 2021 president joe biden was the first u.s president to formally [00:27:20] commemorate Indigenous Peoples Day as a national holiday with a presidential proclamation and whereas Indigenous Peoples Day and Native American Heritage Month are wonderful opportunities for our schools and community to honor our nation's original inhabitants and their descendants. [00:27:37] These commemorations further call us to honor the beautiful and rich Indigenous communities, traditions, cultures, and lives across our country, commonwealth, and around the world. The invaluable contributions that Indigenous people have made in the arts, public service, military service, and other fields are integral to our nation and society. Whereas FCPS serves a diverse student population with many who embrace and celebrate their Indigenous family heritage, now therefore be it resolved that the Fairfax County School Board does hereby proclaim October [00:28:10] 14th 2024 as Indigenous Peoples Day and November as Native American Heritage Month in recognition and celebration of the many contributions of our nation's Indigenous people to our school system, community, and country. Is there a second? Ms. St. John Cunning. I'll call for the vote. [00:28:30] All those in favor? Ms. Marin, Ms. Dixit, Mr. McIlveen, Dr. Anderson, Mr. McDaniel, Ms. Anderson, Mr. Dunn, Mr. Moon, Ms. Lady, Ms. St. John Cunning, Ms. Sizemore Heiser, and myself. That two is unanimous congratulations the motion passes agenda item 2.05 lgbtqia history month proclamation i call and mystics it for a proclamation whereas lgbtqia plus history month is recognized in october across the united states and in fairfax county public school to acknowledge [00:29:02] and celebrate the contributions and experiences of two often overlooked or silenced lgbtqia plus people communities and movement throughout our history and various the special month was founded in 1994 by Missouri high school teacher history teacher Rodney Wilson who chose October for the inaugural celebration to coincide with the national coming out day on October 14 and to commemorate the first march on Washington for LGBTQIA plus rights in October 1979 and whereas the national [00:29:40] PTA state the school should be a safe supportive and respectful environment for all students and that LBG LGBTQIA plus students are more likely than their peers to be bullied feel unsafe in school and skip school due to the safety concerns and whereas students are involved in gender sexuality alliance GCA clubs in many middle and high schools throughout the Fairfax County Public school where they can network and socialize with each other and educate their communities through forums announcements and other activities and these clubs are an asset to our schools with [00:30:17] research indicating that schools with gsas have better mental health outcome for all students and whereas the fairfax county school board celebrates its rich diverse community of lgbtqia plus students, families and staff recognizing the urgency of discharge to foster a school community where all feel valued, supported and hopeful and advanced policies that protect LGBTQIA plus students and staff so they can live without fear of prejudice, discrimination or violence. [00:30:50] Now, therefore, be it resolved that the Fairfax County School Board hereby proclaims October 2024 as LGBTQIA plus history month in Fairfax County Public School the Fairfax County School Board urges all to learn more about the many historical and the contemporary contribution and experience of the diverse community and to build a center of inclusivity and equity not only during LGBTQIA history month but throughout the entire year. Is there a second second Mr. Moon all those in favor [00:31:22] Ms. Marin, Ms. Dixit, Mr. McIlveen, Dr. Anderson, Mr. McDaniel, Ms. Anderson, Mr. Dunn, Mr. Moon, Ms. Lady, Ms. St. John Cunning, Ms. Sizemore-Hyser, and myself. That is unanimous. The motion passes. [00:31:40] Agenda item 2.05, Red Ribbon Week proclamation. I call on Mr. McDaniel for a proclamation. Whereas the National Family Partnership, a national leader in drug prevention education and advocacy sponsored the first red ribbon week in 1988 in response to the murder of tea agent enrique camarena in which in in which angered parents and youth and communities across the country began wearing red ribbons as a symbol of their commitment to raise awareness of the violence and destruction caused by drug abuse in america and whereas the red ribbon program is based on [00:32:17] scientific and evidence-based principles for substance abuse prevention and incorporates the following six prevention strategies: information dissemination, prevention education, alternative activities, community-based processes, environmental approaches, and problem identification and referral. And whereas the 2024 theme for Red Ribbon Week, Life is a Movie: Film Drug-Free, is a call to action to speak out to support of healthy choices and emphasizes the collective impact of embracing a drug-free lifestyle, it also serves as a reminder that every person is empowered to shape the communities around us through positivity bravery strength and whereas fairfax county public schools is committed to fostering a safe and supportive environment that [00:32:57] empowers students to make healthy choices through offering activities and learning experiences which focus on the many ways marijuana alcohol tobacco vaping and other drug use can negatively impact student lives including a substance abuse prevention program for students experiencing substance abuse and whereas the efforts of fcps educators counselors and support staff are instrumental in equipping students with the knowledge skin skills necessary to resist peer pressure and lead fulfilling drug-free lives we especially commend our substance abuse program specialists and the role they play in refer reaffirming a culture of wellness and resilience [00:33:33] in our schools now therefore be it resolved that the fairfax county school board does hereby I proclaim October 23 through 31 as Red Ribbon Week in recognition of the oldest and largest drug prevention program in the nation and encourages students, families, and the Fairfax County community to unite and take a personal and visible pledge to a drug-free lifestyle. [00:33:53] Is there a second? Second. Ms. Lady. All those in favor? Ms. Marin, Ms. Dixit, Mr. McElveen, Dr. Anderson, Mr. McDaniel, Ms. Anderson, Mr. Dunn, Mr. Moon, Ms. Lady, Ms. St. John Cunning, Ms. Eisemarheiser, and myself. That is unanimous. passes. I would like to welcome all of those who are here in support of Red Ribbon Week proclamation to please join the board for a photo in front of the [00:34:21] dais. I would like to invite all those in support of the LGBTQIA history [00:36:12] month proclamation to please join the board for a photo at the front of the [00:36:15] dais. I would like to invite welcome all those here in support of the Indigenous [00:37:51] People's Day and Native American Heritage month proclamation to please join the board for a photo at the front of the dais. All those in support of [00:38:22] indigenous peoples day and native american heritage month to please join the board i would [00:39:01] like to welcome all those in support of the school principals administrators and administrative assistance appreciation month proclamation to please join the board for a photo at the front [00:39:09] of the dais agenda item 3.01 community participation the next order of business is community participation [00:40:49] we welcome all community members who are here and those who signed up to speak this evening additional information about signing up to provide comments at school board regular business meetings and public hearings can be found on the school board's website during the sign-up process community members acknowledge they were informed of the school board's expectations for proper decorum when providing comments these expectations are also available online and with the printed agenda and meeting materials in the back of the room we ask audience members to be respectful of one another shouting and outbursts will not be tolerated please hold your applause and tell the conclusion of a speaker's remarks audience members may not join speakers at the podium and should [00:41:27] remain at their seats including when recording video or taking photos we're grateful that you are here to speak with us today speak to us today and thank you for your cooperation school board members will be listening but not responding mr deputy clerk please call the first speaker samantha ervin hello my name is samantha and i'm a high schooler and students are actively the [00:42:00] highest most terrifying levels of gun violence ever i understand and i'm grateful that fairfax County Public Schools has created policies and curriculums because of this. I'm telling you it's not good enough. I know this isn't your fault, but it is still something you need to interview. At the start of every single school year, me and my friends have been shown the same. It teaches us that we'll be safe if we are quiet and huddled in one spot with fabric over the road. It has never felt safe. Guns don't care about locked doors. I read Dr. Michelle Reed's gun violence prevention [00:42:39] letter, which tells us that FCPS teaches even the youngest grades what to do if they find a gun. I believe that because you accept this point to the issue you're explaining it to fourth graders, you need to accept that it needs more of your attention. Moreover, one or two school resource officers in the school are reassuring, but they cannot protect the thousands of children in schools like mine in a lockdown. Building on this, the county is testing yonder phone pouches in certain schools. That makes sense considering student performance, but [00:43:15] what are kids supposed to do if and when worst case scenario hits? They will have no way to tell loved ones goodbye. 63 people were killed or injured in school shootings last year. Four of them were in Virginia. I'm asking you to have a better plan than to pray it won't happen to your [00:43:35] students thank you Jen Spicer thank you for the opportunity to speak tonight I work for FCPS as an applied behavior analysis coach and I'm here to address the impact of the teacher shortage for students with autism and intellectual disabilities these teachers face very unique and challenging circumstances as [00:44:15] they strive to educate and preserve the dignity of their students a typical day for the teachers I support may include a classroom of multiple grade levels sometimes k-6 and different curricula both general education and adapted for those grade levels. Academic instruction is combined with communication, behavior, and life skills programming to meet each student's needs. Teachers often forgo planning to accompany their students to specials to promote their students' well-being, at times providing intervention to ensure the safety of their students or others. Of course this is all in addition to the standard work of a special education teacher, which is immense. One of the most often posted [00:44:53] positions on the instructional vacancy list is multiple disabilities teacher. while different measures have been put into place they have not resulted in the consistent staffing that our classrooms need a robust incentive for teachers is the only way I see this problem being solved I humbly submit that these teachers be paid on a separate and meaningfully larger pay scale and be provided with retention bonuses to encourage classroom consistency year over year with this additional compensation in place the hope is that we can retain our experienced teachers and attract new talent as a permanent solution to a permanent need. Gandhi is often attributed with a quote, the measure of a society [00:45:31] is how it treats its most vulnerable members. I believe the students I support are our most vulnerable students in FCPS and are deserving of quality and consistent educators throughout their years in our school system. Knowing that I am just one FCPS employee advocating for a substantial pay increase, not for me but for the teachers I support, I invite you to meet our veteran teachers they do wonderful things and I ask is our county's current strategy leading to truly staffed classrooms and with these special education classrooms fully staffed not proactively resolve many learning safety [00:46:03] Leonard Bambaca good evening I'm here to urge you to reconsider the intent to disband HRAC as it raises significant issues in substance process and impact substance the premise that HRAC is incompatible with collective bargaining [00:46:40] is flawed. Many topics HRAC addresses do not fall under bargaining. The school board could set a charge that doesn't interfere with bargaining subjects focusing on best practices and non-bargaining issues like strategic workforce planning, customer service, and recruitment efforts. [00:46:56] HRAC's advisory nature also differentiates it from actual bargaining, and its diverse membership brings unique perspectives and insights. Process. The decision-making process lacks transparency. The vague motion passed after a closed session and the absence of prior notice or feedback depart from open governance principles. Dissolving the committee before a formal vote is particularly concerning, as HRC remains legitimate until at least October the 24th. [00:47:23] As school board members, you have the duty to pursue due diligence and request information about how other entities balance collective bargaining and community input. Impact. This This action contradicts the stated belief in fostering open relationships with the community. [00:47:38] It continues a trend of dismantling advisory committees and severing ties with engaged community members when FCPS needs support more than ever. More broadly, how will this affect other system and building advisory committees? The decision may solve a perceived short-term issue, but at what long-term cost to community engagement and trust? [00:47:59] Trust that calls for actions more than words or photos. I urge you to engage in a transparent process that includes input from HRAC members and the community. Postpone the decision until after a public work session where stakeholders can provide input. [00:48:14] There are ways to maintain HRAC's valuable input while respecting the new collective bargaining framework. It requires creativity and not blanket dismissal. FCPS strength lies in its broader community support. Thank you. [00:48:34] - Roland Hacke, Vanessa Hall. [00:48:50] - Hi all, my name's Vanessa Hall. I'm an active parent, volunteer, and co-leader of FCPS Pride. Thank you all for recognizing LGBTQIA History Month, because this is our history. Alan Turing helped us defeat Nazis. Harvey Milk defeated laws that would fire employees for being gay or even for supporting gay rights. [00:49:11] And Marsha P. Johnson stood up in the face of police abuse and overreach to spark a revolution that continues today. Our families need to be seen in the classroom, curriculum, library, particularly when 20% of students identify as LGBTQIA+. Of course, being queer means one may also be Asian, Black, Hispanic, Christian, Muslim, Jewish, an English learner, dyslexic, or disabled. Those who fight school anti-discrimination efforts ignore these facts. They ignore that respecting pronouns of transgender students means that gender-based bullying decreases for [00:49:47] each and every student and employee. Malicious gendered slurs have long been the tool of choice by bullies, whether the target is transgender, cisgender, gay, or straight. But extremist groups and supporters of Project 2025 have been working against inclusivity in our community and sometimes in this very room. America First Legal is suing you all to permit bullying and exclusion of children. Parents defending education and Moms for Liberty have tried to remove non-white, non-straight, non-cisgender figures from our history books and libraries. [00:50:21] And then there's also the Independent Women's Forum and Network who have sued our school system, long advocated to exclude children in bathrooms and sports, all while actively supporting the right to bully children based on their identity. No matter our identity, we deserve to have equal rights and opportunities within our schools, which can only be done if students can see themselves in our history classes, staff, and school board. Thank you very much. Allison Moonche. Hi. With my daughter's permission, [00:51:01] I want to tell you a story, extend my gratitude, and offer a cautionary tale. First, my daughter, who's a thriving senior now, transitioned eight years ago with a new name and new pronouns. Luckily, she was at an amazing FCPS elementary school where she received the support that all trans kids deserve. When I spoke to you back then, I told you her trans identity was the least interesting thing about her i'm proud to say that's still true when we left here we lived in alabama and florida where the protections for my daughter were non-existent because of the power [00:51:35] and influence of a well-organized but extremely misinformed vocal minority florida said she could no longer get the life-saving gender-affirming care and so we moved back here and a note on the care to it on a note on that care to address the misinformed trans kids aren't getting surgeries and no school is forcing a kid to be a different gender but thankfully you all know that you choose the hard but right path of supporting your lgbtq students because of course it is the right thing [00:52:09] to do here's my cautionary tale as a teacher in florida you know what i didn't have on my shelves books why because some parents had a fear that one of those books might make their kid lgbtq my daughter has read hundreds of books with cisgender or non-trans characters and she's still trans books are windows and mirrors to the world they have the power to teach lessons about life but they do not have the power to change one's gender identity or sexual orientation don't give in to the pressure to ban books thank you for publicly celebrating my daughter and other [00:52:48] students like her your message of support sends ripples of protection around her and helps to silence those who want to take those protections away kelly odinger um i came here tonight with a lot of things to talk about but on my way here actually before i left i got a phone call from [00:53:20] another parent and i haven't been able to really shake it um this county needs to change if kids end up dead or in jail or in the hospital um they can't learn they can't go on they can't um be tomorrow's leaders right um i applaud everybody who came up and spoke before me tonight and thank you for all your of your advocacy i'm sorry but um we need more of it and um if you think fairfax [00:53:57] county public school is the best school in the united states or among one of the best schools in the united states for our kids for all of our kids you're wrong and um i don't i don't even know I mean, look at me with, I'm not usually at a lack for words, but that's it for tonight. [00:54:17] Please do better, okay? Every one of you, I mean, just please. [00:54:32] Erwin Tia Garanjan, Emily Vanderhoff. [00:54:49] Good evening, Chair Frisch, Dr. Reed, and members of the board. My name is Emily Vanderhoff. I'm an FCPS teacher, a proud union member, and proud to serve on the board of FCPS Pride. [00:55:06] I want to celebrate the board's proclamation to recognize LGBTQIA plus history month. As someone who only recently became aware of my own queerness, it has become especially important to me to see our school board take a vocal stance on creating a safe and inclusive school district for queer and trans students and staff. [00:55:24] I want to share a few examples of how important it is that FCPS openly and firmly stands behind queer and trans students, staff, and families in our community, and recognize important events like Pride Month and LGBTQIA plus History Month. I'm just out of breath. I'm not emotional. [00:55:43] One day when I was wearing my FCPS Pride shirt, a student said to me, "I like your shirt. It represents me." In that moment, an FCPS student felt seen and empowered at school. Our freedom to be visible at work so that students can see themselves reflected in the adults who serve them is the definition of meeting every child by