Coraggio Consulting
Loudoun County School Board, Student Services Committee Meeting, Thursday, April 18, 2024

Date: Thursday, April 18, 2024
Place: Loudoun County Public Schools / School Board meeting (see BoardDocs / LCPS-TV)
Length: 1h 34m (video)
Official meeting video (Vimeo / LCPS-TV): https://player.vimeo.com/video/936649526?rel=0
BoardDocs (School Board): https://go.boarddocs.com/vsba/loudoun/Board.nsf/Public

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 2026-10-21. Timestamps are [HH:MM:SS] into the meeting video.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

[00:00:06] - Good evening, everyone. Thank you for being here for the April 18th, 2024 Student Services Committee meeting. We will go ahead and get started.

[00:00:22] And the first item on our agenda is public comment. So before we jump into that, I am going to find the public comment rules and also point out that We are limiting the total amount of public comment today to be no more than 15 minutes of the total meeting time.

[00:01:01] However, as I see, there are two speakers signed up. I don't anticipate that that will be problematic. So we will allow three minutes per speaker and you will bear with me for just one moment.

[00:01:35] Thank you for engaging with the school board the public comment process. The school board welcomes comments from Loudoun County residents and believes that strong community engagement and outreach are important components of a successful school system. Speakers must limit comments to the time allotted. Based on the number of speakers and the agenda this evening, all speakers have been allotted three minutes for each public comment.

[00:01:58] Please be advised that speakers who miss their time slot will not be called at a later time. All audience members shall maintain civility, decorum, and respect for the functioning and dignity of the school board at all times. Please remain seated unless arriving, departing, speaking at the table or during a break. Violations of civility, decorum, and respect include shouting, heckling, jeering, applause, or other noise which disrupts or delays the meeting, obstructing speakers from being able to see the committee and vice versa, interrupting speakers, attempting to speak when not called to do so by the chair of the committee, and approaching a speaker or otherwise

[00:02:36] attempting to intimidate, disparage, or distract a speaker, staff member, or other meeting attendees. Speakers should refrain from vulgarity, obscenities, defamation, profanity, or other like breaches of respect, nor may speakers target, criticize, or attack individual students and or individual division employees during public comment.

[00:02:56] Speakers should communicate those concerns to their school principal or an appropriate school official. The school board requests that comments on an individual student or employee-related matter not be shared at public meetings where the disclosure could violate applicable confidentiality requirements. Speakers should face the committee and direct their comments to the committee members. Per LCPS policy 2520, members of the school board will not answer questions or respond directly to the public during the public comment period. Violations of decorum or civility by any meeting attendee may result in the committee chair directing staff to remove the attendee from the remainder of the meeting. Repeated or persistent violations of decorum or civility by the audience

[00:03:34] may result in on the decision of the committee chair. Public comment being tabled until a later point in the meeting's agenda, limiting the number of attendees in the meeting room during public comment for safety reasons, or the public comment period ending for the evening. Copies of materials for board members should be given to the public information officer in the media box at the back of the boardroom prior to the start of the meeting. Please provide multiple copies of the materials. Under no circumstances may a speaker approach the committee members. With that, we will move to our first

[00:04:03] speaker, Liz Crotty. Good evening. My name is Liz Crotty. I am here on behalf of SEAC to advocate for the adoption of SEAC's recommendations to Policy 6640. Diabetes is a health condition that can have life-altering ramifications without appropriate care. SEAC is advocating for the adoption of language from Virginia State Code

[00:04:38] regarding training for our school staff, as well as the support and flexibility to follow the instructions provided by a student's doctor, including a trained nurse to assist with continuous glucose monitoring, reinsertion of a pump or pump parts, amongst other critical components of care for a person with diabetes. We appreciate this committee's thoughtful consideration on this

[00:05:01] important issue. Thank you. Our next and final speaker is Sarah Plattenberg.

[00:05:22] Good evening. I'm Sarah Plattenberg. I have three boys, two of which are type 1 diabetic, and all of them are students in Lowne County Public Schools. I'm here today also on behalf of the SEAC committee and as a parent in the community to support policy 6640. As a parent, I have watched the daily struggles that my children face. Despite having all of the most available technology, they wear pumps and they

[00:05:57] wear Dexcoms. The pump and the Dexcom talk to each other to help create a more steady glucose level in their bodies. Currently, well, let me back up. So today something happened and I wasn't going to bring it up, but I'm going to tell you because I think it's helpful to kind of highlight the importance of updating this policy. One of my children is in high school and the other is in middle school. My oldest son was diagnosed when he was five years old. So we've been on this

[00:06:33] journey for 11 years with him. I have identical twins. One of them was diagnosed with diabetes during COVID. And diabetes is a really difficult journey. And the first time one of your children is diagnosed with diabetes, it's devastating, but you don't know what you don't know.

[00:06:51] So the second time is really just beyond explanation to put into words the devastation. And I tell you that because I've learned that, and myself, as parents, we're terrified to send our children to school.

[00:07:12] And I have been incredibly fortunate to have fantastic teachers and support staff at my kids' schools. I've also been really fortunate because I was able to change my job so that almost everything I do is online. Once Bryce was diagnosed, that's the middle school of my children, I no longer felt comfortable traveling to the neighboring communities, the neighboring school systems, different states to do what I do.

[00:07:39] And so everything I do is from my home so that I'm only a few minutes away from his middle school. Today, as I left for a very close-by meeting, my phone started going crazy, and I looked down to see which of my two children was having a low blood glucose, which was an emergency, and unfortunately, they were both in dire emergencies.

[00:08:02] To give you some context, and I know I'm probably running out of time, to give you some context, 80 to 90 is where a typical person without diabetes blood sugar level is. 110 is kind of the target number for a person with type 1 diabetes.

[00:08:19] One of my kids was at 53, and the other one was at 63. So in my mind, I thought, oh, my gosh, what's cool? Ms. Flattenberger, I'm sorry. Okay. All right. Well, thanks so much. I think you know where I was going. Thank you to the both of you for engaging with the committee.

[00:08:36] If I may make up. Yes, Ms. LeBeau. I appreciate all of you understanding that we do have a lot of business to get through as a public comment.

[00:08:52] but if people would just write to us they would be able to tell us whatever they wanted no time limits so that's what i basically wanted to say thank you ms labelle it is helpful to remember the the school board members are available through multiple avenues of communication in written form, by phone, by Let's Talk, by email, through public comment.

[00:09:28] Many members also have town halls or office hours where members of the community can come and talk to us directly, which we encourage. Thank you. We'll move on to item three on the agenda, which is approval of the March 19th, 2024, excuse me, approval of the minutes from the March 19th, 2024 Student Services Committee meeting.

[00:09:56] The draft minutes are available on board docs. Ms. Mansfield, Ms. LaBelle, have you had an opportunity to review the draft minutes or would you like an opportunity to do so now? And if you have reviewed them, do you have any questions or concerns?

[00:10:13] No questions. Okay. I will entertain a motion to approve the minutes. I move to, boy. I move to approve the minutes from the March 19th, 2024 meeting.

