Coraggio Consulting
Manassas City School Board Meeting - April 29, 2025

Date: Tuesday, April 29, 2025
Place: Manassas City Public Schools / School Board meeting, Virginia
Length: 2h 9m (video)
Official meeting video (YouTube): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UKIzg2hppbU

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 2026-10-17. Timestamps are [HH:MM:SS] into the meeting video.

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[00:00:43] - Mrs. Garza, would you please call the roll? - Yes, ma'am. - Chair Seabird? - Here. - Vice Chair Spall? - Here. - Mrs. Stevens? - Mrs. Brescia? - Here. - Ms. Miles?

[00:00:58] - Present. - Ms. Brown? - Dr. Jones? - Here. - Ms. Flynn? - Here. - Ms. Breeden? - Here. - Thank you. Madam Chair, we have a forum. - Thank you. Dr. Casada, do we have any additions or deletions to the agenda tonight?

[00:01:15] - Yes, ma'am. We have an addition to the discussion agenda under Old Business School Board Operating Protocol. - Thank you. - Can I get a motion to approve the public meeting agenda as modified? - Chair, I move that the school board of the city of Manassas approve the public agenda meeting as modified.

[00:01:33] - Second. - I have a motion by Mrs. Stevens, seconded by Mrs. Brescia, that the school board of the city of Manassas approve the public meeting agenda as modified. Is there any discussion? All in favor, any opposed? The motion carries seven zero.

[00:01:50] Okay, superintendents announcements and spotlights. Mrs. Radford. - Good evening, thank you, Chair Seberg. Good evening to other members of the board and good evening to everyone that has joined us on tonight. I am excited to share just two spotlights with you tonight and they are from Osborne High School.

[00:02:11] So I have a little bit of assistance this evening. Maggie Connors is here tonight and she is the CTE, I'm sorry, department chair at Osborne and also the advisor to the SkillsUSA group.

[00:02:27] And so she's going to come tonight. I told her earlier that there's a list that is too many to name of some of the other things that she does at the school, but she's going to assist us with our presentations for tonight. All right.

[00:02:44] So we wanted to take a moment to recognize the time and dedication of our SkillsUSA members and advisors who put so much time into this organization this year. This Career and Technical Student Organization, or CTSO, exemplifies the talent and skills of our students across Osborne CTE programs, and we are proud of their hard work and representation of the school's programs.

[00:03:06] The students competed regionally and at the State Leadership Conference this year. Our students in criminal justice competed in traffic stop and crime scene. The training with their community partner advisors from the Manassas Police Department was invaluable. We'd like to thank Captain Petty and Officer Rodriguez for their commitment to our students.

[00:03:23] They have been immeasurable to these team members, and I just want to take a moment to thank them for dedicating so much to these students in our criminal justice program at Osborne. I would also like to thank Esteban Jordan, who is our criminal justice teacher, Chris Taylor, Eric Godwin, Tara Eason, all of our wonderful people, Osborne Administration, and everybody for their support of our students. This is a collective partnership of some amazing professionals that are always finding ways to support our students. So I would like to recognize our competitors. So students, when I say your name, please come to the front.

[00:04:02] I know that not all of us made it tonight, but if you're here, please join us. Josef Ferafino brought home the silver medal for criminal justice. Anaya Evans earned her second gold medal for photography.

[00:04:19] She is not here this evening. Jasmine Bowman, Mitzi Aguilar, Bricia Juarez, Haley Cortez, Ashley Fabian Flores, and Juliana Fuentes-Portillo all competed in crime scene investigation.

[00:04:42] Yuritza Martinez-Ramos competed in the job interview category. Yuretsi Zarazua challenged herself to tackle a prepared speech she wrote and memorized, ultimately earning herself a bronze medal.

[00:04:58] Anna Baruff undertook the Job Skills Demonstration A category, showing her panel of judges how fingerprinting is done by law enforcement. And finally, Gabriela Claros-Ferrofino and Tacey Rivas submitted entries for the T-shirt design competition.