name and by need and allowing students to feel safe, supported, included, and empowered. [00:56:06] One time while tabling at Great Beginnings, I was talking with a new teacher who visited the FCPS Pride table. They had picked up a pride flag from the table, and they said that they weren't sure how welcoming FCPS would be having previously taught in a more conservative southern state. I shared that I felt safe having pride flags in my classroom and that I felt secure that FCPS would back me up in having them. [00:56:27] That safety at work is how we recruit and retain the premier workforce we need to provide the best education for our students. I just want to take the opportunity to thank the board for standing firm in this moment and so many other moments, in spite of the opposition from those who demand that queer and trans students and staff hide our identities. [00:56:45] I'm proud to work in a school system that truly strives to be welcoming and inclusive. Thank you. Air Queen. [00:57:14] Hello. Good evening, Dr. Reed and school board members. I'm Air Queen and I use they/them pronouns. I'm a queer trans FCPS teacher and parent of a current and future FCPS student. I'm glad to be here again during LGBTQIA2S+ History Month. [00:57:31] While I'm glad that I work for a school system that acknowledges that LGBTQIA2S+ History Month exists, acknowledging the month with words is not the same as taking action to ensure our community's history is taught and that our community members are protected from harm. [00:57:47] I can appreciate that regulation 2603 exists at the same time that I know that we can do more to enforce it at a school level. Right now there are schools where it gets completely ignored and it is our students who suffer. There is clear evidence that students in the LGBTQIA2S+ community thrive when they have a supportive environment at school, but if that support only extends as far as this meeting, then I would argue that there is no support at all. [00:58:14] As a queer and trans staff member, all I ever want to do is bring my most authentic self into my classroom and teach the students in front of me. As it is now, though, there is no real protection for me in the same way that there are protections for our students. I don't even have the opportunity to have my chosen name listed in our online directory. [00:58:31] For some transgender staff members, that could lead to being in a dangerous position. It is a publicly outing someone who just deserves to exist and do their job. I would like to remind you that the decisions and actions of today are the history of tomorrow. I would love for my own part of LGBTQIA2S+ history to be that I give space for other people in our community to simply exist as they are without the need to fight and publicly demand the bare minimum. [00:58:57] So for the remainder of my time, I will do just that, exist. Thank you. [00:59:12] Willow Walkie. Good evening, school board members, Dr. Reed. [00:59:35] My name is Willow Walkie, she/her, member of both FCPS Pride and the Transgender Education Association of Greater Washington. We are here celebrating LGBTQIA+ History Month. I'm just going to say queer from now on. As a trans person born in the 60s, I never learned about people like me in school. [00:59:52] I never knew how many of the people that impacted my life were members of the queer community because they were forced to hide, and they certainly wouldn't teach about them in school. My mom told me about one of her college classes where all of the black students in the class first learn that Alexander Dumas, the author of The Three Musketeers that they were reading, was black. They learned that in college. Imagine LGBTQ, imagine queer kids that don't get to see themselves in their classes, like social studies. Baynard Rustin, who organized the march that gave us the "I have a dream" speech, the first black congresswoman from the south, Barbara Jordan. [01:00:31] In music class, Tchaikovsky, Aaron Copland, Leonard Bernstein, or theater, where you learn about so many playwrights like Thornton Wilder and Edward Albee, or art class, getting to learn about Frida Kahlo and Georgia O'Keeffe. But for me, I was a math kid, and I loved computers. [01:00:48] Alan Turing was a mathematician and encryption expert who cracked the German encryption in World War II and helped create computer science. And more personally, Lynn Conway, a trans woman who was fired by IBM in 1968 for being trans, continued her work, hiding her identity and became a major innovator in integrated circuit design. [01:01:09] She disclosed her identity in the early 2000s and passed away this past summer. This is the textbook I used in one of my classes in college. It was co-written by Lynn Conway. I didn't know. [01:01:24] I could have known. Don't let that happen to the kids anymore. queer history in existing classes and teach queer history. Thank you. George Becerra, please play the video testimony submitted by Stephanie Lenkris-Aura. Good evening. I would like to speak to you this evening about the failure of administrative leadership in our school district. We've had [01:02:02] some disagreements over time, school board members, but we, most of us, have a very vested interest in our local community. A lot of us have children who go to school here. Some of us have grown up here, right? I can't say that the same is true for the senior administrators, the senior administrative leadership, who have grown their bureaucratic departments at Gatehouse astronomically. The budget has grown from $3 billion in 2020 to $3.7 billion in fiscal year [01:02:37] 2025 and i ask you today are we satisfied with what we've seen even though the student population has decreased with the extra money with the extra especially bloat at gatehouse what's this money doing uh test scores have gone down over time if you look at them our failure rates are very disappointing um several schools are on the verge of failing and school staff are upset since uh Superintendent Reed has taken her position, 54 principals have left and there's been a mass exodus [01:03:15] of teachers as well. And many of them say that the reason that they're leaving is because of a leadership failure in the sense that the senior leadership of FCPS at Gatehouse doesn't understand the problems and the issues that are happening in the schools. In fact, Several principals had a media interview where they stated this explicitly. [01:03:42] And I ask you tonight, as our elected officials, please hold our administrative leadership accountable. Thank you. Please play the video testimony submitted by Robert and Rigby, Jr. [01:04:05] Good evening. My name is Robert Rigby, Jr. I'm a teacher in this county and a resident of the Providence District, as well as a member of my PTA for Public Education and FCPS Pride. Let me speak briefly as we celebrate about LGBTQ history that I know of in this county. [01:04:25] In the early 90s, there was a group called Gay Fairfax that broadcast on local television that advocated for, among other things, marriage equality, which has since been achieved. a couple of days ago was the anniversary, and they had important guests and celebrated and recognized our community in the metro area. [01:04:48] In the late '90s, several folks advocated for successfully inclusion of LGBTQIA publications in our local public libraries, and with limited success, but some good success about inclusion of queer folks and consent and good things in family life education. [01:05:10] In 2000, Dr. Domenich recognized and allowed LGBTQIA+ student groups in our high schools. In 2002, the school board instituted a good non-bullying policy to protect queer kids. [01:05:26] Over the years, we've protected the inclusion of LGBTQIA, as well as black and disabled, and Native American and immigrant folk in our libraries. In 2014, sexual orientation was recognized, and in 2015, gender identity and the non-discrimination policy. [01:05:46] Many more successes were had, including in FLE and in curriculum. But in 2020, Regulation 2603 was passed protecting trans students. I've run to the end of my time, so thank you very much for listening. [01:06:07] - Chair Frisch, that was our last public speaker. - Thank you, everyone. Agenda Item 4.01, Student Representative Matters. I call on Ms. Sawant. - Thank you, Mr. Chair. Good evening, everyone. [01:06:22] Today, I'd like to address students' access to extracurriculars and activities in Fairfax County. While FCPS provides a broad array of opportunities, the reality is that not all students have equal access to these activities, particularly when it comes to financial support. At the most recent Superintendent's Advisory Council meeting, Students broke out into small group discussions with a mixture of schools at each table to discuss how their high school promoted extracurricular activities and opportunities for students at their school. [01:06:50] It was really a great opportunity to speak with students from Centerville and Chantilly and other high schools of how activities worked at their school, how after school activities worked, how buses were promoted, and of the sort. But one common point that really emerged around the room from several schools was how dance was treated. [01:07:07] For example, at Westfield High School, dance is considered a club rather than a sport, meaning that it receives no funding and that the coaches are volunteers. This creates significant barriers to participation and a girl at Southlakes and Oakton agreed. In Oakton High School, SAC delegate chimed in, mentioning how the cost of participating from shoes, to palm, to uniform, to travel quickly adds up, making these clubs exclusive and expensive. [01:07:32] The Oakton delegate mentioned that there is a financial aid program at Oakton to support activities, but the issue is that most students aren't aware about how to access it and how to use it. She mentioned that the cheer teams receive more resources than the dance teams, raising the question, what determines the funding breakdown between teams and why is there such disparity? I may just be giving two examples here, but there are so many others. When we look at middle school sports, I know that students are grateful that FCPS is giving those to students, free for students in good standing and enrolled in at least five courses, which means that students have the opportunity to participate without facing any financial barriers. [01:08:09] While I know that this isn't feasible at the high school level, as we look at the upcoming budget meeting, I wonder if there's room for dance coaches who are currently volunteers to receive a stipend or some benefits to support the work and the time they take out for these teams. On that note, I wanted to revisit the Virginia Senate Bill 707, which took effect on July 1st. [01:08:28] This bill allows all public middle and high schools to establish career and technical education student organizations, like HOSA and TSA, regardless of whether they offer CTE courses. While I talked earlier about how excited I am for this bill to take place in high schools, it doesn't fully address the challenges that sponsors and students are now facing. A Chantilly High School student in the Technology Student Association shared with me that even with this new bill, the school does have a cap on the number of students who can participate in this organization due to the limited number of sponsors and capacity of students that they can take. We discussed this at the SAC meeting and the questions that students had is, how can we support our sponsors [01:09:08] and the time they take to put into these clubs? Not all sponsors receive official compensation. Their role is often voluntary and they bail our costs and responsibilities of running these programs unless FCPS or the specific CTE organization has stipended them. Again, as I mentioned, at Oakton and Westfield, the coaches for dance teams and other clubs are often volunteers. [01:09:29] I wonder if there's ways that we can recognize our coaches and our teacher sponsors for the time they volunteer and they put into these activities. This ties back into FCPS's strategic plan, specifically Goal 4, which focuses on ensuring equal access and opportunities for all students, which starts by figuring out ways to effectively support our teacher sponsors and coaches. [01:09:50] Before I conclude, I wanted to highlight two upcoming events for students. First is the FCPS Secondary College Fair on Sunday October 20th at George Mason University's Eagle Bank Arena where over 220 colleges and universities will be attending and then on Monday October 21st and Tuesday October 22nd FCPS will be holding virtual post-secondary nights where you can learn more about how to be prepared for your educational journey and I encourage students to get involved. [01:10:17] Additionally STEMology which is an annual STEM Fest is actually scheduled for this Saturday at at Mount Vernon High School. And I encourage you all to intend. Thank you. - Thank you, Ms. Sawant. [01:10:32] Gen item 5.01, action item, certification of closed meeting compliance. In order to comply with section 2.2-3712D of the Code of Virginia, it is necessary for the board to certify that since the Fairfax County School Board convened a closed meeting on October 10th, 2024, to the best of each board member's knowledge, only public business matters lawfully exempted from open meetings requirements, only such public business matters as were identified in the motion convening the closed meeting were heard discussed or considered by the board during the closed meeting do i have a motion [01:11:06] mr mckelveen is there a second mr moon all those in favor miss marron miss dixit mr mckelveen dr anderson mr mcdaniel miss anderson mr dunn mr moon miss lady miss st john cunning miss sizemore hyzer and myself that is unanimous agenda item 5.02 confirmation of action taken in closed meeting i call on mr mcdaniel for a motion i move to deny the school reassignment appeal of a student who is charged with multiple offenses related to virginia's laws on weapons and illicit drugs related to an alleged incident that occurred in the community and to confirm the disciplinary [01:11:43] decision of the division superintendent is there a second second mr moon all those in favor miss marron miss dixit mr mckelveen dr anderson mr mcdaniel miss anderson mr dunn mr moon miss Ms. Lady, Ms. St. John Cunning, Ms. Sizemoreheiser, and myself, that is unanimous. [01:12:01] I call on Ms. Marin for a motion. I move to excuse from attendance at school certain students identified in closed meeting pursuant to Virginia Code section 22.1-254B1. Is there a second? Second. Mr. Moon, all those in favor? [01:12:17] Ms. Marin, Ms. Dixit, Mr. McElveen, Dr. Anderson, Mr. McDaniel, Ms. Anderson, Mr. Moon, Ms. Lady, Ms. St. John Cunning, Ms. Sizemoreheiser, all those opposed? abstaining Mr. Dunn and myself will the clerk read the vote 10-0-2 the motion carries the motion passes thank you agenda item 6.01 performance review financial planning EL5 monitoring report I call on Dr. Reed for a monitoring [01:12:55] report on executive limitation 5 financial planning good evening chair Frisch and members of the board tonight I'll be presenting executive limitation 5 which discusses financial planning and we're ready to turn the page please all right just a reminder that the executive limitation number five is around [01:13:31] maintaining a multi-year financial plan that's data-driven comprehensive transparent and part of a long-term plan to achieve the board strategic goals for our students so at the time of this report to the best of my knowledge information and belief we have gathered information and evidence that I believe supports compliance with the board's executive limitation associated with this topic again for those watching the full report is posted on board docs want to remind the board that there are four major areas of EL5 and here we see item [01:14:07] one which is focused on developing an annual budget and there are a number of subcategories but this is one of the four areas of EL5 the second third and fourth areas are listed on this slide and again these are fairly straightforward so I don't think I need to recite them for you or any of those watching as we look at the budget timeline and again this is FY 2026 and it's a tentative timeline i would like to make sure that the board remembers that our first work session on the fyi [01:14:46] 2026 budget is scheduled for november 12th because of this tonight's presentation will not include any fyi 2026 updates and will instead be focused on new work updates or items newly added to the sell since it was last presented in march of 2024 again when this executive limitation is presented next fall it will include updates from the fy 2026 budget again the full report can be found on board [01:15:18] docs so in looking at the first part of executive limitation five in this area it's the development of the annual budget and I really I want to remind the board that there was a direction from the board at the presentation of the last budget that talked about looking at efficiencies and how we might appreciate those efficiency efficiencies over multi-year budgeting and one of the things we proposed and the board approved last year was working on the Baldrige award process which is a very comprehensive look at all operations and how they [01:15:57] connect budget-wise and to outcomes of the division. So I want to begin by sharing that on September 9th of 2024, FCPS was recognized with the Baldrige Spirit Award at The Ohio State University for completing the Baldrige Organizational Profile, which is the first step in submitting an application. [01:16:17] We're currently planning to submit a complete 50-page application for the award in winter 2025 and it's a consistent agenda item and our senior leadership team meetings recently our FCPS budget documents have received awards from both the Association of School Business Officials and the Government Finance Officers Association we recognize those recently finally in response to the joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission report of Virginia's k-12 funding our communications budget and government relations staff have been collaborating [01:16:54] collaborating on public facing social media infographics and documentation so in thinking about providing the board with a multi-year budget we continue to remind folks that this is there are several things we're continuing to do for this area that are outlined in our full report what I will say is that the newly added evidence is that our FY 2026 budget will incorporate five-year projections I do want to caution all of us though as the out years are projected [01:17:28] they're likely less precise because we really don't have a crystal ball in terms of our ability to identify what's going to happen next year much less five years out but we're really trying to take that longer look additionally we plan to accelerate the timeline for enrollment projections so that we can use those in our fiscal forecast and that's been a you know a request that was made at the end of last year so in thinking about this multi-year plan just a reminder and i know our board knows [01:18:02] this number well but that if the uh fairfax could receive the estimated 568.7 million in state revenue that would certainly be appreciated and again it would be something that would happen if the general assembly were to adopt all of the jlark near and long-term recommendations we do continue to advocate and recently had our legislative breakfast which our board attended with many of our elected legislators and continue to hope for collaboration [01:18:36] as we look at funding models to support our our young people in terms of timely advice to the board for indicator three I'd like to highlight that we had 114 budget questions answered during the FY 2025 budget process and this was more than double the number of questions that we had the prior fiscal year but I think we're really working on trying to provide turnaround answers even more quickly and I know that's something our budget committee is taking a look at in terms of process The fourth area of the executive limitation is to take all reasonable, prudent, anticipatory [01:19:15] and proactive actions in securing financial resources for the division. We continue to work on grants development and these are presented in