[00:10:33] Thank you. Is there a second? I second. Thank you. The motion has been properly moved and seconded to approve the March 19th, 2024 Student Services Committee minutes, draft minutes.

[00:10:49] All those in favor, please say yes. Yes. That motion passes unanimously. So next we will move on to item number four on our agenda, 4.01 action item, new policy 6640, emergency first aid, CPR, and AED certified personnel.

[00:11:11] We saw this new policy proposal in the March meeting as an information item, no, as an action item. We talked about it last time and wanted to gather some additional feedback.

[00:11:29] So this matter is now before us again. Ms. Richardson. Thank you, Chair Donahue. I appreciate that. I am joined today by members of our Student Health Services team. Seated to my left, I have Donna Nahiski.

[00:11:45] She is one of our Student Health Services Specialists. And then Kirk Dolson, our Director of Student Services. So as you do recall, yes, policy 6640 is a brand-new policy based on VSBA model policy, EBBA.

[00:12:02] We did draft this policy in collaboration with human resources and talent development because we always have to be thoughtful about the impact to the required training to staff. So essentially, it impacts the guidance for school buildings based on the number of staffing staff that are present.

[00:12:20] If you may recall from our March meeting, we did propose at that time to add diabetes management trained to the title of this policy because it was surprising that VSBA did not include that information in the title because it did reference diabetes management.

[00:12:43] We did make some changes, some proposed changes to lines 2 through 4. Line 4, we removed certification because it was very important to understand that not all trainings will always result in a certification for staff. And then we added in line six to be designated by principals.

[00:13:03] Lines nine through 12 is truly where we receive the most feedback from our community stakeholders, from MSAC and SEAC, as well as our equity committee. And that was where we left off the conversation in March, was student services committee had asked staff to do a little bit more work with looking into our data, looking into how we are implementing this policy currently at the building level, because certainly anytime we're talking about policy, we have to be thoughtful

[00:13:37] about how it's applied to all 83,000 students across all of our buildings. And then we did go down to line 16 and we made a change. I will tell you, we have had the opportunity as staff members to speak to you all as committee members individually.

[00:13:56] We have also met with representation from SEAC and have had very meaningful conversation with them. And then from speaking to representatives from our Student Health Services office, staff's recommendations at this time that we would like the committee to consider is that we currently pause on the policy development as it is because we really want to provide that clarity on lines nine through 12 with how diabetes management plays out at the building level certainly regulations guide policy implementation and what staff is asking the committee to consider

[00:14:33] this afternoon is if we pause ever so briefly okay this you can certainly have conversation and dialogue and ask us questions but we would like the opportunity to be able to develop a corresponding regulation for 6640 that outlines diabetes management and really how it plays out at the building level on a daily basis. We would like the regulation to cover the overview of the diabetes medical management plan, how it is implemented by school-based staff. We would also

[00:15:07] like to delineate the levels of training and diabetes awareness that take place across LCPS.

[00:15:24] We would like to talk to and define in this regulation how student health services staff train school-based staff in the monitoring of continuous glucose monitoring, as well as our students that have pumps and pods, and then the process for support staff like transportation and nutrition services staff. So that is the recommendation that we would like to put forth for the committee to consider, but certainly we open the floor up for any questions and any discussion.

[00:15:47] Thank you, Ms. Richardson, and thank you to the members of your staff who are also here about this issue. I appreciate the deliberation with which you're looking at this policy, its importance to our students and its impact on the LCPS community.

[00:16:07] I'm also glad to hear you say that you're desiring to take a little bit more time to look at this again. I will say I'm slightly embarrassed to admit that it was only in preparing for today's meeting, as I was reading through the proposed policy, which I've read several times already, that it kind of finally jumped out at me that this is, I realize it's saying it's requiring at least three minutes,

[00:16:39] which there can be more, but requiring at least three employees to have current certification or training in emergency first aid, CPR, and AED. And it's only been just recently that I started to think, wait, are LCPS employees not already required to have first aid and CPR training?

[00:17:03] And that was something that I had wondered about was, is there a requirement currently for LCPS employees broadly to have first aid and CPR training. That was one question that I had.

[00:17:19] And I also was curious about EpiPens and allergies, if there are current policies or regulations or guidelines in place for training of LCPS employees, whether broadly or with specificity to be able to recognize and step in in a situation where a student may be having a life-threatening allergic reaction so I realize that some of this I have not raised with you before so you may not be prepared to speak to this to some of my questions right at this moment but if you have any

[00:17:59] if you have any information or thoughts I would ask you to share them so there is a difference between CPR certification and CPR training. Currently all licensed teachers are trained in CPR. When they initially become trained or certified in CPR, it's good for two years.

[00:18:29] Their licenses say that it's current for 10 years. So we consider them certified for the first two years, and then from year 3 to year 10, they're trained. Okay. Is that clear?

[00:18:48] Yes, thank you. But is there beyond that requirement that anyone who is licensed as a teacher by the Commonwealth of Virginia is already implicitly required to have CPR and first aid training? What about the LCPS employees who do not fall in the category of licensed teachers?

[00:19:07] Are there any requirements for them to have any familiarity with CPR or first aid training? There is not. Okay. That's something that I was interested in. Certainly our athletic trainers are CPR and first aid trained, but if you're speaking about nutrition services, transportation staff, it is currently not a requirement at the state level, nor is it currently a requirement for all of those staff members across LCPS.

[00:19:43] Thank you. That's helpful to know. And I would be interested in feeling out if there would be support to implement a requirement like that and if it would be feasible thinking through if a student has a medical emergency while they're on the school bus or while they're eating lunch in the cafeteria, if there does not happen to be a certified teacher nearby, thinking through what are the options for quick treatment and reaction for students in medical situations?

[00:20:21] Can I speak out? So we do have what's called an AED team. Every school has, it's our acronym for our emergency response team. So in the beginning of every school year, It is responsibility of the school nurse or a resource nurse, along with the admin, together, a group of people together who are trained and willing to respond to a medical emergency in the building.

[00:20:45] So that happens at every school building currently. We also at the middle school and high school have additional what's called MERT teams that there's three other teams that are designated to also respond. And those were developed when we rolled out Linoxone to the schools.

[00:21:04] Okay, so at the elementary, there's the AED team. And then at the secondary level, there's the AED and the three MERT teams. Okay. Thank you. Thank you for that additional information. Okay, so there are people who are willing and ready and able to respond to a medical emergency.

[00:21:24] Okay. Thank you. Ms. Mansfield. Thank you, Chair Donoghue. thank you for taking the time to maybe take a pause on this and rethink. And so I just wanted to let my thoughts be known. While I know we're probably going to be going above and beyond state standards, I think that's okay. And I think it's really important to stay current with the times.

[00:21:49] And that means the ability of someone to monitor the pumps. Because right now, my understanding is that families are being told that LCPS will not do that. And I think we have to be really careful with insisting that parents be the ones to provide the diabetes-related aids or services unless the parents say that they want to do it.

[00:22:12] I think we have to think about the reason why we might want to monitor is because, one, treatment can be faster. Sometimes the alarms don't always work. Pumps can go offline. And if a parent is in a skiff, they have no idea to tell you that the pump is offline.