[00:05:21] These students have all shown the determination and dedication required for SkillsUSA, and we thank them for continuing this organization's excellence at Osborne. And while I have them all here, we also want to congratulate our seniors who earned themselves cords for this organization by participating in it for at least two years and competing once at the state leadership conference.

[00:05:47] Those members are our President Jasmine, Vice President Suzette, Secretary Yuritza, and Treasurer Gabriela Claros-Ferrofino. Congratulations, ladies. Thank you so much for your dedication.

[00:07:17] Alright, I also get the honor of presenting our CyberPatriot group. The Osborne CyberPatriot team is an after-school program that teaches students the cyber security skills needed to defend computers and networks. The team meets weekly. Mr. Frederick funds the team registration fee and snacks for the students.

[00:07:35] Students learn hands-on system administration skills by configuring Windows and Linux virtual machines to protect against attacks. Students also learn how to configure Cisco switches and routers within a high fidelity network simulation. The CyberPatriot program is a national youth cyber defense competition run by the Air Force Association.

[00:07:54] There are over 3,000 teams across the United States teaching students about cybersecurity in a fun and competitive environment. The CyberPatriot team has three competitions held at the high school in October, November and December. The goal of the team is to teach students how to secure computer systems and explore cybersecurity as a career.

[00:08:14] The team is led by Mr. Dave Frederick, a retired Lockheed Martin engineer with over 30 years of engineering experience and 16 years of student mentoring. I want to take a moment to publicly thank Mr. Frederick for his unwavering support of not only the CyberPatriot team, but the robotics team as well.

[00:08:31] Mr. Frederick spends hours at Osborne High School with our students. He gives generously of his time and talents, and we are grateful for his support. Not only does he work with our students, but he also supports our new teachers serving as an SME. His talents and kindness are invaluable to our programs and school.

[00:08:47] We have the list. Yes, and so if my students could also come down as I call your names.

[00:09:04] We have Lucas Catema, Levette, all right. And then I have Levette Gaither, Dimas Gonzalez-Ramos, Gabriela Hernandez-Najaro, we have Rafaela

[00:09:36] Urquizo-Hurtado, and nevertheless, we cannot forget MJ. I'm so sorry. I couldn't read it.

[00:09:47] Congratulations. Thank you all. Thank you so much. And thank you so much, Mr. Fredericks.

[00:10:56] That concludes our spotlights for tonight, Chair. Thank you, Mrs. Radford. Before we go on, I want to acknowledge elected office in the room tonight, Mr. Tim DeMaria, Commissioner of the Revenue, and also MEA leadership is here tonight. Thank you for being here.

[00:11:30] Board committee reports, and I'll go to Mrs. Stevens for our report on the policy committee. Yeah, the policy committee met right before spring break on April 10th to look at the latest VSBA updates.

[00:11:46] We'll be going over those a little bit later this evening under the discussion agenda. Thank you. All right, up next is citizens' comments. At this time, we welcome citizens who wish to speak about services, policies, and affairs of the city of Manassas public schools.

[00:12:07] because we have an agenda we need to complete we ask that comments be limited to three minutes we appreciate the time you have taken to be here and we treat citizens comments as a public hearing and do not engage in conversation with speakers the lack of an immediate response to your comments should not be taken as a lack of interest or concern please be respectful when presenting your comments and up first I have Anna Demeria hi I'm Anna Demeria and I am the proud president of the Manassas Education Association.

[00:12:42] In the fall of 2022, during the MEAPAC endorsement interviews, Ms. Stevens told us that she supported collective bargaining but needed more information. Ms. Brescia gave a hard no. Ms. Spall said collective bargaining gives teachers a voice and that it goes hand in hand with the teacher revolution she believed was needed.

[00:12:59] Fall of 2024 and more endorsement interviews. Ms. Brown said she supported collective bargaining, as did Dr. Jones. Ms. Miles said she thought MCPS staff didn't need it, although she benefits from it in Prince William County. Ms. Seberg supported it, even saying she would like the idea of partnering with the MEA to fight for more funding for our schools.