the quarterly budget review process. And on the screen is a summary of grants showing an increase in submissions and a higher award rate from FY 24 third quarter to FY 24 fourth quarter. [01:19:38] And this would be new information since the prior EL. Our FY 2025 updates will be posted on the FCPS quarterly budget reviews web page when available. But this is an area that we continue to work on. It's time and work intensive but it's important and I wanted to make sure that the work of our teams is represented this evening and the board sees the progress. [01:20:03] So at this time, Mr. Chairman, this concludes the summary of the monitoring report for executive Limitation number five financial planning and happy to take any questions. Thank you. Dr. Reed at this time I invite board members to ask any clarifying questions and provide comments. Mr. Moon. Thank you Mr. Chairman Dr. Reed Thank you for the presentation. Just a couple of quick questions Could you refresh my recollection my memory as to you the last time this was presented to us was back in March? [01:20:34] Yes, sir of this year and now you're presenting 25 presentation in october which is seven months after the last presentation as opposed to one full 12 months cycle so could you tell us why this is being presented at this time as opposed to march of next year yes sir what we tried to do when we actually planned this year this is our first year where we could begin in july with the executive limitations for the entire year [01:21:09] and when the staff looked at what made sense in terms of where in the year this is when we're actually doing our financial planning and in march i think originally financial planning had been planned for lack of a better term for earlier in the year but had been moved um on our work plan last year but this year it really fits um in october and we would expect it to stay there year over year at this point because we're done financially planning well i don't know if we're ever done but March really isn't that's more of a financial management time. [01:21:43] I understand that you know I try to compare the last presentation content of the last presentation with tonight's and there has not been a really you know much addition since last time that is why I was asking because we're talking about financial planning you know going forward as opposed to what happened in the past with us that I understand why are trying to do it this way but however more important question is this with a collective of bargaining coming up we are going through right now I as I [01:22:18] understand that you know doing a multi or financial planning is that is that going to be feasible at all when 90 percent of our budget goes into paying for salaries and benefits and that is a subject of collective bargaining and how feasible is it for you to project five years from now what the collectible bargaining is going to bring to us so a couple answers number one that expectation [01:22:57] for a multi-year budget plan is a measurement the board has in the strategic plan so that's the expectation that staff provide that that was a board direction so I think that when you ask how feasible is it to meet that direction I do think in all matters it's best practice to look forward I don't know that I you know I began the topic that discussion around I don't know how accurate by five years out we really are likely to be but I do know that it's an expectation that we would have a multi-year bargaining agreement once we [01:23:35] are into bargaining so it is very likely that we would have information about our bargaining agreement commitments several years out I anticipate that to be true moving forward I wait to see what happens Dr. Reed yes sir thank you thank you Mr. Moon miss Dixit thank you for the presentation Dr. Reed I did have a question about the budget questions obviously we had more than double a [01:24:11] question this year and there were a lot of redundancies and questions there were it was like PDF after PDF it was hard to find information sometimes so I wanted to say if there is a way to have a drop down menu or sections or a better way to submit those questions so even for other supervisors or other people who are submitting the questions they can follow that process too so it's easy for our staff to address that. [01:24:42] So I think the subject of budget question questions is one that our new budget chair, Mr. McDaniel, and our vice budget chair, Ms. Sizemore Heiser, have spoken already to Ms. Burden and I about, and we are looking at ways to streamline that because we recognize the turnaround for answers that's really important as we're making critical decisions. [01:25:08] And so I believe we're working on some plans that should streamline that moving forward. And my second question was about the grants, which is really good to see that we have a quarter as of fourth quarter fi 2024 is 63 million dollars of grant was submitted and awarded were 22.9. [01:25:29] So this is like a I can see that there was a lot of effort done and not that much of even though there were 75, you know, submitted. I wanted to just see what can we do to increase that capacity and better results in getting those grant awards. [01:25:48] Well, in some cases, the decision hasn't been made yet on some of those applications. So when we close the quarter, those are the ones we've heard about by that date and time. And some of the, I think the grants, one of the things we want to do as a best practice is go back and ask. [01:26:08] Although the grant writers often look at previously successful grants as models and templates. But I do agree with you. When you look at the ROI of that work, it doesn't look as sound. But I don't know if that includes the most recent grant that we received, the $15 million grant, Mr. Norton or Ms. Burden, or if that's going to be in the next quarter report. [01:26:34] There is -- it is included in this. not the it's a 15 million grant over a five-year period oh so that makes it a so it's like three million per year as opposed to the full 15 being reflected but it is since it's over a multi-year period so would that be part of what's accounting for the different number the lower number versus the number written for we can certainly dig into the numbers on the chart and get you an exact answer as to if there's some anomaly for the multi-year reason thank you mr. Norton because that could now that I think about it be part of the [01:27:12] explanation mistakes it yeah it could be how many grant writers do we have in FCPS miss burden do we have a number of grant writers approximately well in the budget office we have one and a half two positions they have other duties that have to do with grants as well and they you know work on grants constantly they are constantly you know looking on federal websites state websites you know looking for you know private industry private industry looking for any grant opportunities and then you know working with the program people to put the grant applications together yes thank [01:27:47] you miss burden and i know other departments instructional services has grant writers um the office of school support and chief of schools office has folks that wrote grants right so but i think our grant writing group is relatively lean so a company of i will just give example of three eight point eight seven billion dollars budget of CPS has as much grant writers which a very small business in federal contracting will have as a proposal writer it is not even the right amount of people because there is a lot [01:28:25] of money out there we are are we getting shrinking budget and if we just can have a good budget grant writers who can do for go for federal grants and I I would I would think this number will increase we just need to like have intentional focus on that. Yes ma'am. Thank you. Thank you Miss Dixit. Dr. [01:28:47] Anderson. Thank you. I do want to start off by saying that I appreciate some of the information that shows kind of the progress over time because that's what I'm always looking for and one of those areas is the competitive grants. It really shows that there's much work and I do agree with Miss Dixit. It doesn't seem proportional to our size and hopefully we can have a few more resources there. The other piece that I noticed was new is the accelerated timeline of the enrollment projections because we typically are just kind of [01:29:25] having an educated guess but being as close as possible I think would help with the staffing reserve and some of those other decisions that are made in order to prepare for any potential gaps. And as always I know this part is not new but I do want to highlight it the budget quarterly reports I think are very very helpful documents not only does it record you know what is it that we are going to spend it on but it highlights where they're coming from it gives details in terms of how we it gives a lot of detail of those expenditures so I just wanted to make sure we just continue to do that and I [01:30:01] know that some of the J log things are a little bit more extensive but they were there before from the report that we just received in march but there are just a little bit more details and i know we've all been kind of disabused of maybe receiving that 568 million dollars but we can hope but we can continue to put the word out um one of the things that i wanted to raise since we're talking about financial planning um if you recall well you may recall last july we spent quite a bit of time having discussions here regarding the summer recess contract [01:30:39] expenditures and planning ahead for that so we don't have that very extended discussion that we ended up having where we I think suspended two pages worth of proposals for contracts for the summer. I don't think I saw any information here about how we were going to plan to not be in that position again. So I believe that's going to be in our EL that addresses procurement because all of those contracts come through procurement department and I know that the team is working [01:31:14] hard to try to create the cyclical planning and also part of the concern at that time was the lack of descriptive paragraphs in terms of several of those items were actually multi-year or addendum rather than full contract so we took that to heart and I believe it'll meet standard this summer okay so I will wait for that procurement is that seven or eight ah it's okay you don't need to answer that that was a unnecessary question the other thing as well I guess I could mention it now but it's really going to live with the same procurement as the board receives those [01:31:51] notices that we receive via email because we have to be notified of of certain things, just having the same level of detail that you tend to provide in the budget quarterly reports would be very important, because I know as one board member, I'm typically emailing back asking for a higher level of information regarding the use and the funding of some of those contracts. [01:32:14] So I want to share that there. Sorry, I just want to make sure. Just one question, you mentioned the Ball Ridge report as related to the follow on motion from last January. [01:32:34] Are we going to be receiving additional information soon? Yes, ma'am. The profile, I believe you have, the organizational profile and the current 50 page project that we're working on right now, you'll be receiving updates as we work through those. [01:32:52] Okay, thank you. And the other question that I had was about the budget questions. did notice the big jump can you also disaggregate for us how many came from the board and how many came from the board of supervisors from this board versus the board of supervisors yes ma'am do you have that with you this evening thank you miss burden would you share that please yeah in fiscal 25 of the 114 71 were scored questions and 43 were board of supervisors so about a [01:33:26] a 62 38% swing do you want fiscal 24 sure it's a good comparison 41 from the school board or about 75 percent and 14 from the board of supervisors for a total of 55 and fiscal 23 about 64 percent or 32 came from the school board with 18 coming from the board of supervisors for a total of 50 that was definitely a little year thank you for that information um i think these are probably procurement questions I'll pause for right now until I leave you my notes thank you thank you [01:34:02] Dr. Anderson Mr. McDaniel our budget chair so first off congratulations on the Baldrige award and the progress is being made I'm looking forward to seeing that continue to play out over the next few years I think the multi-year budgeting I know we've talked about this before but I think it's going to be a good exercise on several fronts not the least of which being as as Mr. Moon alluded to in the collective bargaining side of the House, and this is going to be our first budget where we will have a collective bargaining component, so it's a historic budget in some respects. [01:34:37] And lastly, on the budget questions, Ms. Sizemore-Heiser and I have had some conversations with staff, and please be looking -- please be on the lookout for a memo and more communications from us with the survey that will be coming out here in the next couple of weeks on that front, so thank you. [01:34:55] Thank you. Thank you Mr. McDaniel. Mr. Dunn. Thank you. Dr. Eater you familiar with the Gibson report which was a school efficiency review of FCPS in September 2013. Yes sir. Is the Baldrige report or review process similar in form and substance to the Gibson report that was done in 2013. I think they have the same intent. I had read through the Gibson report actually on my entry in. [01:35:27] And it was actually also provided by a community group, but I and I think the intent of both around studying efficiencies and mapping resources to outcomes would be consistent. We haven't done a full Baldrige report here yet. So I'm not entirely sure as we finish the process, they just recalibrated the Baldrige work this year. [01:35:49] So in reading other Baldrige reports, I think it's likely that it will be very similar. And when we complete our work, I'll have a better answer for you, but it is, I think, a similar intent. Sorry if I missed it, but when are you expecting to have the Baldrige review completed such that it can be presented, any recommendations be presented to the school board? [01:36:11] When we originally talked about this last winter, I think we were looking at about a two-year process. So right now, we completed the initial launch, if you will, and we're in phase one, which is the 50 page. Mr. Smith is really spearheading our Baldrige work. [01:36:30] So, Mr. Smith, do you have more of a timeline? So we are in that first phase at this point, and we'll be submitting our 50 page in the fall of 25. [01:36:42] And then the way that the Ballridge organization works, it's a bit like accreditation as we look at high schools, and for those who have that understanding, there is a review team, and they look at different aspects of our full 50-page submission, and that team will look at each section with a very distinct eye toward improvement with very clear recommendations on how we can create better efficiencies for the entire school. [01:37:12] organization? So there's an external review that's a part of this that's scored that we then will take action on and I will be keeping the board fully apprised through that scoring process moving forward. And is it so is the entire review can focus on simply reviewing the 50 pages of narrative that we provide? It will be more than that but again this is our first time through the process as a county so and from what i gather and i was able to go to the conference at ohio state [01:37:50] from what i gather will be provided guidance along the way in helping to create the report providing guidance on particular items that we need to look for as we're helping to or as we're creating the report and then as we provide those submissions we'll be getting feedback along the from those who are going to be scoring our report at different intervals and at the end I would actually say the 50 page might be what am I sort of a colloquial term for that phase of the project but it's really organized around a number of [01:38:26] operational and goal areas were there seven I think that we reviewed there are seven goal areas that we'll review and while we're moving for the 50 page report there is an interim 25 page report that we will submit to the Baldrige organization to get feedback on and it's a rather rigorous review and they'll have expectations and recommendations that they'll give back to us so that we can again create better efficiencies with our current practice and process so I'm looking at the Gibson report and their methodology includes school site visits interviews with division staff focus group sessions [01:39:06] community survey, and national peer data. So is there any, I mean, do they come into Fairfax County at all, or is this just not on paper? So we'll have individuals come here and look at our processes and actually do interviews here with staff. I think I may be the only member of the leadership team who was here when we had the Gibson Report, so I do remember that it was a panel of individuals who came we had three reviewers who came and interviewed us individually they did surveys of the leadership team did individual interviews with members of [01:39:42] the leadership team and then develop the comprehensive report based on those interviews and surveys as well as review of documents and other reports that we had here available at the time okay thank you it would be great if school board members could be included in those meetings or representatives of the school board. Mr. Dunn, can I clarify when you say meetings, like when the panel comes? Yes. Okay. [01:40:05] Yes, sir. The $568 million were owed by the state. 