[00:22:32] And I know that this might have a budget implication, and so if that is something that you guys could look into as well as the budget implication for monitoring these pumps and whether that could be done remotely off-site with somebody dedicated or somebody on-site and that system, I would really appreciate that.

[00:22:57] I guess something that really drove this home for me was the role that LCPS plays in reducing the risk of short-term and long-term complications of diabetes, and the students are in our care for like eight hours a day or more, and I think we should do our best to give that comfort to the parents so that they feel comfortable sending them to our schools and that we are keeping up with the technology just like we would with any evidence-based practice and technology

[00:23:35] that we are now I mean we're looking at AI we're looking at all those kinds of things I think we should look at that at the medical too and I really sincerely appreciate you guys taking a step back and and looking at the levels training as well and defining that a little bit more for us and so I appreciate that that's all I have to say thank you Ms. Mansfield and to follow up on some of your comments, and then I'll ask you for your comments, Ms. LaBelle.

[00:24:01] I agree with everything that you said, and I was, in having discussions, receiving some feedback from community members about the current language of this proposal, you know, similar concerns raised and similar proposals.

[00:24:20] I was curious if we had available to gather information on roughly how many students in our system are under a diabetes diagnosis, and if we have a sense of if they're concentrated in certain school levels, well, elementary, middle, or high school, or geographic areas,

[00:24:46] And if it would be possible for the students who need monitoring that can be done electronically, if there would be a way to do it, as Ms. Mansfield suggested, perhaps rather than do it by staff on site, if there were a way to do it to assign a staff member, a more centrally located staff member, who might be able to have access on a single device.

[00:25:16] maybe that would never work. I don't know, but I would, I would like to, I would like to find out. And yes. Yeah. I think, you know, I don't know with HIPAA regulations and all the rest of that. I want to be cognizant of all of that. And I also want the parents, like you said, to, I want the parents to be able to feel comfortable with the kids there. And I'm sure that they do right now, but I think this, we just need to, so thank you. And without wanting, and always being cognizant of not wanting to just keep adding more and more training onto our educators also

[00:25:53] thinking of all of the educators that i know who i have talked to in lcps care very deeply about the health and well-being of their students and thinking about giving them also an added layer of of feeling prepared to meet their not just their responsibilities but i try to put myself in the mind of if I were a classroom educator and I had a student who went into a diabetic crisis, if I didn't know the warning signs or know how to respond, the amount of stress that

[00:26:28] that would cause for me and that I imagine it may cause for our, at least some of our dedicated education professionals here. So, Ms. LeBeau. Going back to Mrs. Donahue's first question about licensed and certified people.

[00:26:49] are the classroom assistants through special ed also included in this training because they are frequently in classrooms where students with diabetes issues might be.

[00:27:05] There would be another place, another stopgap to try to help students, try to help teachers understand. And let's say a teacher is out and we have a substitute there. They may or may not know what's going on.

[00:27:20] So if any of this training is being done for our teachers, could we also have our special ed teachers' assistance included in the training? Thank you, Ms. LeBeau.

[00:27:41] Ms. Richardson or other staff, if you had any other comments or questions for us, we're happy to hear responses from you. So now, obviously, you have requested additional time, and I don't think any of us are going to be opposed to that.

[00:28:02] Okay. Well, you did mention data, and our amazing student health services team has been able to pull some of the data, and they pulled it together rather quickly. So just to give you a picture of how many students across the division we are supporting, currently there's a total of 416 students across our student population.

[00:28:22] 203 of those, we know and we're working with families, they have diabetes medical management plans, which include continuous glucose monitors. So, 203 students on CGMs. 129 students either have a pump or a pod to help monitor their blood glucose levels.

[00:28:43] And then we have 84 students that are either syringe or pen administration of insulin based on how their physicians have written the orders. So that's currently how many students we are supporting. Now, looking across the data, our team was able to disaggregate that by school.

[00:29:04] And so the highest for CGM, we're looking at about 10 students that would have to be managed. What you are asking us to consider, and I do have it down as what is the budget impact for the monitoring of CGMs, we would also have to factor in HIPAA, as Mrs. Mansfield has mentioned, would require us to probably have some pretty high-tech equipment to be able to do so.

[00:29:30] So we will work on gathering that information and be able to bring that back to the committee for consideration. I also have that you would like for us to do additional research on CPR for all. Is that correct? okay, at the minimum training for all, okay, and then what would be the impact to making sure that our teaching assistants had more than just diabetes awareness training, but the higher level of training required for the specific students for which they're in classes, is that

[00:30:02] correct? I think that would be what, level two training, I think. Currently in LCPS, we either have awareness or we do level 3 training. So anybody that's going to have direct contact with a student and would be monitoring them closely goes to level 3 training, which is a six-hour training. It's four hours online. It's two hours here at the admin building with our resource nurses.

[00:30:30] And then there's continued training out once they complete their training here to work closely either with the school nurse or the resource nurse to feel comfortable with the knowledge that they've here to be able to care for their students in their classroom so the policy has level three training three people well as that's the number of people but what we provide here at this at school for LCPS there's an awareness that's 45 minutes anybody can take that and then anyone any any staff member who's going

[00:31:05] to be directly caring for a student having a student in their classroom then And they take level three. So could you explain to me what the difference is between the awareness and level one or level two training? Yeah. So an awareness is basically the signs and symptoms of hypoglycemia.

[00:31:25] If you look down on somebody's, if you saw a student who you knew was a diabetic and they may be presenting with certain symptoms, you would say, oh, that's hypoglycemia, that's hyperglycemia. Do they have a CGM? Let me see your CGM. What is the reading?

[00:31:41] Do I hand you a juice box and call the nurse, or do I give you a glass of water? Okay, so that's an awareness. So you would be familiar with what signs and symptoms to look for. So is that level one or level two training? That's level one.

[00:31:57] That's just the awareness. Just level one. Okay. And then what's level two? Jeannie Coleman, who is our supervisor, feels very strongly that we shouldn't have all these different levels and that anyone that is going to be providing care for a student, that could be a teacher, a TA who's going on a field trip, who has a student in their classroom, the school nurse or health clinic specialist would be receiving level 3 care.

[00:32:23] And that's the more intensive care, the training. That's the four hours of online, two hours here, and then additional training at the school site, learning the student's individual DMMP. So you're saying that all of the teachers who are working with the students...

[00:32:38] I wouldn't say all. In elementary school, it's a little bit different than what it looks like at the secondary level. Okay, so could you unpack that for me a little bit? Sure. We can't say that the classroom teacher who has the student in the elementary school has to go to training, but we probably could crunch the data and say there's a very high percentage of all elementary classroom teachers have taken the level three training here at school so that they can also take them on a field trip.

[00:33:08] and they can monitor them in the classroom so why not that middle level to be honest with you so there's no confusion so that if a teacher was going to take a student on a field trip out on the playground and would know how to immediately intervene it starts to put a little bit area of gray so they would be able to administer insulin and that's just the way we've done it here at school. Is that per VDOE policy? The guidance, I guess, not policy. There's ADA that differentiates

[00:33:45] between the three different levels. The program that we use through VDOE has two levels of training, and that's the SALAS program, and that's through VDOE, that we access that program that was recommended by VDOE to use the SALAS program. Did you spell that for me?