[00:13:19] And when seeking local Democrat endorsements, Ms. Brown, Dr. Jones, and Ms. Seberg publicly and unequivocally said yes, they support collective bargaining. On February 4th, we, the MEA, voted to launch our campaign. We thought now was the time because we have five board members who said they support us, and we did not know who would be in charge of MCPS after the next election.

[00:13:42] On February 5th, out of courtesy and out of respect, I emailed Ms. Seberg and Dr. Newman to let them know, and that turns out was a mistake. On February 27th, at a school board work session, an infographic appeared. It implied that collective bargaining would strip programs from students, from our students, and it was an insult.

[00:14:03] As if we, the educators, who pour our souls into these kids every single day, would ever want them to lose access to fine arts, to sports, or to any opportunity. In March, we held one training to educate ourselves on the process. And then April 8th, this board spent $6,572 to ram through a resolution banning collective bargaining for MCPS employees.

[00:14:28] And let's be clear, we did not ask you for anything. We did not demand contracts. We did not demand raises. We didn't even ask you to allow collective bargaining. We simply wanted to educate ourselves and to start a conversation. But the moment you, the employers, were confronted with the idea of sharing power with your staff, you tried to silence us.

[00:14:52] You betrayed your employees. But we will not be silenced. This is about every educator who deserves a voice and every student who deserves educators who are treated with dignity, respect, and fairness. We are still here. We are not going anywhere. We will continue to fight because our students and our profession are worth it.

[00:15:16] Shaniqua Williams. Good evening. My name is Shaniqua Williams, and I reside in the Brentsville District, proud school counselor at Metz Middle School. Reflecting on the individual statements made following the premature vote to ban collective bargaining without first consulting the educators, this impacts, I feel compelled to speak out.

[00:15:44] Board Member Miles, you directly benefit from collective bargaining in your home district. Your voice is reflected in your teacher contract, yet here from the dais you voted to silence the employees of this district. You dismiss comparisons to other districts regarding salaries and resources yet had no issue using Loudoun County's process as a reference point to justify your stance that contradiction speaks volumes board member dr. Jones you stated as a school board member I don't even know what you all want and yet when community members

[00:16:20] and employees simply asked to allow the conversation to happen you voted to shut it down. This decision hindered the collaborative progress needed to ensure educators have a seat at the table regarding their working conditions. Board member Recia, I'm deeply concerned by your various statements. They were based on assumptions, lax citations, and served to craft a narrative that suited your perspective. Most concernably were your blatantly disrespectful remarks about students of color. You stated you have no desire to emulate Richmond City student

[00:16:59] achievement. So let me share with the public what that really means. Richmond City Schools are comprised of 85.5 students of color percent. Students who look like me, students who resemble over 75% of our school population. In comparison, Monassau City Public Schools has 90.4% students of color. By disparaging Richmond City students, you effectively made harmful generalizations about the students of color, their academic efforts, and though you mumbled your concerns, we heard you.

[00:17:35] Anyone that wants to listen, go to our three on the last school board meeting. You're an elected official, and your duty is to support all students, not to reinforce harmful and outdated stereotypes. Your remarks minimize the complexities of the challenges that our students face and dismiss their resilience and success.

[00:17:56] And if you won't hold yourself to a higher standard, will stand here to remind you that you vow to serve the students in this district so let your words reflect that responsibility furthermore I want to highlight at the last meeting 22 speakers voted support for collective bargaining while only three opposed it yet with overwhelming support this board again brought pre-written remarks and passed the resolution to silence voices and I'll send the last paragraph to you via email thank you Tammy Dehaven

[00:18:35] Tammy DeHaven. I'm a Manasseh City employee and a resident of Manasseh City. We asked for nothing. You were under no timeline, yet you spent over $6,000 to draft a resolution against what was literally a non-threat for at least a year. The public should know that. The public should also know that the data presented against collective bargaining was from one source, the legal group on retainer for Manasseh City, who is known for union busting and benefiting financially off of

[00:19:12] pitting school boards against its staff. If the public has been attending and paying attention, there's also a lot of talk about mediators. Y'all can't seem to get your stuff together. Who's going to foot that bill? What will that cost?