568.8. But in any case, for Fairfax County residents, what would you do with that money? If state legislators ask you, okay, you're doing pretty well FCPS what would you do with half a billion dollars more you know I I think we would make sure that our educators and all of our staff our [01:40:42] operational staff were compensated in a manner in which they could afford to live in Fairfax County on that wage without having to take second and third jobs in some cases I think we would look at our supports and activities that we could provide you know I think our school board rep Megan was talking about the different activities that are so cost prohibitive even today for many of our students I think that the ability you know we have to space our curriculum [01:41:18] materials out over a series of years and I think that's challenging the ability to provide time for staff to do the planning they need that's compensated AGAIN I DON'T KNOW TEAM ANY OTHER THOUGHTS THAT I MEAN I CAN GO ON ALL NIGHT PROBABLY BUT MISS BURDEN ANYTHING THAT WE WOULD MAYBE TAKE CARE OF HEALTH BENEFITS IN A WAY THAT IS MORE SUPPORTIVE FOR OUR OUR STAFF FACILITIES IN CONSTRUCTION OH I SEE MS. SEMANSKI OVER THERE BOUNCING OUT OF OUR SEAT MS. SEMANSKI IS BOUNCING UP AND [01:41:56] DOWN OVER THERE I WAS TRYING NOT TO MAKE EYE CONTACT BUT YES facilities I mean we have elevators and HVAC I mean miss Szymanski did you want to weigh in at all certainly with any funding given to us we'll try to maximize it to the best extent possible to your point we have a bunch of aging infrastructure and a very large maintenance backlog so I think at a high level we would probably target that first I do think we keep when we're not adequately funded we keep moving money from one place to another and eventually the need catches up and overwhelms us in those areas that have been underfunded. [01:42:34] Have you, has FCPS done any work or consultations with regard to Title 17 clean energy financing available under the Loan Programs Office of the Department of Energy? I know we talked about that in our recent FACTS meeting and looking at that for solar and so forth. [01:42:54] Ms. Szymanski or Mr. Muick, do you have any comment this evening? Or if not, we can get back to you. I think we'll have to get back to you, Dr. Reid. So I wanted to highlight because that's a program that provides, if we provide 3% of the money, they provide 97%, which I like those odds. [01:43:21] And that money can be used to replace HVAC systems and other, you know, clean energy efficiency is interpreted extremely broadly to replace a lot of the infrastructure in our schools, upgrade a lot of our windows and other things that might be deteriorating, and that's 97% free money. There's just billions and billions of dollars available. So I note the one and a half grant writers, that's a very small team of grant writers, and there are outside consulting firms [01:43:53] that sometimes get paid on success fee, basically. So there are opportunities to engage. So I look forward to engaging with you more in that respect. Thank you. Yes, sir. Thank you, Mr. Dunn. Ms. Maren I do want to commend the activity for the grants I actually think the numbers are quite impressive especially since so much of it remains outstanding for this quarter I think it would be helpful to know what other peer school divisions do what are they applying for and receiving you know dollar amounts [01:44:28] number of grants kind of what's the ROI but I mean I don't remember any pace of grants being obtained or reported to the board in my last term so I could only compare it to that that this is you know many times more beneficial um i would really you know this question about the multi-year plan you know it i didn't recall it from last year as i read it and i was like well we know that the best we'll get is this biannual budget from the state but that has been late every year and although the jlark funding is included it's a good historical marker in here you know we heard that that's going to take several years so i don't think [01:45:05] think it's a you know necessarily a good exercise to budget down to the granular level for five years but I think it's good to have projections and even like what would be your budget if we were just going to sustain the bare minimum I think that's something we've talked before about on the board and I think it would be good to know because already we're spending a billion dollars more than what the state thinks we need and so and we're only at bare minimum so what is that we really need so I think maybe we as a board can talk about it and with you but I also think this gets to having more regular meetings about the budget and financial and you know like budgeting is different than financial management as you've pointed out and I think you know over the years [01:45:45] we've gotten I've seen the board get a little more focused on those two different aspects but especially with the Baldrige work you know I also on that note it would be great to include the board more in that work like when is our opportunity to hear more about it or even is there a role for the board in that and it's wonderful that you got this award but um I think that that would be really great for us to really understand that and the last thing I wanted to add was um I already submitted my comments so I'm ahead of the game okay that's it thank you Miss Marin Miss Anderson [01:46:25] so I'm I am I do have to say that I am thrilled with the speed that you guys are working through through Baldrige because I as now I was working with students who writing the reports it was a much more involved process however just I understand how tedious all of the questions are related to that particular so the fact that we are already making progress I am very excited about the the path that we have going forward I am going to guess to my colleagues point I'm going to guess that Baldrige is going to illustrate to us that we need every penny that we have currently and every penny that we can get more so I would like to also applaud [01:47:03] although the grant work I know that our our chief operating officer is also working diligently to ensure grants related to any electric buses that we can get as well so while I know that we don't necessarily have dedicated grant writers in every department I do know that we have lots of staff that are looking and that's where a lot of the work is coming from so I agree with my colleagues that seeing how we can bolster that is important but I would like to applaud the staff for what all they're doing. So I just wanted to say that I'm excited to see how Baldrige grows [01:47:39] with a division our size just because I know how tedious and how extensive the process is. So I can't wait to hear more updates about how things are going. Thank you. We can't either. Thank you Ms. Anderson. I will take a turn. So thank you for this and I will also take some of the blame for the timing because one of the goals that we had for this this coming year is that everything can be done before we enter the superintendent's evaluation cycle and so that obviously necessitates [01:48:12] the moving of some of these around and finding an optimal way of spacing them so that the work can be done and there's going to be some that are closer to the previous one than there And there will be some, I think, that are a little further than a year. [01:48:33] But the goal is it's on track now. It's all before the superintendent's evaluation, including the goal reports. And we're not doubling up on them in meetings. We don't have any goal reports on the same nights as ELs. So progress, progress, progress. I will say huge kudos to the folks who work on our grants because I was down in Richmond this morning literally and participating in a panel discussion about electric bus electric buses and specifically about what steps could divisions who haven't started this process take and the first thing I said was well you need a school board that will direct the [01:49:10] superintendent to get it done and then you need a superintendent who will empower the operational team to make it happen and I didn't have to point out because it was pointed out before my turn to speak the number of buses that we have all but three of which are the result of grants either from deq or from the epa we've purchased three outright and by the end of this school year we will have 105 electric buses in fairfax county four years ago we had zero and that is all except for three because of grants and so kudos to our team for making that happen [01:49:51] i think we can always you know uh it was it was interesting watching everybody's eyes light up like uh you know opening presents when the question was asked what would we do with the jlark money um i have like this great depression mentality i hate to even think about things that aren't like already delivered but i think it presses the point of how important it is that we continue to advocate for this money because there is so much need and when i was asked what else school divisions could do i said every single school board needs to be talking about jlark because imagine how many buses every school division in in the commonwealth could buy with [01:50:27] a little extra money from the from the commonwealth so um i'll be voting in compliance on this i think um the baldridge work is exciting um and i appreciate the level of update that i'm getting on it thus far um i am not in the operational weeds on on the um uh administration of of services and and classroom work in the division and so I'm eager to see the reports back from staff's work with Baldrige since they are obviously much more in line to know precisely what's happening [01:51:04] and I look forward to the work so thank you very much we have one go back Dr. Anderson thank you I just had some points that I did miss both in this year's report and well last year's meaning last school years there were there was conversation there were statements regarding how collaboration occurs with the different teams to help build the budget how can we get a little bit more insight into that in this report kind of like a show your work question well i think [01:51:41] miss burton what would that look like if we we could maybe take some photos of the teams working together the departments that senior leadership not of the people per se but of the product I think the budget but during the budget you know planning discussions with chiefs in the departments you know the chiefs are constantly evaluating their programs and deciding if something is still a priority and perhaps shifting funds if they have a greater priority and I think [01:52:16] dr. Anderson is just asking that you know we we track that information so that it's available yes thank you I think you hit the nail on the head I would love to see how that can be embedded into this report and also similarly to last time when we talked about this just having greater transparency I know our budget book is heavy because it is we have a big budget but I continue to have community community members who want to know where things are and they're just struggling to find where things are located I am not sure I know the answer to this but I do want to raise this as a point and [01:52:52] And then just lastly, speaking of transparency, and again in the planning, and if this is not the right EL, please let me know. I'd like to have a little bit more clarity on the plans for the achievement gap closing strategies. I know there were, you know, some dollars, several millions of dollars devoted to that in FY24 and then some more last year, but I don't have a good sense as to how that will be spent. [01:53:16] And last but not least, it's just a little tighter alignment with the budget priorities for the board. When we get to that budget process, we have the resolution that lays out the priorities. I'd like a little bit more explanation as to why certain things are assumed and some things are not included. [01:53:36] Yes, ma'am. Thank you. Thank you, Dr. Anderson. Mr. Dunn. Thank you. Dr. Reed, can you describe any enhancements to the budget questions process? Because I know that was discussed in, I think, a previous presentation or mentioned. [01:53:54] I THINK I DON'T KNOW THAT I HAVE AN ANSWER TO ENHANCEMENTS TO THE BUDGET QUESTION PROCESS. I KNOW THAT MR. MCDANIEL AND MS. ISMORE HIZER ARE LOOKING AT SOME NEW SYSTEMS TO PUT INTO PLACE PERHAPS OR NEW -- I THINK THERE'S SOME TYPE OF A SURVEY THAT'S GOING OUT TO BOARD MEMBERS TO GET YOUR PERSPECTIVE OR YOUR OPINION ON WHAT YOU WOULD LIKE TO SEE IN THAT PROCESS AND THEN WE'LL BE RESPONSIVE TO WHATEVER IT IS THAT WE'RE ASKED TO DO. [01:54:20] THANK YOU, MR. DUNN. ALL RIGHT. I CALL ON MS. ANDERSON FOR A MOTION. [01:54:36] I move that the school board finds the superintendent is in compliance with executive limitation number five financial planning I further move that the school board approved the monitoring report based on the superintendent's reasonable interpretation of executive limitation number five financial planning as outlined in the strategic governance manual is there a second Mr. McDaniel all right all those in favor Miss Marin Mr. McElveen Mr. McDaniel Miss Anderson Mr. Dunn Mr. Moon Miss lady myself miss Sizemore [01:55:24] Heiser that is unanimous for board members present and a couple away from the table if the clerk could read the vote it's nine zero three with with Dr. [01:55:43] Anderson missing Miss St. John Cunning and mystics it away from the table just a point of order we only count the total number of people so the vote count should not be 12 it should be whoever's here plus Miss Sizemore Heiser your points taken okay so is that the correct the correct vote is 9-0 thank you I do believe that we know when people are away from the table though in minutes so it's worth saying but you're correct we only report the vote as voted so can I [01:56:19] confirm I only heard the clerk say 9-0-3 that is what I heard the clerk say so the vote is 9-0 with miss dr. Anderson miss Dixit and missing John coming away from the day thank you for clarifying thank you miss Marin agenda item 7.01 policy review. Actually we're going to take a brief five to seven minute recess [01:56:44] so people can fill out their form or fill it out online and get cookies. Board members [02:07:57] please return to your seats. Board members please return to your seats. The captain has [02:10:06] turned the return to your seat sign on. All right. Agenda item 7.01 policy review financial [02:10:43] PLANNING EL5. THE NEXT BUSINESS IS THE POLICY REVIEW FOR EXECUTIVE LIMITATION FIVE, FINANCIAL PLANNING. ANNUALLY THE BOARD WILL REVIEW EACH OF THE 13 EXECUTIVE LIMITATIONS. NOPE? YES. AT THE TIME OF THE RONOR REPORT IS PROVIDED TO DETERMINE IF ANY REVISIONS ARE NEEDED. MOVING FORWARD, THE BOARD WILL REVIEW ANY OF THE EXECUTIVE LIMITATIONS AT ANY TIME. CHANGE MIGHT BE NEEDED. [02:11:09] AT THIS TIME BOARD MEMBERS MAY PROVIDE COMMENTS ON EXECUTIVE LIMITATION FIVE, FINANCIAL PLANNING TO to determine if any revisions are needed. At this time, I now invite board members who would like to suggest revisions. Seeing none, I call on Ms. Marin for a motion. [02:11:39] - I move that the school board maintains executive limitation five, financial planning, as it is currently detailed in the strategic governance manual. - Is there a second? [02:11:56] Ms. St. John Cunning. The motion is on the screen. We'll now vote. All those in favor. - Do we speak, do we speak to the motions? - Oh, thank you for the correction. Point of order, point taken. Would you like to speak to your motion, Ms. Marin? yes I'll just say I think this is a sound um EL and the points raised were valid so I'm glad to keep it going forward thank you Ms. St. John Cunning would you like to speak to your second thank you seeing no others we will now vote for the motion that's on the screen all those in favor Ms. Marin, Ms. Dixit, Mr. McElveen, Dr. Anderson, Mr. McDaniel, Ms. Anderson, Mr. Dunn, [02:12:35] Mr. Moon, Ms. Lady, Ms. St. John Cunning uh I can't see Ms. Sizemore Heiser oh yep Ms. Sizemore heiser and myself that is unanimous the motion passes and i will now agenda item 8.01 strategic plan update i call on dr reid for a strategic plan update thank you chairman frisch and members of the board as a reminder to our public each month we share an update on the strategic plan to highlight the efforts of fcps as we pursue our street strategic plan goals so i'm excited this evening [02:13:14] to talk about our um not our academic matters yet but it's our strategic plan uh report um so it's our strategic plan update and this evening i want to remind our board we're focusing on goal two um in this report which is our safe supported included and empowered uh goal two and within that we're looking at positive school climate which is our safety inclusion and sense of belonging And our disciplinary disproportionality, which, again, is part of our or embedded within our equity commitment. [02:13:53] So this evening, we chose to profile our restorative justice practices in Fairfax County public schools. And these practices actually teach students important skills, which are on the screen, and also talk about what happens when conflict does arise. [02:14:11] And I honestly think that I was listening to a podcast recently that talked about maybe that being one of the top essential skills right now for our young people to learn is how to manage conflict and how do we engage in a civil and thoughtful way when there is conflict. [02:14:32] So by focusing on these areas, we feel that the restorative justice practices can lead to a more positive and supportive school environment. Essentially, there is a continuum of these practices, and really, they're used to address a range of needs and situations. [02:14:50] They're used in classrooms and small groups, and it's also a formal process that can be facilitated by trained and FCPS-certified practitioners that allow participants to understand what happened that might have led to the conflict and understand the impact of what happened. [02:15:10] Again, students will engage in behaviors that are not intended to harm, but that, in fact, is the impact of those behaviors, and it's very important to help our students understand the need to positively move forward. [02:15:26] And this is a process and an opportunity for those who've experienced conflict to be heard, as well as emphasizing accountability in a thoughtful way. I want to remind those watching and our board that in 2024 we started an initiative that actually came from schools. [02:15:45] We had several school principals make a request to have more training. So what we decided is if we're going to work on discipline disproportionality, it would be important that every school have an opportunity to have trained practitioners. [02:16:00] And this became, I think again, I know our board has talked a lot about this distinction between a school system and a system of schools, and we want to make sure that these options are available for our students in every school. [02:16:17] Deonna Shin is here this evening with me. Ms. Shin is a senior manager in the Office of Equity and Student Conduct, and she's really been leading this initiative across the division, and I'm very proud of her efforts. and the efforts of all of our staff who agreed to attend and participate in this training, and we now are working on that goal of having two trained practitioners in every school. [02:16:43] Because as I recall, when the principals came and requested this, we had wait lists sometimes of several months to have a facilitator get out to a school, and one of our elementary assistant principals said, "Dr. Reed, it's hard for a seven-year-old, a second grader, remember what they did yesterday much less three months ago so by the time the facilitator would come out to do restorative justice I mean it just it was not time-sensitive so very proud of the work Deanna's led and all those who participated at this time we'd like to show some examples of our program in [02:17:18] action and while they do not involve actual conflicts or decisions the video does accurately portray the structure and dynamics of restorative justice practices so if the clerk would please play the video in Fairfax County Public Schools restorative justice practices are used to build community foster relationships repair harm caused by conflict and prevent conflict from [02:17:57] occurring in the first place these restorative practices range from the informal development of an empathetic restorative mindset by staff and students to formal settings which include preventative community building circles, small group interventions, and responsive restorative justice conferences. [02:18:15] The benefits of restorative practices for students are that every student is seen, heard, and valued. At London Town Elementary School, community building circles were implemented three years ago. We have students now that we're in our third year of doing community building circles that are advocating to have, you know, problem-solving conversations. Students are more comfortable bringing up problems with each other and wanting to have a dialogue with each other. [02:18:45] I notice they're advocating for themselves, especially in the classroom. Tier 2 restorative practices take place in small group intervention settings. They're from different classrooms, but they share the same problem. And so with those, it's a 9 to 12 week program, so you have to spend the first part building that trust in that circle process and then getting to the root cause of why things are happening and then by the end of that 12 weeks hopefully we have strategies and ways to help. [02:19:18] Tier 3 restorative practices known as restorative justice are facilitator-led sessions that bring together those impacted by wrongdoing to discuss the incident, understand the effects, and agree on how to repair the harm. justice is a formal tool that we use when conflict does occur that gives us the opportunity to intervene, to assess and to discuss what happened, the impact of what happened, and what we can do in order to feel like we can move forward and to repair our relationships in our community. [02:19:51] Twain Middle School and Chantilly High School regularly use restorative justice to resolve situations, repair relationships among students, and correct negative behaviors. One of the most important parts of RJ is the students have an opportunity to talk through that situation and take ownership of their impact on that situation. [02:20:12] Almost every time I know the students I've had worked through it, they'll come back and say, "Oh, this actually ended up really well." The benefits is giving students a platform to be heard, and students are learning how to manage relationships in a positive way, and they need our help, and especially if student feels like they could have handled the situation better or if they feel like they've been