[00:34:07] SALAS. It's S-A-L-A-S. There are three programs in there. There's awareness. It's the 45-minute. Then there's a program for the nurses and then non-medical. And they're basically almost the same program. So that's where we get the one and three. If you were to go into the SALAS program, you're going to see three programs. But essentially, there's an awareness, the non-medical

[00:34:43] and for the nurses is basically the same program, which is a level three. Well, I'm interested to see about the levels training and all the rest that you guys are looking at. Thank you.

[00:35:00] Ms. Richardson, if I could ask you a couple of follow-ups about the numbers that you just mentioned. I believe you said 416 students who are diagnosed as diabetic. Currently, I believe you said it was around 200 in need of constant monitoring.

[00:35:18] So there's 203 students who we have knowledge of that wear continuous glucose monitors. Okay. And then what is the next number you said was 10? 129 students wear either an insulin pump or an insulin pod.

[00:35:36] And then 84 students use a syringe administration of insulin or a pen administration of insulin. Okay.

[00:35:53] And you, I believe, also mentioned a number that if we were to look into LCPS's ability to monitor students who need and have access to electronic device monitoring, what was that number?

[00:36:16] So that would be the 203 number that we would be looking at. Those are the students that are currently wearing continuous glucose monitors across elementary, middle, high. as well as the North Star School and Roby. So we would be calculating for you all the possible impacts.

[00:36:35] So I think we'll have to work as staff to come up with, okay, what is the level of skill required for the person that would be looking at and monitoring these apps? What would the technology cost be needed? What are the HIPAA sort of considerations that we need to take into account?

[00:36:52] And then be able to bring you back some figures with what we'd be looking at as far as staff, implementation, and then any technology that we might need to look into as a division. Okay. And do we have, or would we be able to identify whether these students are elementary, middle, high school, whether they're special needs students?

[00:37:18] Yes, yes, we have that. Okay, and then I'll stop, I promise. So, when we were talking about HIPAA compliance, could you help me understand, if you have 10 students, would you need 10 different iPads, or it was the HIPAA compliance that you were talking about with the one app that could add 10 all into one iPad?

[00:37:44] Is that what we were talking about? So, I think that's what we'll have to navigate, and I take this back, I'm not well-versed in this, right? Clearly, neither am I. But I did participate in our Student Health Advisory Board conversation, and one of my very first meetings on that board was in July, and this was what they were talking about.

[00:38:06] What is the impact, and how does it play out at the building level? Should we shift to school nurses having access to all of the applications? And so where we landed with that conversation, now mind you, we didn't have anyone from DDI in that meeting to sort of support our understanding of how this might play out.

[00:38:26] So you're talking about sort of a layman's sort of conversation, but we likened it to, okay, if the nurse had the iPad, they would have to download, there's different types of CGM, so you'd have to download the corresponding app per student.

[00:38:41] So, of course, the parents would have to give us the login information to that particular student's app. And then we would also have to make sure that we maintained Wi-Fi connection throughout the entire building so that we're getting the constant reads on that app.

[00:38:57] And then our conversation sort of transitioned into we think we could do it all on one iPad. We would have to check. So that's part of the research that we would have to do. We do believe that we could download the app multiple times.

[00:39:13] We did not feel that it was confidential if we added more than, I don't even think you can add more than one person's CGM readings to the application. So there's some things that we'll just really have to talk about and dig into and bring it back to the committee because we don't have the clarity needed.

[00:39:50] All right. Thank you very much, Ms. Richardson and all. that was very helpful and we look forward to hearing more about those in the future and with that we'll move on to item 5.01 of our agenda section 5 of our information items and item 5.01 is revised policy 5345 restraint and seclusion of students uh ms richardson yes thank you for

[00:40:26] that so we do have one we have two information items one is a presentation um i am joined this afternoon by Mrs. Donna Smith, our director of the Office of Procedural Support. You all will remember Donna from her presentation on restraint and seclusion before the board earlier this semester. And so policy 5345 is up for our five-year cyclical review through the Virginia School Board Association. You will notice in your red line there that all All references to pupil services, because that is once what LCPS referred to student

[00:41:06] services as, that has been changed. We did make the recommendation that the definitions pertaining to restraint and seclusion be removed from the policy because they are outlined in the corresponding regulation, and we do support them remaining in the regulation.

[00:41:28] to prone restraint have also been added. The references to prone restraint can be found on lines 94 through 95.

[00:41:45] The revisions also still reflect the required actions of LCPS staff with regards to training and reporting that has not changed. We also have included the exceptions allowable under Virginia law.

[00:42:04] You can find those starting on line 191. And then we certainly just wanted to reassure the committee that there's no impact to implementation, training, and/or the reporting of restraint and seclusion in LCPS for our students that are in our school-based locations as well as those that are being served in private day and residential facilities.

[00:42:31] And so Mrs. Smith and I remain available if you have any questions or concerns. It's really just being able to streamline it. Certainly the copy of the regulation can be found on board docs. We have not made any changes to regulations yet because it would depend on what changes the committee would make to the policy.

[00:42:57] Thank you, Ms. Richardson. When I was reading through this, I was going to ask if the regulation is available for us to look at and also if the definitions that are still in the regulation are substantively the same as what is proposed to be stricken from the policy.

[00:43:25] Yes. And thank you. so i was curious um when i was reading through this that i suppose because in the definitions it says physical restraint is a personal restriction that immobilizes or reduces the ability of the student to move freely but does not include several things um and all of the i felt like all of the definitions are like that saying this is this is what this is but all these other

[00:44:00] things don't count. And I found myself reading through this going, well, what does? Then what is permissible? Is there any way that you can describe for us examples of restraints and seclusion that are permissible under this policy? Thank you. It is a good question. Thank you for that question. So the things that are excluded are things that can happen in the day-to-day sort of interactions with children escorting down the hallway holding hands you see that often

[00:44:39] happening with kindergartners and first graders and so some of those things when it says this does not include moving kids to a safe area for safety those are not considered restraints but when you are actually physically holding a student and they are not able to get away and it's not due to like safety to running into something running out into the street but it's more of really restricting them because they're in a crisis situation that would be considered a restraint there are there's a lot more definition to it in the regulation there's a lot more detail about what is a restraint all of the requirements how long a restraint can last what you have to do

[00:45:17] throughout all of that is in the regulation so it does talk about briefly holding a student to calm or comfort sometimes we put our hand on the back to escort a student down the hallway but we're We're not really maintaining them to where they can't get away. They're not able to move.

[00:45:37] So I think the bigger part is when they're in a crisis and you're having to actually restrict them from being able to get away. Thank you for that. And following up on that, with regard to mechanical restraint, what mechanical restraints does LCPS use?