[00:19:28] And why can't you work together to do what you were elected to do? I do have a suggestion, though, for increasing transparency. I'm publicly requesting that the school board work sessions get posted publicly and that the public can hear them without needing to FOIA them.

[00:19:46] The projected cost is zero since you already record them. What's it hurt to post them on the website? I was pretty appalled when I got a letter on my work email asking me to beg the city, the city council, to fund me. It's interesting to see how many came out specifically to speak in support of that letter.

[00:20:04] Again, I'm being pitted against a funding body. I feel a need to remind you that it takes more than money to, and I quote from said letter, retain and recruit the high-quality educators our students deserve, especially amid rising costs and inflation.

[00:20:19] Guess what? It also takes communication. respect and trust. No amount of money will keep employees in a place where they're not respected for very long, especially if they can go elsewhere to get better pay and a say.

[00:20:37] I'm tired of the excuses. Our uniqueness as a district, whether it's size, purse, or demographics, is always used as a reason to do what you want or to remind naysayers why their suggestions won't work here because we're so unique. I'm tired of the comparing to others when it makes you look good, yet bashing them when it's convenient.

[00:21:06] - Jenny Higginbotham. - Good evening, everyone. I am being held together by Advil and decongestants, so I'm gonna try and power through this. I wanted to cover a couple of things that had been on my mind since our last meeting.

[00:21:25] I know we pride ourselves on being a data-driven school division, and if that's true, where was the data from the lawyer who knows about collective bargaining? That lawyer told Mr. Gefeller that we would need to hire someone for a payroll position. Why?

[00:21:41] It'd be the same as payroll now. You give a raise and payroll makes the paychecks happen. So I'm confused as to why that position was listed. I'm also confused about why there was no real school division given as an example of how the costs were figured. We make our students cite their references.

[00:21:58] Maybe our central office people should have to too. No one else signed up? Is there anybody else that wishes to speak

[00:22:11] during public comment?

[00:22:51] OK, so unlike I typically would, I do not have any prepared remarks. But I do feel like it's necessary for me to still speak.

[00:23:07] And my thoughts are going to sound very jumbled, because my thoughts are jumbled. I am a teacher in the city. I teach at Jenny Dean Elementary School, my gifted and talented teacher. I was hired in 2014 by Dr. Jones at Jenny Dean Elementary School.

[00:23:23] It's my seventh year serving with the division. I left for four years, and I came back. My husband is also a teacher from Monassah City Public Schools, and he has been for a long time. we live in the city we love the city any given day you'll see us out and about in the city we love the children in the city and that's why we don't leave the city it is extremely upsetting that this board found it necessary like everyone has already said before we'd we really hadn't even gotten the ball rolling and you preemptively banned collective bargaining

[00:24:00] You are the only school division in the state of Virginia that wrote a resolution to ban collective bargaining. We have board members who were going into our schools and speaking to teachers during their contract hours, belittling collective bargaining.

[00:24:17] You know exactly who you are. Okay, this is unprofessional and inappropriate. It's okay, baby. Okay, when I think of people like Cesar Chavez and I think of the women's suffrage movement, I guarantee that you hold these people in history in high regard.

[00:24:37] All they were doing, they were asking for a seat at the table, whether it was women asking for a right to vote so that their voices were heard, or rights for farm workers. Jill, you specifically said that because we are not, I forget the verbiage that you used, but a hard labor position that we don't need it.

[00:24:58] There are people who need it, but we don't need it. The majority of states in the United States do have it, and majority of the states who do well have it. And so I've pulled that data, and I'll send it to you, although I often hear absolutely nothing in response to the emails that I send.

[00:25:17] I spend hours and hours making sure that I find research. Thank you, Chair Seberg, for responding to my email. Thank you for pointing out my mistake. I do make mistakes and and it's only through honest conversations that we we get to what is true and what is not true I'm also extremely upset that this board came up with this idea of meet and confer well you didn't but sans Anderson your law firm did right the ones who are union busters the ones who have put on multiple presentations at the VSBA about collective bargaining and they're very literate was the word that confeller used in collective bargaining

[00:25:56] So on a side note, I don't know why they would need a separate lawyer, but you guys want a mediator. You don't even wanna be at the table for me and confer. - Thank you, Ms. Cook, you're welcome. - Dr. Newman doesn't wanna be at the table. You're gonna hire someone else because you refuse to sit and talk to your teachers.