mistreated. It's a way for them to understand how it affects the community as well as how it affects each other and to figure out a way to come to some sort of agreement on how to move forward. And this is all part [02:20:47] of it, learning the empathy, learning accountability, learning reflection. This is a great way to teach children the skills of how to get along and once they learn it at this age they carry it on for the rest of their lives excellence equity and opportunity so as we continue to move through the year we're going to continue to keep our community informed the first of our five strategic plan goal reports goal one will be voted on at the october 24th regular school board meeting and goal two is going to be presented at the december [02:21:26] third work session so we'll need to get plenty of rest before those meetings. Mr. Chair this concludes this month's strategic plan update and Ms. Shannon and I are both here to answer any questions you might have. Thank you Dr. Reed. Dr. Anderson. Thank you I'll save most of my questions for when we have that conversation at the work session but I just wanted to give a preview I would love to hear in terms of the impact of restorative justice to discipline if you could ensure that that data is provided that would be very helpful and also I would like to hear maybe [02:22:03] in this conversation we know it's a great tool I I was trained in RJ in my former district and it is a wonderful way to teach kids how to resolve conflict but I do know that we need permission and consent in order to participate when there is a student conflict that we want to resolve in this way how do we try to inform families and students that this is a good thing to engage in because if If they say no, obviously we don't force the conversation. [02:22:33] But how do we ensure that they have enough education to know that this is a worthwhile and beneficial activity? Yes, ma'am. I mean, that's a key question mission. Do you want to share some of the strategies we use to work with families, please? Good evening. Again, my name is Deanna Shin, and I am the senior manager for the Office of Equity and Student Conduct. [02:22:53] Previously, I was a restorative justice practices specialist and led the restorative justice program here in FCPS. To your first comment in relation to impact we will be issuing a discipline practices report which does have an overview related to the impact of the pathway so that information will be forthcoming. [02:23:14] Also in terms of just how are we able to instruct families about restorative justice practices and the benefit of it for themselves and for their students. We have developed within the restorative justice program tools and resources for administrators to use in their conversations with families. One of them includes a very line by line script that administrators can use when calling families and talking to them about the benefits of restorative justice. [02:23:38] We also have developed reading lists which are accommodated and also in various languages. And then we also have our school based facilitators through the restorative justice pathway and through their certification program. Part of their training includes how to have conversations with families about restorative justice. [02:23:58] And so what that means is if an administrator feels that they just need a little bit more support in having this conversation beyond the resources and beyond the script, they can be able to call on that school based facilitator to support them in that conversation with family. Thank you. [02:24:14] In the last piece, we have the justice component. We have just the practices component, which is the preventative part. Can you walk us through a little bit in terms of how often students participate? Is it more at the high school? Is it more at the elementary school? And how does that dovetail or align with some of the other programs that I know the elementary schools engage in such as zones of regulation, et cetera. [02:24:41] So yes. So what we see you're absolutely right restorative justice circles for discipline and conflict and harm are voluntary and they do of course require parental consent. Our central office facilitators as well as our school based facilitators are trained in how to be able to move participants into a space to be willing to have those conversations and to be able to engage the process we do tend to see that elementary school students participate more in restorative justice conferencing middle school students are pretty consistent across the board but we do see that high school students tend to decline to participate in the [02:25:16] process more than than their peer counterparts and so part of what we do within the work within the pathway and then also within the restorative justice program is to ensure that facilitators have that training to be able to again support high school students and understanding the benefits of restorative practices and restorative justice and participating in it. [02:25:37] We often get the question about how does this somehow align with all of the other initiatives that we're doing specifically like responsive classroom positivity project. How does it enter. How does it intersect with SEL. Where does it fit within the MTSS framework and the answer to that is that restorative practices complement each of those very well, especially within the MTSS framework. [02:25:59] It can be utilized at the Tier 1, the Tier 2, and the Tier 3 level, and you can be able to have a school which is implementing restorative practice circles as well as responsive classroom. Restorative practice circles tend to be student-led, they tend to be consensus-building, and responsive classroom has some elements of that, but they do tend to be led by the teacher or the facilitator in that space and so what's really great about those two complementing each other is that you get to have kind of the best of both worlds you get to have to some extent that teacher-led experience but then you get to have that relationship building consensus experience with the students who are leading that conversation with the facilitator really acting as a guide [02:26:38] and so what we tend to tell our schools when they're trying to think about how do we somehow integrate these two we tell them you don't necessarily need to integrate them you just need to know that they they work in tandem alongside one another thank you and you are going to be offering participation year over year in the Goal 2 reports. Thank you. Appreciate it. [02:26:58] Thank you Dr. Anderson. Mr. Dunn. I'm generally supportive of restorative justice but there's a fundamental flaw in this discussion which is it focuses on the people who are engaging in bullying or other practices at the cost of the victims. You know I just don't support that rubric. We have you know i keep hearing from students after students after students at different high schools they can't use the bathrooms right people are vaping there are bullies in there [02:27:38] holding it all day doing damage to their kidneys and bodies um because you know there's just bad things happening in the bathrooms in our middle schools and high schools um are because of that so many middle schools and high schools are closing a large number of their bathrooms right And so I hear from the victims of the bullying, and I feel like we don't talk about that. [02:28:02] You know, we talk a lot about restorative justice, disproportionality, and so forth. But, you know, what I hear from parents is not about these issues in this slide presentation. It's about their kids not feeling safe in the schools. And then sometimes through conversations with students last year about just that some schools feel like, you know, they're being locked down to some extent. [02:28:23] So, could you talk a little bit more about what's being done to end the inaccessibility of bathrooms for our students and to protect the victims of bullying who may not want to engage in a restorative justice process where they have to sit across from their bully and kind of come to some agreement or outcome when they didn't want to be bullied in the first place or didn't have a relationship with that person? [02:28:51] And if I'm being bullied, I know I don't want to sit down with the person bullying me. It just results in more tension and so forth. So thank you, Mr. Dunn. I think there are two questions. One, the safety of the halls and bathrooms and then the bullying and the discomfort with sitting across from the bully, right? [02:29:11] I think I'll start there and just want to be really clear, and I think Ms. Shin also shared this, But to actually do a restorative justice circle requires both parties to agree to be a part of that process. [02:29:28] So if you're someone that feels like the incident harmed you in a way that you're not willing or it would be traumatizing for you to be in that sitting, you have that choice not to be a part of that. So that's a choice to be in that restorative justice circle. [02:29:44] I think the restorative justice practices are different in the sense that those are very much so preventative. Those are responsive classroom comes to mind. In elementary, you often see circle time at the beginning of the day. [02:29:59] Middle schools, I have also seen sort of class meetings where a lot of discussion takes place around the learning community and learning space norms that students often in secondary come up with on their own. or not on their own that's guided but they come up with those and then work within those and same with the high school level but I want to be very clear that if for the restorative justice circle after a bullying event you do not have to a student would not have to sit across the table from their bully that's not required to go to the bathrooms we've actually I think really improved [02:30:38] the safety around our restrooms in a couple ways one you know this board preemptively came out on their cell phone concerns and one of the things is we've restricted cell phones more whether it's been within classes or at the middle level bell-to-bell there's less communication between students to meet up right in the hall or in the restroom and so we've really seen I think a much more focused learning space within classrooms and fewer students out in a hall or in a bathroom sort of without other people knowing about it [02:31:17] right the meetups aren't happening as often I would also say that many of our schools have created portable desks for admin staff and security staff and specialists we have some of our security specialists here this evening they're out in halls a lot more during passing time and during class so I feel like we've turned a bit of a corner on that topic and so I think we're going to continue to make progress in that area but that would be how I'd respond to those two concerns this evening and and do I mean you engage a lot with students I mean do you do does your engagement indicate that students feel safe [02:31:54] especially if they're victims of past bullying that the SRNR provides sufficient remedies for principals teachers etc to to protect those victims I think that bullying is a really difficult topic for young people and adults honestly one of the experiences perhaps I cherish more than others is years ago with our former governor and my prior state I was part of a six-person team that wrote our bullying legislation for the state and we wrote that at the [02:32:30] behest of our pediatric association in that state because bullying it was a public health concern because so many children were visiting pediatricians with nonspecific illnesses or concerns around not wanting to go to school and you know back in the early days the Columbine school event very much so tied to how children treat one another so I think that bullying something that we take seriously here I take seriously I'm committed to that and I know our staff are committed to that and I think it's difficult to feel safe when you've been [02:33:06] in that situation it's also a behavior that we want to shift for people who are bullying because we know that's the one trait that carries into adulthood transfers in at a higher percentage than any other behavioral trait so we have to make sure we intervene on the bullying behavior as well as making sure our students feel safe thank you thank you mr dunn miss dixit dr reed Thank you for the presentation. [02:33:39] I'm fully supportive of restorative justice practices. It definitely helps in the elementary school level more in then when the kids have already gone through their middle school and high school. So the more emphasis to get them, you know, their mind is young and fresh and they the positive behaviors are easily under, you know, they can understand my my only question or I should say just to comment is that when the high school level and you had shared and you also shared that the students don't participate that much and it's because I [02:34:16] think there is a word justice across you know there starts to come into their mind like we are doing something wrong and we are now going through this you know justice so I would just say having a positive word with the restorative empowerment or something which makes make them feel more welcome that they have now power in their hand and they are doing something about themselves and they're taking charge of their own actions and obviously going through the whole process but that word makes you feel you know you're in charge so that's what I was going to say and I did hear a lot of concerns [02:34:54] about that discipline issues have happened more since pandemic and we all have agreed that's happened but it's getting better um there it was obviously a case after pandemic kids were you know doing what they're doing and then now they're coming back to school and understanding how things work and they missed that social interaction i think that was the reason i think at that time but i think things are getting better um so i'm fully supportive and i would say that if you could put more reinforcement in the early ages i think it's going to be have better results [02:35:30] for the others other age groups thank you yes ma'am thank you mr mcdaniel um i know it may come as a shock to learn that i was picked on as a kid growing up but i was um so i i take the bullying issue very seriously um but a question there a word was mentioned intersectionality and i think a data request um for that december 3rd work session um can we get more can we get some data back on the intersectionality of kids that go through this restorative justice process versus those that choose not to in particular and I think I asked this [02:36:07] back at a work session I don't know March April somewhere then but in particular and I understand that there's some challenges of collecting this type of data but our LGBTQ kids in particular that would be very helpful for that conversation on December 3rd if we have it yes sir thank you mr. Mcdaniel Miss St. John Cunningham so first of all thank you for this presentation I've had the privilege of being trained on this and seeing how powerful it can be I'm glad to see that it's being expanded I know that this presentation is only one of the components that our school supports to have safe supported included [02:36:46] and empowered schools so it's not going to address the plethora of issues associated with this but the fact that we are investing in this and that we are not not only providing it but expanding it I think is really critical and particularly when we go to the equity piece because if the students choose to participate in this then that will reduce the incidence where they will be receiving certain discipline consequences and I think it's teaching [02:37:18] children or our students to be accountable I wish you could give a presentation to the school boards so that we could see it in action because I think unless you see it in action or unless we sit around and the way I participated in it the way it's been presented we sit around and do the whole process and once you see that you see the power of it and then once you engage with the students and are part of it it's very powerful and it is a time commitment but it's a time commitment that's worth it because it does go to equity and teaching skills to our kid that will be to our students that will [02:37:56] be lifelong skills thank you thank you miss st john cunning all right we will move on the agenda sorry mr chair oh i'm sorry mr heiser i missed you go ahead it's okay i put my hand up late so my apologies for that i was um so i appreciate this presentation and i appreciate the thoughtful comments of my colleagues and i also think that i think it may be important to to also make a point that restorative justice and discipline can go hand in hand it doesn't have to be one or the other but restorative justice is a really great way to help as many of my colleagues have mentioned [02:38:34] teach our students how to work through conflict and how to own take responsibility for their actions and learn from their actions but it doesn't mean that there can't be discipline and having discipline doesn't mean there can't be restorative justice so i wanted to make that point but the other uh question i had um for you dr reed perhaps and i can't see the auditorium anymore so i'm going to assume you're still there but um is what work are the folks who are doing the restorative justice or what part of the restorative justice training has some um embed [02:39:11] embedded into it cultural competency as well and an understanding of neurodiversity and the fact that um sometimes actions and words don't always um indicate intent so i just want to make sure that the folks who are doing these trainings or developing the practices are working with our neurodiversity specialist on that piece. Yes ma'am I want to emphasize how correct that is right because we have a number of students who [02:39:43] don't maybe recognize the impact because of their maybe action or statement because that wasn't their intent. Miss Shen do you have just some comments on your planning with our neurodiverse neurodiversity specialist or our staff working with our neurodiverse students please so thank you for that question excuse me um the certification program to receive the fcps certification to do restorative justice facilitations through the rj pathway includes a [02:40:21] baseline training for how to facilitate that victim offender model restorative justice is in fact a victim centered process but because that training is baseline what is required in order to maintain the certification is that those facilitators continue professional learning and development in order to enhance their skills part of that enhancement means understanding how to accommodate the restorative justice process for diverse needs participants and learners and so what that means is that the certification requires them to receive training and how to accommodate [02:40:57] a circle for students with special needs, neurodiverse specialties, also on how to adapt circles when participants, English is not their first language, there's diverse ways that we are able to accommodate circles and we give that particular training to certified facilitators. [02:41:18] So it is something that we are aware of and it is something that is a critical part of their training. And if I have the opportunity, may I address some of the other comments and questions that came previously so I think there was a question or a concern around the impact to victims and participating in a restorative justice process and one of the things that's critical about restorative justice is that it is in fact a victim centered model and the process is fully geared towards their needs victims when they have been harmed have about three primary needs the [02:41:55] first is they need to be heard the other is that they have the need to tell their story over and over again and one of the other needs is that they need to be able to ask questions why what were you thinking at the time that you did that why was it me why wasn't it someone else what have you thought about since then and so restorative justice that circle when you have the opportunity through your consent to sit there and to have that conversation with another person who you're engaged in conflict with or who has harmed you is a way for to be able to have those needs met that