[00:45:55] None. So why do we have mechanical restraint? Because it's a required definition as part of the regulation. As part of the Virginia code as well and a mechanical restraint does include if a school resource officer or a police officer has to handcuff A student that is actually considered a mechanical restraint And on our state reporting we have to report those things even if they happen within our property even though our staff do not do that So there are provisions in here we have to put the definition of mechanical restraint

[00:46:29] But we actually do not engage in mechanical restraints. Thank you. That eases my mind considerably. Okay. So restraint and seclusion is really important, is really hard thing to talk about. Now your definitions, do they come from code or do they come from Okuru or what do they come from? They come from all from code. Okay. And then there was one, I typically don't like

[00:47:09] all of the definitions put into regulations, especially for something as important as this. um so i would really like to keep them in there um because i don't want people to have to go through 50 different things to find something that's buried um there was the so there's many

[00:47:41] different codes that are put in here that i don't see referenced in the back uh like at the very end you usually have you know your referenced code there's there was code throughout this including i think we should add okay so like um yeah so so let's say um where is it b8 i think b8 it was c

[00:48:15] but now b8 sorry line 118 that's better that's not referenced and do you mean 50 or do you mean 5 on that page it's 5 because the use of seclusion rooms and is i think 50 seclusion standard for for standards for use 8 vac 20-750-50 so it's saying that the use of seclusion rooms or

[00:48:48] freestanding units not meeting the standards set forth in v 8 vac 20 750-5 and the um that next at sec means and what follows so in the actual virginia code i will go back and look but i actually was looking at that again today because this was language that was part of that was um i think the actual could may have been added by um division council i have to go back because we the additional what's prohibited on here was added as well we had some and then we add there were there are more things that are prohibited that we added to the policy for this revision I went back and looked at this

[00:49:27] and I'm fairly positive it is 5 but I'll go back and look again because this came directly out of the Virginia Code this new language that's on here was verbatim from the Virginia Code but I will double check that okay and oh could we have links to where it says well first of all 197 that reference section 22.1-7276.2 of the Code of Virginia

[00:50:00] that's not in the back that's not on the reference um that needs to be put at the end i think uh and then on page i mean on a section 200 line 200 section 9.1-101 of the code of virginia i think we need links also applied to those as well as put into the back for reference and then our memorandum of understanding do we have a link to that with the between the local law enforcement

[00:50:31] agency and LCPS we do not have a copy I do believe as a division we hold a copy so I would certainly have to work with legal counsel to see if that is something that could be linked but definitely the code references can be linked so that when you pull it up in board docs you could click and be taken directly to the code yeah because it says except to the extent governed by a memorandum of understanding between local law enforcement agency and LCPS and it's like okay so what is that you know so that's what i was also thinking for reference um and then

[00:51:07] on line 212 i don't think that's referenced in the back as well um probably just because this is all new stuff and y'all just didn't get it back to that get to the back of that um and checking on the actual legal references uh 234 um 22.1 through 16 i tried to link that and look at that and i don't even know what that is could you check that i did you did you check that i did it's the bylaws and regulations generally that's what that clause is that was also added by division council

[00:51:45] so i looked it up to see what it was and it just says bylaws and regulations generally so it's sort of the regulation and bylaws that are what are the authority of the school board okay so that that's kind of mine i um when we have an alternative school and recovery school um what kinds of restraints i so i'm worked long long long 20 years ago and we did use pharmacological restraints and we don't we don't do that anymore period not even because okay just checking i didn't know if

[00:52:19] the medical model would be different but it's not okay all right um that's what happens when you worked at something 20 or 30 years ago okay so i think that's all i really would like to keep a lot of this in here just because i don't like to have to go hunt and peck for things so that's that's all i have to say about this chairman so can i ask for a point of clarification yes ma'am for the definitions i think where this went back and forth when we were working on this revision is there are a lot of definitions in the regulation um and we started adding them to the

[00:52:58] to the policy and then realizing it would make this a very lengthy document so some guidance on which definitions you want to maintain in it I think would be helpful we started adding the definition of aversive stimuli and things like that because those are all in the regulation or would you just want the definitions of restraint and seclusion like we have it now and then the rest of it would be in the regulation I hadn't thought about that there's a lot of

[00:53:27] If I could chime in with a possible suggestion, I am not sure that it would be helpful to include definitions of the things that we don't do anyway, if that's a way to not include all of the definitions in the text.

[00:53:54] If we, you know, there's half a page here about mechanical restraint, which is a prohibited practice anyway. So maybe that's not helpful to the community if they are reviewing this document.

[00:54:12] But I would think at minimum, if we want to include definitions, the minimum definitions to be included would be permissible practices, you know, definition of physical restraint to the extent that it is permitted in LCPS.

[00:54:31] Yeah, and we do have to think about sheriff and mechanical restraint as opposed, because that is permissible probably from our MOU or something. And they're law enforcement, they're different. I mean, I think that sounds logical. what we do do as opposed to what we don't do?

[00:54:49] And then what we don't do put in regulations? Right, right. And potentially cause confusion because if people only read, you know, the definitions come first. If people read the definitions first before they get to the prohibited practices.

[00:55:05] Yeah, you're already standing on end. Right. Did you have other questions? You don't want me to talk anymore.

[00:55:22] No, I'm fine. I'm good. That's why we're here. Ms. LaBelle, did you have anything on this? No, except that I do have some concerns about the understanding of staff in the schools about the use of the seclusion rooms.

[00:55:42] I think that needs to be looked at and revisited before we put any of this through. And Ms. LaBelle, there is in code any seclusion room or area shall be free of any objects or physical features that may cause injury of the student.

[00:56:03] that isn't so i think if we do have that code in there we should and there should be sufficient dimensions and there's lighting heating cooling ventilation there's like a whole section of it so i i think what miss or one example that ms labelle may be referring to is we all three of us received an email just this afternoon from a parent raising some concerns about use of seclusion with a student, and because it was just received for me shortly before coming to this meeting,

[00:56:39] I have not had a chance to read it in detail or make any follow-up inquiries, but I plan to read through it carefully and follow up with some inquiries about this parent's concern.

[00:56:58] Thank you. Maybe relevant to Ms. LaBelle's comment. Certainly, and as a point of clarity, we don't have any seclusion rooms that are specified for that distinct purpose, so certainly as you all read through this communication, if you feel that individual follow-up is needed with myself or Mrs. Smith so that we can support the parent as well, as well as the school site, we'd be happy to do so.

[00:57:22] If you would like, I will go ahead and forward you the letter that we received. Thank you. Okay, done. Okay. Seeing as this is in, not to cut anyone off, do you have anything else about this one?

[00:57:46] And this is information, right? That's what I was just about to ask. It is on for information. Are you requesting for us to put this on for action next month, or do you have, you did not get to a recommendation?

[00:58:02] Right. So, certainly with the recommendations that you all have given us, it seems as though the committee came to consensus that we would like to keep the definitions that are applicable to LCPS, but then make sure that all of the definitions are contained per the code in our regulation.

[00:58:22] I think we can make those changes. We can also double-check the code references and then make sure that they are cross-referenced at the end of the policy. We can also make sure that all of the links are live. And then I can follow up on the MOU that we have with the Sheriff's Department.