[00:26:12] - Thank you. - And this is sad.

[00:26:29] - Can I get a motion for the consent agenda? - Chair, I move that the School Board of the City of Manassas approve the consent agenda as presented. - Second. - I have a motion by Mrs. Stevens, second by Mrs. Brescia, that the School Board of the City of Manassas approve the Consent Agenda as presented.

[00:26:49] Is there any discussion? All in favor? Any opposed? The motion carries 7-0. All right, first up on our discussion agenda tonight, from Finance and Operations, the FY25-26 Student Fees and Charges, Building Use Fees, Food Service Fees, and Charges Fee Waiver Policy.

[00:27:12] Dr. Casado will give us a brief mention of what this is all about. - All right, thank you, Chair Siebert, Vice Chair Spall, members of the board. The fees and charges for FY25-26 are posted in board docs and I'm happy to report that there are no changes in any student fees, including no change to the practice of providing free meals to all of our students.

[00:27:35] The only change in any fee that is in the attached document is about non-commercial use of the, I'm sorry, commercial use of the buildings paying for security. So that rate went up, the hourly rate went up 50 to 65 dollars for that and the rest nothing has changed since last year or since this year thank you any questions or comments from the board about one fee change mrs. Stephens um I just wanted to say I appreciate that the school division is still able to provide free breakfast and lunch for all our students

[00:28:10] I think it's quite important and as I speak to people in the community everyone agrees that providing our students with free meals is an excellent decision and and I hope we're able to continue it. - Thank you, anyone else?

[00:28:25] Okay, we will move along to our CTE update. And then we have Ms. Chris Taylor to present an update on the CTE programs.

[00:28:42] - Good evening Chair Seberg, Vice Chair Spall, members of the school board, and Dr. Casada. As you know, this is my favorite night, 'cause I know you love CTE as much as I do. So, I'm very happy to be here, and I'm happy to have the opportunity to talk to you a little bit about an update, some things that we've been working on, and supporting our students.

[00:29:21] You'll note that I am not tech savvy.

[00:29:56] Thanks for your patience. CTE strives very hard to reach every single pillar of our strategic plan. We do our very best to have inclusive and collaborative environments for each and every student in our care.

[00:30:13] We create a culture of caring, quality workforce, and strong family and community partnerships. CTE has a three-tiered approach here in Manasseh City Public Schools. We have an awareness in kindergarten through sixth grade where we look at our elementary and intermediate students and ensure that we connect them with guest speakers and field trips and career days.

[00:30:40] We talk about job shadowing through TIGBEE and I think I mentioned TIGBEE before but it is a phenomenal free resource for our students. We have family STEM nights and OHS CTE student speakers, which I'll talk a little bit more about later on.

[00:30:56] In seventh and eighth grade, we look to exploration for our students. Again, looking at guest speakers and field trips. Our career investigations course, which will now be mandatory starting the 25-26 school year, will allow students to explore all of the different pathways and different occupations and career paths that go with those.

[00:31:18] We also have Career and Conversation Day, which many of you have been to, which is pretty successful. And this year will, 25-26 score year will be our fifth year doing Career and Conversation. So we're very excited to partner with our legislative officials and our community on that.

[00:31:37] In grades 9 through 12, we work on preparation, so we know we need to prepare our students. They've had a chance to become more aware of careers, we've explored careers with them and options, and now we guide our students into possibly identifying a pathway that they feel they're connected to that they could have a passion for.