often don't tend to happen in traditional disciplinary [02:42:32] spaces. And so restorative justice gives to victims the needs that sometimes they are not able to have in other potential situations, which is why it's an extremely empowering experience. And I fully agree and understand with the idea of perhaps not calling it restorative justice. [02:42:51] That is in fact a growing refrain within the field of restorative justice practitioners that sometimes just the idea of justice has different connotations considering our justice system or we think of terms like chief justice sometimes there's a connotation with that that isn't necessarily related to empowerment and so we actually um at thomas jefferson high school there is actually a peer group of students who are trained restorative justice facilitators and they do restorative justice interventions specifically related to plagiarism and they [02:43:26] They do not call themselves restorative justice practitioners they have initially they were considered the honor council but they went through kind of like some focus groups and have since changed their name because they understood that that term justice somehow had different connotations and students were hesitant and reluctant to to participate and so I think that that is something that we certainly can look into and think about at the high school level and even all the way down to our elementary school students how can we be able to support them in this process perhaps just through just by changing that particular name and then we certainly can try to compile some data [02:44:04] relevant to like declination in regards to students participating in those whom are not and I love the idea of a presentation to the school board perhaps not a we could do a mock circle something like that certainly could be possible I think before you go I know miss Sizemoreheiser has one more question actually i might have a couple more questions but i appreciate that um mr chair so thank you for that explanation and i'm glad to hear that in the additional training there's some work on how to help facilitate neurodivergent students and students whose english is in [02:44:40] you know maybe students from who grew up in a different culture right but i think i was trying to get a little bit more also at the understanding of the restorative justice practitioners as well as the school staff on how to interpret behavior and words from a different perspective than that what may be neurotypical because i think and i don't know if that's part of the training or not and maybe this is a conversation offline but i think the perspectives matter and how we even [02:45:12] approach talking about the incident and working through the restorative justice process so i'm happy to talk more offline but i was just curious if that's part of that training it is part of that training but we're happy to continue that conversation and think about ways that we can make sure that we enhance that um that kind of just background and training and support for our school base and our central office facilitators yeah that would be great and i would highly recommend uh maybe talking to kristen hayner and our diversity specialist as you're doing that because she i think could be really beneficial and and seeing if there are and it doesn't i'm so glad to hear you considering that already but if there are any gaps i think she'd be great to [02:45:51] identify those and help with those um and same on the cultural side i think it's it is really important because there are so many implicit norms built into some of the way we reflect upon and think about um incidences i think that's a really important piece as well so those are my main points i thank you very much for the time um that was sort of my last comment and i'd appreciate if you want to chat more offline i'd be happy to do that thank you thank you miss sizemore heiser Thank you, Dr. Reed. Thank you, Mr. Frisch. And I did, I'd forgotten until mission mentioned it that our honor council students from Thomas Jefferson were a student group that came to meet with me [02:46:31] and ask that we provide these practices at younger and younger ages because they found them so important. Awesome. Thank you. Agenda item 8.02 academic matters. I call on Dr. Reed for academic matters. Well, thank you, Chairman Frisch and members of the board. It's a great opportunity to talk for a few minutes this evening about our 2024 accreditation and SAT outcomes. [02:46:57] So as we continue in our second year of our 2023-2030 strategic plan, we continue to maintain our focus -- I'm just right at the same page with you -- continue to maintain our focus on high expectations with high support. [02:47:13] So our instructional services team and Ms. Betris Huffman is here this evening. We have just a few slides, we'll be going into much more detail when we hit goal three. But this evening we just did want to provide a couple just short slides and really highlight some of the improvements in our accreditation indicators. [02:47:37] And one of the things that you can see the little stars under chronic absenteeism, that's an incredible, incredible data point. nationwide improvement from 108 schools rated at performance level two or three to just eight performing below that level in 2024 and that's serious work on the part of staff at 191 actually of our schools serious work at all schools but the progress was definitely more significant in 191 of them and then in support of goal three around academic growth [02:48:14] and excellence all of our high schools set a measurable objective around access to advanced coursework within their school improvement plans and this concentrated focus honestly is translated into a division-wide improvement for the college and career readiness indicator which means that 19 schools were rated at performance level 2 or 3 in 2023 to down to only 5 below level 1 in 2024 so we're very excited to see that progress when we look at the school accreditation summary i want to mention that all fairfax county public schools are accredited [02:48:53] this year we did have 98.5 fully accredited with three schools that were accredited with conditions and those three schools continue to make progress and in fact when you look at fairfax county um at 98.5 percent of our schools being fully accredited the commonwealth had 86 percent of schools fully accredited and the commonwealth had 14 percent accredited with conditions where we had 1.5 percent so we continue to outperform the commonwealth in our accreditation so sat [02:49:32] outcomes we consistently outperform virginia and global averages for our sat total scores and we're excited about those when we look at our mean scores this recently released data continues to show that we perform above the commonwealth as well as global standards and we're really actually excited about the opportunity to talk about our growth and participation rates since 2021 so we're almost back to pre-pandemic level and participation rates of our sat with [02:50:09] maintaining a high degree of performance you can see a gap building again between Fairfax County and the Commonwealth because you know we continue to outperform the Commonwealth and global scores even while we're adding more and more students who are taking the exam and I think that's illustrates the excellence equity and opportunity that we think is so critical we did show participation rates of five percent increase in 2024 to 69 percent which [02:50:44] matches our pre-pandemic high of 69.2 percent and this is despite the developing nationwide movement to de-emphasize these exams and we far outpace the statewide participation rate which is only at 52.4% so that puts us the state as a whole has not seen the same progress in returning to its 66% pre-pandemic rate so I'm really proud of our staff our students and our families as they continue to you know stay in the game [02:51:20] here in our SAT scores we also are working on some strategies for our students uh and programs to put into place to support work along these lines so those are really the only slides i wanted to show this evening and really i hope you as a board are excited i think the leadership you're demonstrating has shown some dramatic student achievement gains and we're headed in the the right direction i think the community when we present goal one will also see some very powerful improvement with our multilingual learners. [02:51:55] So that is academic matters this evening. Thank you, Dr. Reid. Mr. Dunn. I think FCPS is a lot to be proud of to be where we are with accreditation. Can you speak a little bit about how slide three and the accreditation would change with the new accreditation standards that have been proposed by VDOE? [02:52:22] Well, I will one of the things remember the video we talked about is separating accreditation and accountability. So I'm going to turn to our expert in all things accreditation and accountability, Miss Betris Huffman. [02:52:38] So Betris, do you want to take a run at that for me, please? Yes, Dr. Reed, you're absolutely right. under the new performance and support framework, accreditation for schools will be based on the ways in which they are able to demonstrate that they're meeting the standards of quality, which are those baseline operational expectations around staffing, safety, security, curriculum, and so on. [02:53:05] So the expectation is that all schools in Virginia will be accredited based on that ability to demonstrate those operational expectations where the school performance and support framework will be coming in, which we've discussed at previous academic matters and previous school board work session, and we'll be learning more as the state puts out additional details on that system. [02:53:29] We'll be seeing that the performance of schools by level will be disaggregated in a different way, just to show where there are strengths and needs under the new framework the state has modeled out. And again, in Fairfax, of the things dr reed has really worked with you around are how we're prioritizing in our system the strategic plan goals and strategic plan measures in terms of where our priorities and our focus is so we'll be learning more about how we can align and support kind of the the thinking [02:54:05] and the communication messaging around those two systems so more to learn for certain and more that that we'll be sharing as that comes out what are the three schools accredited with conditions so those for this year are justice high school excuse me we can certainly review those I'm trying to have the schools have we met with the schools about that first yes okay so little times all right so the schools are Justice High School Whitman Middle School and Sandburg Middle School [02:54:44] Okay. And Whitman and Sandberg are in my district. So what is being done to support those schools to become fully accredited again? So Dr. Ponce and his team are working with those schools. So Dr. Ponce, would you like to share? I know there are significant plans in place. And actually, Justice almost got, they're very close. They're almost out. [02:55:09] yes we have a with money we have summer summer was a map didn't make the minimum standards well they were very close we have been working with the project momentum and they are priority school which means that they have been meeting monthly with the department having cities as well they can share that we review the data they do receive different support that means that we have [02:55:44] expert we have a math specialist they go and we utilize what we call I do you do we do so especially go with a model for them based on the data and the need now for Whitman is the science part the same but in the science department and at At the same time, we are providing support on the other areas as well. [02:56:09] I believe Whitman was 26 students in science off from being accredited, but it reached that level in all other content areas. But it was science, and I believe it was, as I said, fewer than 30 students. I know that Whitman has an incredible leader with Principal Flowers, and I know that Sandberg has a great leader in Principal Underhill. [02:56:30] Do you know that the cause, was it a narrow miss as well for Sandberg? Sandberg, it was in mathematics. And I know our staff in all three of those schools have been working extraordinarily hard. I don't know how many students. [02:56:47] I don't have the specific number, but they were very, very, very close. Right now, if we have to take back again that, they will be meeting standards. AND THESE STANDARDS ARE REASSESSED ANNUALLY, SO IT MIGHT BE THE CASE WITH THIS EXTRA SUPPORT THAT THEY MIGHT BE ACCREDITED BY NEXT YEAR, IS THAT CORRECT? [02:57:10] YES, SIR, THAT'S THE EXPECTATION. ARE THERE ANY OTHER SCHOOLS THAT ARE ON THE BUBBLE OF MOVING FROM ACCREDITED TO ACCREDITED WITH CONDITIONS? WE DO HAVE CHARTS BACK IN THE OFFICE, WHICH I CAN'T QUOTE THIS EVENING, BUT I'M HAPPY TO SIT DOWN WITH YOU AND REVIEW THOSE. [02:57:25] OKAY, THANK YOU. - Oh, I'm sorry, one more, just, it seems not just for this set of slides, but for all sets of slides, we always compare ourselves to Virginia, which is fine, that's a valid comparison, but I'd love to see if we're comparing ourselves on salary and other metrics to the schools and the Wavy Guide in the DMV region, it'd be great to be able to look at, you know, not accreditation necessarily, but student achievement and other things, compared to DMV area school divisions, as well as kind of the top 10 school districts across the country, because being able to see [02:58:03] where we are compared to our peers, because we're the largest in Virginia. So that's, I don't know if the rest of Virginia is always the best comparison. So being able to look regionally and nationally at school systems of similar size would be, I think, very valuable, regardless of what the subject is. [02:58:21] - Yes, sir, I think we can do that. I think off the top of my head, The only data point I can think of is our national merit semifinalists because we were just in that conversation. I know one of our neighboring counties, half our size, had six national merit semifinalists and were twice the size and had 191. [02:58:43] So I think that's one example of a comparison, and I think we certainly have others we can provide. And I think that's helpful just to be able to share with the public the daily excellence that is FCPS. That's really the brand, and to be able to show that in figures and comparisons helps to educate the public about, you know, the investments that they're making as homeowners, as residents, through property taxes and other means, really is achieving maximum return on investment, and it's important that we show that to rebuild trust in public education. [02:59:20] Yes, sir. Thank you, Mr. Dunn. Miss Lady. Thank you. Thank you for this presentation. Kudos to all the staffs at our schools and their tackling chronic absenteeism. I certainly have several of schools that were, I think, exceeded expectations in addressing that in Drainsville and also throughout the county. And I also want to talk about the open enrollment we've had in Fairfax County. As someone who's given presentations at national conferences, whenever I share about open enrollment, I'm swarmed with questions from people who attend sessions saying, how [02:59:56] did you get that? And it's just the way we believe, it's the way we think, and that's going to always continue to elevate and allow our kids to thrive. I want to talk for a second about the, well, the other thing I want to say too is in terms of all the accreditation, which is fantastic work, is kudos to you and your staff around the data dashboards. [03:00:17] expectations that principals on a daily on a weekly basis are going to open up the exact same data we're looking at the same things and we're keeping the main things the main things and the fact that our sip goals elementary level are consistent across our schools until we get reach our numeracy and literacy goals and I just I want to bring that up because if someone who worked in the system as long as I did there was no consistency in what we were doing with sip goal school to school and I think this is just an excellent way to to approach it um and i give you uh great kudos for narrowing that focus for us and making it the [03:00:53] real thing um but then i also want to talk about the sat scores i think that uh you know we've we've heard a lot um about decline um i think it's it's fantastic in terms of our participation and when you quoted the 69 pre-pandemic and we're back to 69 in 2024 you know give or take a few you you know, point some things, that that's important. [03:01:18] I also want to say that when we look at the national average and the state average, and probably if we put ourselves up against our wavy other jurisdictions near us, we're probably exceeding what's taking place, just as you made the note around the six national merit semifinalists versus our close to 200, that, you know, we moved also post-pandemic to a school day test day for SAT. [03:01:43] And for people that understand that are not as familiar with that, we are basically allowing all of our seniors at no cost to take the SAT in the same day that the underclassmen take the PSAT. I bring this up because, you know, I was still working the first year we did that, and there were a lot of students who otherwise would have never taken that test. And many of those students were underrepresented or economically disadvantaged. And the reason they couldn't or wouldn't have taken the test is they couldn't get there on a Saturday. And so I just want to uplift the fact that we're doing that, but also for some of those kids they're recognizing that when they get the score back that college could [03:02:18] be part of their future um just by virtue of taking that test um the other thing i also want to comment on is uh we don't talk a lot about act testing but you know i believe our composite average pre-pandemic um and i forget the number was exactly almost exactly the same as it was for 2023 so we really while there may have been a slight drop we really just we did maintain um pre to post pandemic. And then another thing I want to say is I know with AI, this is the kind of my brain working, I know when I was working at Chantilly, I often asked our math [03:02:56] and English teachers, could you please create some questions in the format that the concepts are tested or written for an SAT math question or an SAT English question. Similarly with ACT, I do believe with AI we could do more of that you know we could have teachers say create three SAT questions based on the concepts that I'm teaching just for practice because that's not necessarily the way we test our kids but giving them exposure even through just even formative like hey right now you're gonna take you're gonna do four problems that are the way that this concepts are tested on the SAT but I and I think that certainly in the past that [03:03:35] would have taken a long time but I do think with AI that can probably generate pretty quickly so I just want to share that suggestion because a lot of our kids don't have access and can't afford any official test prep so if we can embed it in instruction I think that would be great but overall I just really appreciate the work that your team is doing and the work we're doing it at the school level and you know putting our kids first and making sure we're focused on numeracy and literacy thank you yes ma'am thank you miss lady dr. Anderson thank you miss lady actually talked about a couple of the things that I had [03:04:14] on my list but I do want to echo her suggestion of embedding the the test format and content and to instruction because it provides them with a greater opportunity for practice I do want to talk about the chronic absenteeism because I know some of the strategies that were utilized second chance buses all of the people calling the homes the constant the emails the text messages the phone calls well it's a lot it does keep it at the forefront for parents so I do want to make sure that I offer my kudos for all of that work because it takes a lot of effort [03:04:51] on the part of the schools. I do want to talk a little bit about the SAT data. You know our public who's going to look at this they're not going to see that we are outperforming the state. What they're going to see is that we are declining