[00:58:39] If you all are comfortable, we can certainly bring those to the full board that it moves to action so that you guys would bring it back in May as action item once all of those revisions are made.

[00:58:54] And we'll also make sure that you have a paper copy of the regulations to look at so that you can see the definitions particularly and the regulations also really dive into how this plays out at the building level with regards to training and reporting.

[00:59:10] So it would be our recommendation that staff would make the proposed changes and that this come back to the committee for action in May. I'm comfortable with that as we would still have that opportunity to review the changes and provide any other feedback or input before sending it to the board.

[00:59:30] And I think SEAC would have some really big thoughts about this as well. I see Liz nodding over there. Yes, I expect it. Right. And so, and I think their last meeting is in May, so we would probably want to get their input sooner rather than later.

[00:59:47] So if we could have that as well by next time Ms. Crotty when is the when is your next meeting? Thank you certainly before ours That's perfect. Okay Ms. Crotty would you also like a copy of that parent letter? Okay All right, so we will I don't have we don't have to vote on that, right?

[01:00:18] Like I just we would like to see this come back for action at the next meeting, please I see that we are at 6.32, which was the end of our scheduled meeting time, although we do have another item on the agenda, a schooling's presentation.

[01:00:38] And I have new business I'd like to bring up. Me too. Okay. I don't want to force anyone to rush through a presentation, but I also am reluctant to put things off uh if not necessary so um can you can you tell us a little bit about at least about what this presentation is about and if you have an idea of how long it is and whether it makes

[01:01:13] sense to go ahead with it tonight or it definitely makes sense to go ahead with it tonight because we have been talking to building leaders as well as teachers and advisory groups about school links which is our new college and career planning platform across the division.

[01:01:32] We are joined this evening by Mrs. Heather Ross, our supervisor of school counseling, and Mr. Jeff Roundsley, our director of teaching and learning for K-12 education here in LCPS. And they have really been spearheading the work. So I think that you will find this an informative presentation, and it will sort of help to connect some of the dots for you as you are interacting with parents and out in our schools and working with teachers and students thank you for that before you jump in I would like to ask my colleagues if you are open to extending this meeting somewhat longer than

[01:02:10] scheduled especially Ms. LaBelle who is with us having just had back surgery no leg surgery excuse me uh no pain pills are holding we're good okay Ms. Mansfield and just to clarify It's ibuprofen, nothing else.

[01:02:27] No, no one asked. Ms. Mansfield. Yeah, I'll stay. I'll stay. Thank you, Ms. Ross.

[01:02:43] All right. We will hustle through as best as we can while also trying to paint a really great picture about the capabilities of SchoolLinks and an update for SchoolLinks as well as new integration of a feature that we find will be very helpful. So in May of 2023, School Counseling Services provided an overview to the Student Services Committee of the new college and career platform that we would be implementing in the 23-24 school year. We sunsetted our previous college and career

[01:03:21] readiness platform, Naviance, after 20 years. And today I'm thrilled to provide an exciting update for the usership in the platform that we've had so far for the school year, as well as announce a new feature that we plan to implement next school year. SchoolLinks is a comprehensive college and career readiness platform that we implement for all students. Previously, we had a platform that was geared towards secondary students, and SchoolLinks supports kindergarten through

[01:03:55] graduation as well as supports our alumni. In May of 2023 we communicated to the student services committee that our goal was to increase student usership in the school in school links as compared to our previous platform by 300 percent as that was a very lofty goal. We are excited to announce today that we surpassed that goal and middle school usership is has increased by 60,000 percent. I didn't know that that was possible but and then in high school usership

[01:04:34] has increased by 327 percent. So we attribute the success to school counselors dedication to learning and educating students on the new platform as well as students and families embracing this very exciting change. Because Naviance did not have an elementary platform we did want to note we have nothing to compare the data to but did want to give you a brief update that as of yesterday 32,331 students have logged in so those are unique user logins and for context

[01:05:08] we have roughly 34,642 elementary school students along with usership data school links is able to provide us with real-time analysis of results from student activities and assessments for example you could see on this page that we have provided a snapshot of the top career clusters our students identify in currently. This helps us understand what fields students are interested in studying in the future, and it might also help us with course pathways, course offerings. So we are

[01:05:43] very interested in the data that SchoolLinks provides us. Additionally, you will find on average 6th through 12th graders identify STEM, arts, audiovisual technology, and communications in health sciences as their top three in LCPS. Additional data that helps support our students include students' post-secondary goals and career goals. On the chart to the left, you'll see a large amount of our students, roughly 84%, set a post-secondary goal aspiring to attend a four-year

[01:06:18] degree, or I'm sorry, a four-year institution, followed by 7% for a two-year, 3% military, trade school 2%, 1.5 gap year, 1.5% for workforce, 1% internship, 0.6% apprenticeship, and 0.2% volunteer. On the chart to the left, you will see the students setting a career wish to practice medicine, law, software development, and many, many more. We are beyond excited that this platform has provided our students with dynamic and engaging learning opportunities

[01:06:55] while also providing significant data to help support our students' interests, skills, and aspirations for the future. I will now kick it over to my lovely colleague, Jeff Roundsley, to talk about some of the feedback, objectives, and benefits that we have received to help support a new portion of the platform we seek to utilize for next year.

[01:07:23] Thank you, Ms. Ross. So the School Links platform that you just heard about from Ms. Ross and the program of studies within the Department of Teaching and Learning has really been a great intersection to create something that we think is going to be a true benefit to our community, our students, and our families.

[01:07:40] And so last year, at the end of the year, we asked our principals to give us some feedback on the current program of studies, which is where we contain all of our course offerings for students. And you'll see some of the sample responses on the screen now. One of them is that we kind of maybe do some information overload that the current Google site that we use is just kind of a text list of all of the classes that are available to students and maybe kind of overwhelming to families and students as they plan out what their graduation path might look like.

[01:08:08] And also some feedback. This was very consistent feedback about how we can make this more interactive, how we can help students visualize what their pathways might be, what's available to them, how we can help families understand what graduation requirements might still exist and things we might need to look at more closely and really use this as a tool to bring our program of studies in a way that is interactive to life for students and seeing all the opportunities that exist within Loudoun County Public Schools. We also interestingly heard very similar feedback from students on the next slide, which is that students were looking for more clarity on their available courses and prerequisites to have more information about what they need in order to be successful and

[01:08:47] move forward, a better understanding of course progression, so what are the options that are available after we complete each course, and also how can we make academic advising a true collaboration between students, families, and school counselors and schools to see what all the options are and how we can make informed decisions as we move forward. So these are some of the overall objectives of this entire project, and the first one is to create consistent and transparent course offerings and pathways. So how do we create systems and processes where we create courses, new courses, we make revisions, we modify, we retire courses in ways that bring

[01:09:22] educators to the table and hear many voices. How do we engage students and families in the course planning process and make sure we're equipping people with the information they need to make informed decisions and to visualize how these pathways of courses play out over a student's middle and high school careers? How can we take a consistent approach across all of our schools towards academic advising? And how can we put in place clear processes and protocols for making decisions about what courses are offered where and how we're strategically placing resources in ways that provide students with the maximum benefits for courses? And on the next slide, some of the

[01:09:59] benefits that we see for schools as well as a more consistent way to monitor on-time graduation. Heather's going to show you some examples of this within School Links, but it will help counselors and school administrators see where the gaps are in students' course progressions and how we can help fill those gaps quickly.