[00:31:57] We again have guest speakers, industry tours. We do quite a few industry tours. For example, this year our EMT students went to Micron to look at their emergency medical responses as well as at the airport. So we do try and think out of the box and we try and offer our students in all of our Pathways options to explore. We have CTE Expo Night, which I think most of you have been to as well, and interviews. We just had a very successful job fair with over 35 businesses. We had over 130 students who actually came with a resume

[00:32:32] ready for their first initial contact with a business partner. And actually exciting today, I had several students stop in and say, "Oh, I heard back. I'm so excited or Mrs. Taylor can you help us with our resume they want to see something else on this so it's been it's a really positive purposeful experience and we also heard a lot of positivity from the business partners who who were with us yesterday we have our career pathways and our CTSOs and I'll talk about those in a moment we have continued our women in trades lunch and learn and that's sponsored by Virginia tire and auto and this is the third year

[00:33:09] that we're doing that. And then of course our Career and Conversation Day. Every single student in Manassas City Public Schools is a CTE student. I love saying that. It is exciting. It's exciting, it's challenging, we engage, we support, and we do everything we can to help our students prior to graduation. And so I am very proud to say that in Manassas City Public Schools every single student is a CTE student and I know that not all divisions can say that but we can so for

[00:33:48] those of you that are new on the board I just went back just a little step and thought it would be helpful to share with you our programs and our career paths that we offer to our students so at Mets Middle School we have four different pathways we have business and information technology we have career investigations family and consumer sciences and technology education and Those are relatively new.

[00:34:12] This is our third year that we've continued with those programs, but when I first came, they didn't all exist. So I'm proud of that. I'm proud that we've been able to help our middle school students do that exploration. At the high school, we offer automotive technology, business, construction technology, cosmetology, commercial photo, criminal justice, engineering, health and medical, information technology, marketing, and teachers for tomorrow.

[00:34:45] Of those 11 pathways, we offer over 50 classes for students in CTE to choose from. Our CTE course components involve four areas, competency-based instruction, credential and dual enrollment, CTSOs, and work-based learning.

[00:35:13] Competency-based instruction, how do we get there? How do we ensure that each and every instructor we have in career and technical education is ready for the challenge? Subject matter experts, SMEs, that's my favorite word. We have SMEs come in and talk to our instructors.

[00:35:30] At the beginning of the year in August, we had over 30 business partners come in, work with our teachers, talk about industry standards. How have they changed? Where do our students need to be at graduation so that they are workforce ready?

[00:35:46] They talk about the technology changes that they've seen, the equipment needs, and how to engage students to be prepared for the workforce. We offer professional development to teachers throughout the school year, and that includes workshops and trainings. This year, we have focused on ELs and SPED support so that we're reaching each and every student in our classes.

[00:36:08] Industry tours, again, EMT, we went to Micron, but that's just one example. We have a lot of industry tours that we set up with our students and our teachers. It's so beneficial for our teachers to go out.

[00:36:24] Our auto tech teachers just went to Porsche and they took a group of students. So they came back all excited, right? But they also learned about new technology. They learned about the trade. And so any way that we can to support our teachers with industry tours so that they're at the cutting edge and our kids are ready, that gives them an edge as well.

[00:36:44] And then VDOE opportunities. We have opportunities often that the state gives us for teachers to come down and serve on an advisory panel for different competencies for different classes. For example, this year, Maggie Connor set in for commercial photography and Taja Robinson-Whitaker set in for cosmetology.

[00:37:07] I had to think for a minute. But they had to use their voice and they were able to work with other members around the state who also offer these programs in ways that we can adjust competencies, create new ones, revise old ones, and ensure that we're still at the top of our game here in Manassas. So I love it when our teachers get invited to go down and do those things. I want to take a minute and talk about our credentialing opportunities and our dual enrollment. So we offer 11 credentialing exams this year to students. These are aligned with a career pathway.