in FCPS and I would love for there to be some additional context provided even if we were to just provide the end to show that we're testing more kids more than ever I think that will be helpful just so that people understand this so that it does not necessarily cause for alarm because people are not some individuals who see [03:05:26] this chart are not necessarily going to see this as um as a positive so I would love your thoughts on that I'm happy to add the in uh to that and um yeah I'm happy to add the end to that and I'm also very interested in what Mr Dunn had shared regarding how do we compare with our local schools. [03:05:50] That's interesting information that if you were able to be able to procure that I think it might be very helpful here as well. And my last comment I guess it would be for Dr. Ponce regarding Justice High School accreditation status. I would love to hear some additional information in terms of the specific area and the efforts and resources to be put toward changing that position. Yes ma'am I I know we were working on graduation in particular, which dramatically improved, actually. [03:06:18] But Dr. Ponce, Justice High School, please. Yes. Let me just check that very specific number that I can tell you have it handy. I was looking, but it was a dropout, and that was the number. [03:06:35] We improved. It was by six last year. However, this year we will have all the numbers. So if you can remember, it will take one year, so this coming year you will see the award that we implemented this year because for graduation is one year behind, so they will be full accredited. [03:07:02] You said we improved by six. What did we need to improve by to not have accreditation with conditions? Yes, because remember, with a certain number of students, you get levels. So in this case, and probably Beatrice can help me with a very specific percentage of a student that they have to the maximum. [03:07:25] Yes. To reach that level two, well, Justice High School did meet the level four dropout rate for this year. So they actually did improve from Level 3 last year, which is higher than 9% dropout rate, to a Level 1, which, as Dr. Ponce said, is less than 6%. [03:07:51] So they made, in the scheme of dropout rate, a very significant improvement, all the way from the Level 3, which is that red designation, to the Level 1 green for dropout rate. So only the science for a very small number of students, as Dr. Reed mentioned before, was what was the determination for the conditional accreditation this year. [03:08:18] And I'll just throw in that while there's a lot we don't know about the new accreditation system or what its overall perspective will be for our school system and how our individual schools are reported, A potential positive in the system is that it's no longer a one strike and you're out type of system as the current one is. [03:08:40] So for each of our schools that is accredited with condition, it was only one indicator area out of 13 that led to that conditional. And so in the new system, it's more of a holistic look, which might give us an opportunity to really highlight the strengths and leverage those across the board as we're looking at illustrating our school performance. [03:09:05] Yeah, I do think the one issue because I know I talked with principal Narcisse actually yesterday and he was very excited about the progress they'd made around the graduation and dropout rates. But you're right. It was the science and it was really close. [03:09:21] It was like, well, I know at Whitman we were less than 30 students, right? And the math at Sandberg. So one indicator out of 13. Yeah, it's tough. Sure, sure. And I know that science has been an Achilles heel this year for many of our schools. [03:09:40] That's an area of focus, particularly in schools in the Mason District. I'm excited to hear that you are seeing a little bit of a positive with the potential, well, not potential, with the new accreditation system to come. Because I think my worry and concern has been by the modeling that has been provided with that system. [03:10:00] 60% of our of schools in the Commonwealth will not be successful. And so that does not while it may be more holistic, it gives me nothing but heartburn because we cannot have 60% of the schools in Virginia be identified as failing. [03:10:16] Yes, ma'am. Thank you. Thank you, Dr. Anderson. Miss Dixit. Dr. Reed, thanks for the presentation. My comment was about SAT scores first. And the one of the things I've seen that with my own students, my own kids, that they could take an SAT exam in eighth grade and that would not reflect on their transcript, like it doesn't get reported to college board. So like a lot of students who are already taking Algebra I in eighth grade or seventh grade, if there is a way they can start [03:10:56] doing some of those math practices for SAT in eighth grade, when they go to PSATs, they will definitely have a better stronger way to skill sets I should say and same thing with the comprehension reading it's I think it should be started in eighth grade to really see that number uptake which we are looking for and I think our students are really capable of doing that yes ma'am and the other point I was saying it and then the kudos to the team for the absenteeism and the C C C R I This is a very difficult acronym. [03:11:32] But I was looking at the math and the math gap has increased a bit and again the focus on algebra and other things we are implementing now with the strategic plan, it should help but I just wanted to know how we can just get to the, we see the remarkable change in math numbers. [03:11:55] Well, we are, we did reactivate the math resource group to look at math curriculum. We moved that up a year, recognizing that this is a situation we can't wait two years to address. [03:12:10] So I'm very proud of our instructional services team. They've taken on both social studies review and math review this year, so that we can move with possibly new curriculum materials for secondary math, which is middle and high school next year and then two years from now looking at materials for elementary school. [03:12:32] So we've got a fairly aggressive plan to address mathematics. Yes ma'am. Thank you, Mr. Dixit. Mr. Moon. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Sorry to belabor on SAT scores since several colleagues of mine mentioned that. [03:12:50] I'm going to add just a few more comments to that. the way way big guy does contain sat scores or they have a scores there was a participation rate by seniors so you can go i think the last one was back in november 2023 and that has 23 scores and participation rate uh you know in olden days i talk about olden days all the time don't i in olden days our competitor competitor used to be mongamere county we used to compare ourselves with Montgomery County on academic achievements uh you know a few days ago when I [03:13:31] read about news release from one of our neighboring school districts in Dolden Virginia not the Montgomery County that their graduation rate was a second in the commonwealth next to city of first church public schools that really caught my attention because they passed us they past us so I do really want to see when we present some of these very you know notable notable data on student achievements whether we can have a [03:14:05] comparable data to that particular school district west of us when I see SAT score graduation and student achievement and that's so request as you'll be presenting some goals report called three or what is already done at the work session by goal 3 hopefully you can include that information. [03:14:32] Yes sir. Thank you. Thank you Mr Moon. Ms. Ajahn Cunning. So what I would like to lift up first of all thank you for this presentation and the reduction in chronic absenteeism that was a huge lift and I know everybody in our schools was working on that and I just really want to lift up our family liaisons who I know did a lot of that heavy lifting making the phone calls explaining the importance to parents in their native language and sometimes even helping pick up the kids and bring them to school so when we look at the [03:15:11] data as a collective board sometimes we forget the people that are down there doing the work and so I want to particularly thank family liaisons for their work thank you and I know I heard from several families actually also from some of our high schools who made tremendous progress, who are no longer part of project momentum based on how hard they've been working. [03:15:37] Thank you. Thank you, Miss St. John Cunning. Thank you, Dr. Reed. I will now speak very slowly as I announce the next portion of the agenda, which is eight point zero three. Superintendent matters. [03:15:55] And I will call on Dr. Reed for Superintendent matters. Thank you, Mr. Frisch. And I am really excited. this since our last meeting we've had a lot a lot of fun together out in the schools i want to first add my great appreciation to our principals our school administrators and school support staff this month the work that happens in our schools is the work of our school division so a big shout out a big thank you very grateful to our principals administrators and admin assistants so last [03:16:33] evening we also celebrated excellence with our excellence awards big shout out to our human resources department and their organization and presentation last evening it was really an inspiring evening listening to the achievements of our staff this morning along with miss hall i was able to attend the fairfax county digital equity summit and the northern virginia tech council and that was an opportunity to meet with some of our community partners and elected officials and reinforce the need for digital equity and learned about some new grants that we'll be writing [03:17:11] and really excited about that mr sethe and miss hall will be working on some of that grant work also with several board members attended the climate crisis forum this week and listened to some of our students and really talked about our get to green goals as well as attending our Fairfax Council PTA meeting with several board members and just so proud to have community partners like our PTA so just been so supportive also had a chance to get out and visit some schools Cunningham Park Cedar Lane Crossfield Fairfax High School and in fact this week [03:17:49] Fairfax High School held their second annual multilingual career fair Dr. Ponce and I had an opportunity along with Mr. Plattenberg to address that group and just very very positive and then finally I did attend the first robotics competition at Hayfield and I have to share with the public it was the greatest line I've heard all year they were talking about how excited everyone is about some of our new sports right our boys volleyball and girls wrestling and they said you know what Dr. Reed we are all 100 going pro because of robotics they're all going to get [03:18:25] great robotics job so they were very proud of themselves so um we do have upcoming community conversations so look for those on our website and we are constituting our boundary uh review advisory committee we're very excited about those topics so thank you mr prish thank you dr reed agenda item uh nine consent agenda our adopted rules of parliamentary procedure roberts rules provide for a consent agenda listing several items for approval by the board by a single motion many items listed have gone through board review and documentation has been provided to all board [03:19:00] members in the public in advance items may be removed from the consent agenda at the request of any board member prior to a meeting the consent agenda is now on the screen is there any objection to approving the consent agenda hearing and seeing none the consent agenda is approved agenda item 10 new business the following are new business agenda items there will not be a vote on on these items this evening but action is scheduled at a future meeting agenda item 11 board committee reports governance committee chair miss lady do you have a report yes I do thank you mr. Frisch we've had three governance [03:19:38] meetings to date and we will have our next meeting Tuesday October 15 our discussions have been focused on revising policy 2418 reporting student progress to parents and guardians committee discussed the six focal points from the grading committee work and whether these concepts should be included in Arise Policy 2418. The committee also discussed draft policy 2418 created with committee members input from the current policy while incorporating the grading committee work pillars section by section. At our next meeting we will continue the committee's discussion on the draft created at the October 1st 24 governance meeting with the incorporated areas of committee [03:20:16] consensus. So I will say we have had robust conversations. It has been great work and I think that you know our focus is to make sure that what needs to be in in a policy is in a policy and the things that need to be in in the operational side the regulation side is actually in that side so I really appreciate my colleagues that are on the committee and also staff who are in attendance to help answer questions and support the work we're doing thank you Thank You Miss Lady Public Engagement Committee chair Miss St. John Cunning do you have [03:20:53] Yes thank you. At our last meeting we had a discussion on the overview of the makeup of our advisory committees and where they should be housed. We are going to continue to delve into those options. We're also continuing the work that we started at the beginning of the year to develop toolkits and orientation for our advisory committees so there will be consistency and new committee members can understand what their roles are and we will continue to look into the forum topic to add another student representative to serve on the board and get some student feedback on what that should [03:21:29] look like. Thank you Miss St. John Cunning our state and federal legislative liaisons Miss Marin or Dr. Anderson would you like to update us on the breakfast earlier this week. Sure we were way ahead of schedule but that seems to be the new normal. I think for our legislative briefing where the school board hosts the delegation of state and federal elected leaders who represent us in their bodies. So for the State General Assembly, it was the House of Delegate Members and State Senate, and then we had congressional representation. [03:22:00] So we really focused on two main topics. One of them was the get-the-money work through the JLARC report's findings, and there is a lot of energy around that and also reality that it will take some time. But we have some really great leadership from our delegation. [03:22:17] We have members on the subcommittee of JLARC, excuse me, the chairman of the JLARC subcommittee, well as members on the JLR committee that's specifically on focusing on the funding report. So you know we just have to keep at it and this was great timing because the electives and state will have some time before they submit bills so it was really positive and thank you to I want to thank our school board staff office our clerks and our staff aides and executive assistants it was really a nice team effort and of course our government relations office with Michael Malloy and coming up is November's take our legislator to school month [03:22:53] I know several colleagues are making plans to bring some of those elected officials in to see what they are working for to fund and support and to the public and everyone be sure to vote early ratings open and in Virginia we vote every year and every year public education is on the ballot because the candidates we elect directly impact our public schools funding and policies thank you Miss Marin agenda item 12 board matters the next agenda item is board matters I I will call on each school board member to offer an update. [03:23:23] Ms. Sizemarheiser. - Thank you, and I will be brief. I'm very excited as the school year has continued strong. I wanted to first say, it feels like it's just started, but the fall theater art season is well underway. [03:23:39] And so I wanna be the first to start urging everyone to support your amazing high school theater productions. If you haven't had a chance, people in the community, to see some of our local theater at our high schools, really these are amazingly professional productions and our students are incredibly talented so having said that there's already scheduled at braddock district schools in october and november lake braddock secondary school will present alice in wonderland october 17th 18th and 19th and i think there's even a special tea with alice for one of the performances at 10 a.m on saturday so come have some tea woodson high school drama will present lear on november 8th 9th 15th and 16th and robinson [03:24:19] and secondary schools, Rambunctious Theater presents Midsummer Night's Dreams, opening November 15th. Those are the three schools located in the Braddock District, but there's lots of shows going on by many great theater programs all across the county, so check it out. [03:24:34] I'd like to give a shout out to some staff members. For those in the community who may not be aware, we have a program called FCPS Cares, where you can go online and submit something positive that you've seen a staff member, teacher one of the custodial staff administrator really anybody who works with your students if you see something that they're doing that you really appreciate please go to fcps cares and and nominate them i know our hard-working staff really appreciate that so having said that i want to give a shout out to a couple that i've seen come through lately for a braddock district school and that's first the custodial team at lake braddock has received an fcps cares for keeping the school [03:25:12] really really clean and if those you know lake braddock that is over 4 300 students that's quite the job and then john trillotte the theater teacher at lake braddock also received an scps cares and having seen um his production he stepped new into lake braddock's theater and won a capi's for best play so that is not an easy feat to do and then paul arena the intellectual disabilities teacher at robinson i just want to share one particular comment about mr arena robinson which was that mr arena is robinson he pours all his energy into the school through teaching coaching special [03:25:48] olympics and being in the community always has a smile on his face so if you want to be inspired if your teacher or other staff member has done something special for your student or fcps please let people know through fcps cares having said that have a great night everybody thank you miss sizemore hyzer up next we have dr anderson thank you i want to start off with the kudos to this staff because I've had the opportunity to probably visit over half of the schools in the Mason District and a question that I always ask every year when I visit to the the principals are regarding their vacancies because it's [03:26:23] been staggering in the last few years. This year however has been very different. So the efforts of HR the recruitment I also noticed let me just keep going on that thought the recruitment efforts are working. I have many principals who are reporting zero vacancies or maybe one because somebody who they had hired you know they're now their spouse is deployed and they need to move or they need to it's just things that were not able to be anticipated which is a very very distinct difference from years past because parents have been very concerned about not having a licensed teacher in front of their [03:27:03] students and this year has not been the case so I really really want to say thank you and I want to ensure that we continue those efforts. I see Mr. Solomon I saw in the board's letter just recently about all of the recruitment efforts that will be taking place in the next few weeks from Bowie State etc. We cannot do that enough so again thank you because that's been really huge for our community. I do want to say congratulations to Annandale High School for being named a special olympics national unified champion school i know mr moon who is [03:27:39] not sitting there attended with me last year their unified event which is fantastic i really hope all of you can join when it comes again this year it really shows how inclusive our schools can be when we are being intentional about participation i also had let me see i'm trying to keep going here I also cannot miss, and this is kind of my little spiel every year because these are my people, the National Principals Month. [03:28:10] I really want to take a minute to just thank you for all of the work that you do. It is incredible the amount of energy and effort you pour into your school communities. Thank you, and I'm just so very grateful. The Mason District has terrific, terrific, terrific administrators who are working so very hard on behalf of our students. [03:28:32] And so I want to take a moment to say Happy Nationals Principles Month to you and, of course, all of the other principals throughout Fairfax County. We have exciting news when it comes to music in the Mason District. We have two schools who will have the opportunity to perform at the Virginia Music Educators Association Conference in Norfolk, Virginia, next month. [03:28:57] the Glasgow Middle School Wind Ensemble, and the Falls Church High School Chamber Orchestra will be performing, so yay to both of these schools. I had a wonderful opportunity to present on Tuesday, I believe, to Girl Scout Troop 55105. [03:29:16] They were so interested about the work of the school board, and they were really interested in who is the boss of the school board. and i was very excited to point to their parents who were in the back to say that they are the ones who are the boss of the school board it was a wonderful group and please invite me again i had the best time last thing that i want to share that i didn't get a chance to share last time was the wonderful visit that we had to the white house and there were many school board members [03:29:52] that were there for us to hear jill biden um speak and to welcome teachers and there were teachers who were national teachers of the year it was a wonderful event we had students from holmes middle school and students from janesville elementary thank you janesville elementary who were um participating along with miss lady miss st john cunning mr mcveen miss maron and myself i think that was everybody it was just a fantastic event and i'm glad to be able to have participated and lastly I do want to say again another shout out to the [03:30:27] renaming of the Bailey's Community Center to now be called the Minnie H Payton Community Center at Bailey's which was a fantastic opportunity to learn so much about this African-American community of Springdale and her contributions I am really hoping that our justice pyramid will really take advantage of the information and of the expertise of the civic association to really learn more about that community. [03:30:58] Thank you. Thank you, Dr. Anderson. Mr. McElveen. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Since my body clock is still on 4:30 a.m. right now, I am going to be very brief. But this past Friday we had the exciting opportunity to launch our second year of the 17 rooms program in collaboration with the GCP so very excited to see what our 150 plus high school seniors are going to do to bring the 17 sustainable development goals to our community this year [03:31:34] and how they can make our little place in the world a better place to live. Thank you. Thank you. Ms. Dixit. I'll try to be brief. to all, 191 students have been named semi-finalists by the National Merit Scholarship Corporation for 2025. There were many Sully District students among them. There were also many Sully District students among the 69 FCPS student that earned the Advanced Placement Capstone Diploma and the 19 student that earned the AP Seminar Research Certificate during the 23-24 school [03:32:13] year. Congrats to them for all their well-earned achievement. Big congrats to TJ High School student Pratika Katiar, class of 2021, who is a Sully district constituent for being named one of the glamorous magazines College Woman of the Year. [03:32:29] She is currently a senior at Northeastern Boston and the magazine called her the future of STEM with the side of soul. She wants to make STEM more accessible for the next generation. Very proud of our FCPS students working towards the ethical and responsible use of AI and technology. [03:32:49] People's Day celebrated in October 14 and I wanted to highlight the Fairfax County Park Authority Indigenous Peoples Play Day Habitat Restoration event that students can participate on October 14 in Oakton where they can learn about native and invasive plants and assist with the removal of invasive species. Details can be found in my newsletter and the FCPA website. Thank you and good night. Thank you, Ms. Dixit. Ms. Marin. Yes, I wanted to speak just [03:33:23] for a moment about the the ending of the human resources advisory committee the HRAC one of the boards advisory committees this was actually one I know very well because I served on it in 2018 and 19 before I was elected and I just want to say I appreciate the work of the committee and it's a difficult transition and I certainly would like to see those who have been generous and thoughtful enough to be volunteers continue to find ways to engage with FCPS as we move forward in this new era of collective bargaining to find other ways to volunteer with us. [03:33:54] I do want to mention I appreciate the points my colleagues made about the benefits of having the SAT and PSAT day that was yesterday but it was also a day when 15,000 ninth graders were not in school and I'm not okay with that. So I know the superintendent is thinking about options for the future so that our students don't miss a day of learning while other students complete a very important day and milestone in their education career. [03:34:19] I was really pleased to be reminded of Indigenous Peoples Day, and I remember that I actually helped to make that happen back in 2020 due to some really incredible advocates in the community who showed us that we needed to have that honored. And so relatedly, the Social Studies Committee, I'm really pleased that we were able to confirm some people on that committee to review potential social studies materials. [03:34:42] And so not only do we need to make sure that we have expansive history included, but also as we heard tonight from the history of our queer community members and history, and I'll also say for Holocaust education to expand that. And on that note, I just want to share that this Saturday is Yom Kippur. It is the most important holiday of the Jewish year. It's not Hanukkah. It is Yom Kippur. It's the end of a week of introspection begun at the Rosh Hashanah holiday about how an individual would like to lead their life for better in the coming year, including repairing the inequities and problems of the world so it begins at sunset and ends at the next sunset and it's [03:35:20] traditional for no food or water to be taken so and it's also a time to remember loved ones and those who have died in the past year so Yom Kippur can be an emotionally and physically demanding observance and if you'd like to acknowledge this holiday to someone observing it you could say I wish you a meaningful Yom Kippur thank you thank you Miss Marin Miss St. John Cunning thank you I'm going to try to read this fast because it's a lot this morning I had an incredible start of my day at Groveton Elementary for their Hispanic Heritage Month celebration and you got to see some of that tonight when they sang De Colores for all of you. I attended the fifth annual LMBSC [03:35:58] sports club coach versus coach soccer game at Edison where the Edison color guard conducted the flag ceremony and a Claremont sixth grader Fiona Mote sang the national anthem. Hundreds of players, most FCPS families, showed up to support the club. Last night I attended the FCPS Excellent awards ceremony. I'd like to highlight those winners who serve Franconia students for collaboration and partnership Kimberly Harrison from Lewis High School and the West Potomac Super Snacks team Annie Corabelli, Mike Henrich and Iris Jane Stuffield. For innovation and improvement Eric [03:36:33] Underhill principal of Sandburg Middle School. For student achievement and success Sarah Closon from Lewis High School. For equity and cultural responsiveness West Potomac La Liga Nathan Bush, Mike Henrich, and Catherine Lodge. For Student Achievement and Success, Key Crisis Team: Jessica Bamford, Sean Ganley, Shannon Hecker, Gregory Hobchick, Caitlin Myers, Ashley Onoku, Mike Reich, Natalie Schroeder, Marielle Sontoc, and Diana Young. I'm also thrilled to congratulate the recognition received by Lewis High School and West Potomac High School from [03:37:09] the Virginia Board of Education. Both schools earned two prestigious awards: the Continuous Improvement Exemplar Award and the Continuous Improvement Graduation and Completion Index and Dropout Rate Exemplar Award. Shout out to Edison Eagles. The marching band scored a first place in Division I with a recognition for musical, visual, general effect, percussion, and color guard. [03:37:31] And to Owen Love who advanced to the state golf tournament shooting a 73 at Twin Lakes. Finally, thank you and farewell to Alicia McMahon, a beloved string teacher who inspired generations of students. For 30 years, she served as an orchestra director at the high school, middle school, and elementary levels, including Cameron, Claremont, Bush Hill, and Rose Hill. [03:37:53] FCPS students have greatly benefited from her talent as an alumni of the Peabody Institute and the Juilliard School. She will be recognized at the Edison Pyramid Orchestra concert on October 23rd. I hope all of you guys have a good evening, and I hope I read that within my two minutes. [03:38:14] - Thank you, Ms. St. John Cunningham. Miss Lady. Thank you. And yes, a happy National School Principal Appreciation Month to all. I want to wish all FCPS principals, assistant principals, directors of student services, directors of student activities, and their school support staff, especially those in Drainsville at Hartville. Thank you. Your leadership, guidance, early and late hours, and willingness to be there for your school community is appreciated by me, our students, families, staff, and community. I can't say enough for all the small and big things you and your staff do on a daily basis and I hope that you will be able to join me Monday the [03:38:48] 21st to celebrate you and this month. I'm looking forward to several school visits tomorrow in the coming weeks. Each school visit brings the hard work of our staff and students to life and reinforces the whys of my work as a school board member. I want to offer congratulations to Spring Hill Elementary School for being named a 2024 National Blue Ribbon School. They were recognized for their overall reading and mathematics performance and their performance rate for multilingual learners students with disabilities, and white, black, Hispanic, and Asian students. [03:39:17] Congratulations to Principal Briggs and the Spring Hill staff, students, and families. Thank you to staff, parents, and caregivers, and students for being an integral part of the principal searches at both Forestville Elementary School, which is actually complete, and Langley High School, which is in process. I want to thank Principal Washington at Forestville and Principal Greer at Langley for their dedication and commitment to excellence throughout their tenure as principals. I wish them well in their new positions. I also look forward to welcoming and working with the new principals once they are in place. I wanted to share the efforts of Marshall senior Samad Karashi and other students [03:39:53] in the Center for Voters initiative in action. They lobbied Congress to pass the High School Voter Empowerment Act which directs states to designate public high schools as voter registration agencies and requires public high schools to conduct annual voter registration drives to register eligible students expanding access for young people to get involved in the election and voting process. He was awarded the Why Vote scholarship by the National Society of High School Scholars recognizing students who spread awareness and education of the importance of voting in their communities. [03:40:24] Thank you to the League of Women Voters. Your yearly efforts of in-school voter registration for our students are appreciated. Remember 16 and 17 year old students are allowed to pre-register and their registration automatically becomes active as soon as they qualify in age to vote. The majority of our Fairfax County Public School alumni from classes of 2020, 2021, 2022, and 2023 haven't yet had the opportunity to vote for a president. In Virginia, the last date to register and ask for an absentee ballot is October 15, 2024. Please get registered and exercise your voting rights. And finally, [03:40:59] I wish everyone celebrating a meaningful Yom Kippur. Thank you, Miss Lady. Mr. McDaniel. Last week, I toured Whitman Middle and the Belvoir primary and elementary schools, and I wanted to uh dovetail off of what mr dunn said the principal at whitman in particular is very impressive um we did a lot of good work there also quick shout to orange hunt elementary on their 50th anniversary they had a celebration last week that i unfortunately could not attend but congratulations to them and lastly earlier tonight my wife sent me a picture of my daughter watching the school [03:41:36] board meeting so people do watch this and alice if you're still up go to bed i'll be home soon good night miss anderson it's been an extremely busy start to the school year and i didn't speak the last word matters so I'm going to go ahead and share a little bit about what I've been doing around the community. I have been to both community and employee conversations. I kicked off the year with a school parent leader kickoff event with Mr. McDaniel which was an awesome way to kind of see what all the kids what all the parents are out there working on with the kids for the for our [03:42:16] PTO, PTA, PTSA, PTSO groups. I was also able to participate in Chantilly High School's Homecoming Parade with my colleagues, both Miss Dixit, Mr. McLevine and Mr. Moon, which was really fun. [03:42:32] We got to throw candy at the kids, which my son also enjoyed thoroughly. I was inspired by our community at the Educate Fairfax Alumni Hall of Fame and Faith Alliance for Climate Solutions Climate Crisis Forum this week or in the last couple weeks. [03:42:48] And I particularly enjoyed Chantilly High School sophomore, Aria Lee's speech about the climate at the climate forum. It was all the kids were just amazing. But her speech was was completely and totally on point. So it was very impressive. [03:43:04] I also attended the FCPTA's first general membership meeting, and it was a great opportunity to connect with all of our school partners and hear a little bit more about what they're hearing in their communities and what their challenges and successes are. Those folks always have a special place in my heart. [03:43:22] I will I was also able to attend last night's FCPS 2024 Excellence Award, which was a wonderful opportunity to celebrate the efforts and achievements of our staff who produce excellent results on a day to day basis. I would also love to congratulate Springfield District students at Centerville, Chantilly, Fairfax, Oakton and South County High Schools and Lake Braddock Secondary School, who received the 2324 AP capstone diplomas and AP seminar and research certificates. Cheers to Chantilly's High School's The Purple Tide News Magazine for [03:43:58] receiving an All-American Award with marks of distinction in coverage, content, text and presentation, which we all know is important to me, from the National Scholastic Press Association. And congratulations to Fairfax High School's Peter Choi for winning the 2024 election sticker contest with the City of Fairfax Electoral Board. His winning design will be featured on election stickers for the 2024 election. And finally, I'm looking forward to attending the Carter G. Woodson's rededication ceremony on October 23rd and continuing my board work on [03:44:34] behalf of our students, families, and staff. I hope everyone continues to enjoy the fall weather in in Northern Virginia, however, I hope that we are all keeping our fellow Americans impacted by the severe weather recently in mind. The pictures coming out are just horrific, so I hope everybody's okay. [03:44:49] Good timing. Thank you, Ms. Anderson. I'll take my turn. First I want to say happy LGBTQIA+ History Month to everybody, and kudos to my colleagues Kyle McDaniel, the first out bi man elected in Fairfax County, and Robin Ladey, the first out lesbian elected in Fairfax County as well for their role in our local LGBTQ history. [03:45:20] A couple days after our last board meeting, I had the honor of speaking at the University of Virginia's Queer Alumni Network 25th Anniversary Gala in Charlottesville about LGBTQ life for K-12 students in the Commonwealth. I even had an opportunity to meet a few FCPS alumni from Oakton and South Lakes High School who attended the gala and are thriving as who's as i said during the event while most incoming first-year students arriving on grounds at u of uva from virginia public schools come from school [03:45:54] divisions that support and uplift our their lgbtq plus students a few hundred attend uva having never attended an educational institution that supports them for who they are and celebrates them and so i am on this day when we're celebrating lgbtq history month so grateful to be part of a board and part of a school division where our commitment is not in doubt and where we are on the right side of history and that we are always pushing ourselves to do better and do more so thank you all for being a part of that um i've had a fairly busy two weeks i had an opportunity [03:46:32] to attend the virginians organized for interfaith community engagement gathering with dr reed and chairman mckay where we talked about the supports that fcps is offering our students for mental health supports and how we're addressing the dangers of fentanyl last week i had a chance to visit mantua elementary school's pre-k program with supervisor palchik it was a lot of fun to spend time with our youngest learners and one of them asked where [03:47:02] my hair was going and I said it was on vacation so hopefully it comes back soon also this past weekend we had Providence Day and back to school celebration supervisor Palchuk and I co-hosted it at Marshall High School we had scores of people from the community there food trucks fire engines for kids to check out the electric school bus which is really the hottest draw in town I must say. Dr. Reed was there, many community leaders and local businesses were there as well. It was [03:47:39] a great event. We had magicians and the JV cheer team from Marshall was awesome, you know, welcoming everybody as they came in. Same weekend I attended with Mr. Moon, the Dunloring Improvement Association's annual picnic, where I was grateful to be able to announce that we are moving forward with discussions for a Stenwood school zone which has been on the community's mind for many many years and then it might have been yesterday it's a little bit of a blur I attended with Miss Anderson the [03:48:18] Faith Alliance for Climate Solutions forum this was Tuesday where we got to meet some great students who are active in the climate fight and hear from them about what they're doing in their own schools we heard from local superintendents including Dr. Reed about what they're doing and it was a great opportunity to reconnect with a former school board chair Elaine Tolan who moderated the discussions I want to give special kudos to our legislative liaisons for an excellent legislative breakfast many of our delegates and senators there and by all accounts [03:48:52] very impressed with what we had to say also very much appreciated being at the excellence awards last night, and this morning I got up, I drove to Richmond, I attended an event about electric school buses, it was called a teach-in, and I learned a lot, and I also was able to brag about how well we're doing in Fairfax County, so I was grateful for that opportunity, and I drove back, and here I am, and so I am now the only thing standing between us and the end of this meeting, and so at 10.48, we are adjourned. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Coraggio Consulting ยท aguyonx.com