[01:10:15] It'll be a support to school-based administration. So one of the things that Heather is going to point out to you as well is that students will be mapping out course pathways over a number of years. And so for us in the Department of Teaching and Learning and for school principals as well, it will help them see areas of future growth, maybe areas where we need to create more opportunities for students and more pathways for students based on interests that we're seeing in younger grades and provide some equitable access to course pathways and academic advising to make sure students know the full range of opportunities available to them in LCPS. Thank you, Jeff. So we are excited to announce that we will be adding the course

[01:10:55] planner feature for school links in the 24-25 school year. This will allow students to begin planning courses for the 25-26 school year. There are many amazing features, and I could probably spend a whole day going through all of them, but for everybody's sake, I won't. We did have a video on the next slide we could skip through the video it is linked just for time sake so course planner is designed to focus not just on picking the next year courses but to help students make the right choices for next the year after that and take them all the way to their post-secondary goals planning for the

[01:11:34] next school year and future school years help students ensure they are actually planning the right courses and fulfill their graduation requirements and then we see in real time what's meaning graduation requirements and what students aspirations lead to additional goals. Students and families will be able to access course descriptions, prerequisites, and co-requisites right in one place just simply by clicking the course. Currently students and families view this information in a separate user information system so to have it all in one place will be helpful for our students and families. Students in seventh

[01:12:13] grade will begin to plan for graduation. As you know many of our middle school students engage in high school credit courses in middle school so having the ability to support a graduation plan and engage in a graduation plan in the seventh grade will be extremely helpful for them to understand where they are going and where they have been and the markers that they are utilizing to support their goals. And finally students and families will experience an equitable access to consistent academic advising and planning because we are all using one platform.

[01:12:51] Currently, our practices may differ from school to school. While we have one united program of studies for LCPS, we do have different schools engaging in different practices for academic advising and recording of those course requests.

[01:13:11] So uniting this process will help support, again, consistent practices and equitable access to rigorous pathways and coursework for all students. Students currently receive lessons from school counselors on the graduation requirements and utilize their knowledge to make course selections, but all of that is really built into this platform.

[01:13:39] So on this slide, we can see all the things in one page that students can do. The LCPS page will look a bit different. This one begins in 9th grade, but ours will actually begin in 7th. So 5th grade will be planning for 6th grade, 6th grade will be planning for 7th grade, 7th grade will be planning until high school.

[01:13:57] This aligns with the Virginia Code to help support an academic career plan, as well as, again, make sure that any of the achievements the students have made towards graduation and middle school are really aligned with their goals, interests, and skills.

[01:14:14] So here you can see you can view the program of studies, click on any requirement to add or remove courses, see supplemental plans, and then also communicate right in real time with students can communicate, families can communicate with the counselors right in the UI.

[01:14:34] So the timeline for this, we have already started. In January through March, we really were kicking off implementation, the systems configuration.

[01:14:50] We're still working on a lot of that as well. We have an in-depth communications plan that we are ensuring all of our stakeholders in the community are aware of this change and can prepare for this change. There will be a significant professional development for our school counselors, as well as school administrators, as well as a learning curve for our students and our families, and we are very excited to get to speak with our community about these changes.

[01:15:19] They truly embraced School Links. When we moved from Naviance to School Links, we had a very overwhelming amount of support for this change. So we hope the same for Course Planner as well. I won't go through every piece of this, but one aspect to know is that we are really hopeful that in November we will have this available and live for students and families.

[01:15:48] Thank you for your time this evening. Thank you, Ms. Ross and Mr. Ransley. Ms. LeBeau. When the students are going through as they get into the high school area of School Links, are there links from the school program, which we've been filling out consecutively each year, with an opportunity not only with just the career cluster that they're in, but the different universities or programs available to them they can click on?

[01:16:24] Okay, so there are two, so SchoolLinks is a very vast, a dynamic platform, and there are several components. So there's a college application program, which is called CAM, College Application Manager.

[01:16:41] That is where our seniors only have access to, and that's really where they do a lot of, not exploration, that's where they apply for colleges. In the college and career readiness platform, students can begin seeking college, university tours, all of that information, as well as take assessments to learn their skills and interests and values and what type of post-secondary goals they may have, beginning in kindergarten.

[01:17:14] So all of that is, now we do make it developmentally appropriate. In kindergarten through fifth grade, it's a lot of exploration. But in the secondary platform, there are, you know, virtual tours and lots of information, scholarship information, career information.

[01:17:36] The thing that we like about School Links is it just doesn't focus on our college goers. It focuses on the diverse opportunities for students. Well, just quickly, I've got to tell you, I love this. I'm very interested in CTE. I did the CTE assessments for the entire special ed population for the county, and we've been doing this sort of thing starting at seventh grade for years.

[01:18:01] But I actually went back and worked in both middle school and was preparing a program to even go back to elementary school and kindergarten. So, I am familiar with all the assessment type tools you're talking about. Will I be able to get in there and play and look around?

[01:18:17] I think so. Why? I don't see why not. We can absolutely, if it doesn't, yeah, yeah, we can certainly look into that. I would love that. Find out if I'm in the right career at this point in time.

[01:18:33] I mean, I'm 73 years old. I don't have much time to change. Thank you. Thank you, Ms. LaBelle. So I'm wondering, thank you, Chair Donohue, I was wondering about how accessible this is, speech-to-text, text-to-speech, all the rest of that.

[01:18:51] Great question. It went through our accessibility tests in LCPS, and the exact words were, wow, we've never seen an educational platform that's so dynamic. So it does have read aloud, it has translations to over 175 languages, and so it is pretty accessible.

[01:19:14] Even for fill in the blank kind of a thing? Mm-hmm. Yes. Yep, the students can actually record their voices instead of writing, so yeah. So is this something that we would be using also for IEP transitioning as well? Are we going to be using this?

[01:19:31] We are working with our transition teachers right now to see how we can incorporate some of that. There are some copyright barriers that we may have to overcome, but we are in lockstep with our transition teachers.

[01:19:47] They have been trained on school links as well as the supervisor and specialist to help support that work. Thank you. Thank you very much for the presentation. It's an exciting idea.

[01:20:05] With that, we'll move on to item 6 on our agenda, which is new business. And I would like to ask Ms. Richardson if she could provide us with a quick update about the status of the 80-40 focus group process.

[01:20:27] as I've received several inquiries from the community about where we are in the procurement process and also who will ultimately be making a decision to select a contract.

[01:20:47] So if you could give us a bit of an update, Ms. Richardson, please. Certainly, yes. So at our last committee meeting on March 19th, we did have discussion. staff came back with some clarifying questions thank you again for answering those questions and helping to shape the scope of services so at this time the scope of services has been drafted we're looking at some large over overarching areas the introduction so what started like what is the reason for this request for quotes being posted pre-engagement phase so what will the vendors

[01:21:25] provide us on the front end before we really dig into the work. Focus group facilitation. We've written out the scope of services for that area. What are those expectations? Again, based on your feedback. Data management and analysis. So what sort of data outcomes can we expect? We have defined that scope of service. Post-engagement support. So after we have moved through the focus group work, what can we expect for vendors, and then quality assurances and any elements of customization that we would like to add. So currently the request for quotes is with our procurement department.

[01:22:05] They have taken all of this information that we have drafted again based on feedback from the committee. They're putting it into the legally required format for procurement in Virginia. We should be really close to launching live publicly, and then we should be getting some requests coming in.

[01:22:27] As explained back in March, the process, once it is out, it does have to be by law posted for 10 days to give everyone the appropriate access to be able to write a proposal for us to consider. Once those quotes come in, or if we don't get any quotes, we would then possibly have to revise that posting, put it back out again to see if we get some vendors that would be interested in helping us to facilitate this work.

[01:22:57] But it does have to be posted for a minimum of 10 days. After that, procurement will notify us. I have been established as the lead point of contact for this request for quotes, so they would notify me. I would work with procurement to put together an evaluation team.

[01:23:17] That team does have to sign off on confidentiality agreements because once you're on that team, you are not allowed to communicate with any of the vendors that have submitted re-quote, have quotes. And then we move through the work of looking at the quotes as they compare to our rubric, and then the evaluation committee scores the quotes as they have come in.

[01:23:38] Our procurement department handles any back and forth questions that the evaluation committee may have with the vendors, so the evaluation team does not speak directly to the vendors unless we choose for the vendors to come in and give us in-person presentations, which that is an option.

[01:23:57] After we go through that process and all of the vendors are ranked, we would then be able to make a recommendation to the school board that this is the top vendor, here's how they they met the criteria. Here's the number of vendors that were selected. And then we would begin the process. Thank you, Ms. Richardson. The evaluation team, is there a standard number of people on the evaluation team? And where do the members, who are the members, where are they drawn from? Certainly. In working with procurement, they have said that they like to keep the numbers of

[01:24:33] the participants on the evaluation team, about five to six, not any larger than that, because that's a lot of people to coordinate, because this is a time-intensive process for those members on that team. It is internal stakeholders.

[01:24:50] It's not parents. It's not students. It's not teachers. It would be folks from the Department of Student Services, so certainly myself, more than likely, Mr. Dolson would be a member of this team, because this... The Office of Student Services was the originating presenter of Policy 8040 back in 2021.

[01:25:10] We would want some school board representation and then possibly a representative from Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility. Thank you. And do I understand correctly that, as you said, if the process resulted in a recommendation from the evaluation team, would go to the full board does that mean that ultimately the full board would be voting on whether or not to assign that contract that is correct thank you

[01:25:48] Ms. Mansfield Ms. LaBelle do you have questions or comments when we first considered this when it was presented to us in February 15th my understanding of focus groups was that it could be any size it could target any population and it could take a very short time to an enormous amount of time and I also understood that there were a couple of companies that would provide this

[01:26:24] service for free seeing is how this has grown so enormously I can no longer longer support the use of focus groups in this way. So I move to rescind the directive of February 15, 2024 Student Services Committee meeting regarding the use of focus groups in collecting information in the matter of Policy 8040 and move forward with the revision of this policy through the collaboration of the members of

[01:26:59] the Student Services Committee and their LCPS assistance in two public work sessions prior to the May 16th meeting of this committee. I feel that we are all well-educated women, certainly capable.

[01:27:19] We have a lawyer, an educator, an activist. Certainly we are capable of doing the work that we were elected to do ourselves. Thank you. labelle i may need some guidance from staff on what i am allowed or required to do in light of a motion um being sought to be being presented in the new business section of the meeting um before we get to that uh i would like to i would like to say a couple of things in response

[01:27:59] i appreciate you sharing your your thoughts on where we are with this issue right now and i would like to say i had some reservations about the focus group idea when it first was suggested to the committee um not in not because i thought focus groups was a bad idea but because I wanted to know a lot more information about how the process would work

[01:28:34] and whether, why, I wanted more information about how the process would work and I was hoping to also gain some insight as to how it would enable us to collect the information that we feel we need as we go through this process.

[01:29:02] considering revisions for 80-40 or considering action with regard to 80-40. And that being said, as I have learned more in conversations with staff about how the procurement process works, I would prefer to at least see what proposals come back, as my understanding is that it would be possible that some companies or vendors may offer to do this for us for free or for not very much money.

[01:29:42] And I am very interested in learning from the vendors how they would envision the focus groups working and how they would plan to obtain opinions and insights from individuals who are vested in the outcome of these discussions.

[01:30:10] I also think that whether or not we go forward with focus groups, I think there are other tasks that this committee can do to continue the work that we're doing on this policy.

[01:30:30] And that has been my desire and intent, even assuming that we do, well, maybe I shouldn't assume, if we do go forward with focus groups and we go through the procurement process and we select a contract, if it's approved by the school board, I still plan to continue having conversations about it and working through this issue.

[01:30:57] I believe my biggest concern is the amount of time. As Ms. Richardson has pointed out, we've been working on 80-40 since 2021. We actually, when I thought about it in retrospect, have collected an enormous amount of data.

[01:31:18] We have videos of every public speaking session since then, including the ones of our own. we also have had multitudinous emails and letters from people. If we look back, if we take this and sort this data, we will find that we have information from parents, teachers, students, all the different cultural groups, all the different religious groups, they've all spoken and we have it recorded somewhere in this building. I'm really at the point where I don't feel like

[01:31:58] we need to spend months more trying to collect this data. I need to call a point of order for the committee because you made a motion. So Mrs. Donoghue asked a question.

[01:32:15] So she asked for a status update. Ms. LaBelle, you have made a motion. So you all have to pause. You need to take a vote to suspend the rules and you would need a two-thirds vote to say yes, we're going to suspend the rules to then consider the motion again.

[01:32:38] Thank you. That is the guidance I was looking for. Thank you, Ms. Richardson. Okay, so Ms. LaBelle has made a motion to rescind the... To suspend the rules before we can say that, I think. Ms. LaBelle has made a motion to rescind a prior directive of the board.

[01:32:58] In order to consider that motion, the committee would have to vote to suspend the rules. So is there a motion to suspend the rules? Ms. LaBelle. I move to suspend the rules. Is there a second? I will second the motion to suspend the rules.

[01:33:23] So we will vote on whether or not to suspend the rules. So all those in favor of suspending the rules, please raise your hand and say yes. Yes. Opposed? No.

[01:33:38] So that vote, or the motion to suspend the rules fails with myself and Ms. Mansfield voting against. Do we need to do anything else for this?

[01:33:59] No, there's nothing else to be done. There just can't be any more conversation about the motion. Okay. All right. Which I am sure we will do. Okay. well then with that we will adjourn. The next meeting for this committee will be May 16th, 2024. Thank you all for being here and for staying through the extra time that we took to talk about things and drive home safely.

----------------------------------------------------------------------
Coraggio Consulting · aguyonx.com