[00:37:44] These are approved by VDOE. VDOE sends a list. This year it was a little late, it came this spring, but they revised their pathway or their credentialing approved list with us and we use that list as guidance. These credentialing opportunities are supported by industry. For example, OSHA. OSHA 10 is well received by our construction companies in the field and some of our students have even gotten a raise up to two dollars for having their OSHA license and so we're excited about

[00:38:19] that and these credentials are also offered through a CTE class so students that are involved in a level two or above course we do not give credentialing exams on level one classes those are introductory and it's again still that little piece of exploratory and so when they get to level two is when we really hone in on on the credentialing exams dual enrollment opportunities we have EMT 1 & 2 we have automotive technology 1 2 & 3 teachers for tomorrow 1 & 2 business management and entrepreneurship and so we do offer

[00:38:58] options for students in CTE for dual enrollment our career technical student organizations you've probably heard the CTSO verbiage we have HOSA which is our Health Occupation Student Association, DECA which is our marketing students organization, FBLA is business, SkillsUSA as you heard tonight, wide range and is really open to all CTE programs, and robotics and so those offer students an opportunity for enrichment after the regular school day. Oftentimes a student

[00:39:35] will also experience some of the competencies and the goals of the student organization through their regular class. Work-based learning. I love pictures. They speak volumes. Look at the smiles on their faces. Look at how excited they are. Although I did have to pull a few smiles out of our students working on the shed. But you'll see some some great photos here of all of our students engaged throughout the city of Manassas. And so you can see our CNAs

[00:40:10] there we have our dental assistant up there who was went through the grow Manassas program and got her dental radiation certification last summer and thanks to mr. Godwin we were able to place her this year in a dental office our students who don't always have transportation we still want to offer them an opportunity to do work based learning and so you'll see the gentleman and miss Whitaker and miss Eason and mr. Weaver in front of the shed these students built a shed last year which we donated to our community garden and so we offer the experience right at the school building and then they were able

[00:40:48] to go over and help deliver that so exciting all right work based learning partnerships key to everything but I stand before you exceptionally proud of this percentage this year we are at 85% of the 2025 senior class to complete a high-quality work-based learning. This is no small feat. We have grown by leaps and bounds. I have a phenomenal team who I'll think a little bit down the road, but many of our students have engaged in at least one, if not two, high-quality

[00:41:26] work-based learning experiences. And in order for this to happen, business partners are absolutely critical to the success of the program. We would not have these numbers if it weren't support of our community. They're committed to our students, they engage in experiences, and invest in our future workforce. The businesses have built a partnership with us that are based on communication, trust, and goodwill, and it shows. We work very hard and we work well together to make sure that it's a win-win for both sides. And I do want to highlight our two

[00:42:04] students over here on my right. Miss Bland is a product of work-based learning. She completed all of her clinical hours this year for CNA. Yay! And Miss Breeden, who's had several internships with Manassas City and has grown by leaps and bounds.

[00:42:26] So congratulations to both of you young ladies. We're very proud of that. So work-based learning and growth. And so thanks to our work-based learning Coordinator Specialist Eric Godwin. You will see the numbers from 2022-23, 23-24, and 24-25. Three years ago we had a very soft start offering work-based learning at Osborne High School. We formalized that in year two and here you see year three. You'll notice currently we are

[00:43:05] projecting the following totals for high quality work-based learning. Now I say projecting, we are well on our way, but as Mr. Godwin completes 10 to 12 sheets of paper for every one of these students in work-based learning, they're still finishing up and getting loaded, but I feel very confident that I can share these with you.

[00:43:27] So we currently have over 230 students that have completed an internship. Over 60 students have completed clinical experience hours. Over 380 students have completed a school-based enterprise. School-based enterprise is our automotive program where you bring your car in or cosmetology.

[00:43:47] 450 students plus have completed service learning. This is a huge accomplishment. We hear from our business partners that our students need soft skills. They need to be ready for workplace readiness.

[00:44:03] They need to look you in the eye, shake your hand, be confident, ask questions when needed, and show that they're ready. All of these students are leaving our care in a much better position because we've been able to support them with those workplace readiness skills.

[00:44:22] It's a process, right? And we continue that process, and we continue to support our kids and believe in them. You will notice a shift in experiences as you're looking at the graph. There's fewer service learning experiences and a higher level of internships this year.

[00:44:39] That is due to our career strategies class this year for seniors. In the career strategies class, I'll talk about that in a second, but it's a different approach and so it's a lot more guided and it's a lot more purposeful in giving the students the support that they need.

[00:44:59] We do also offer, now the ones I mentioned are high quality work based learning experiences. The state does not recognize all work-based learning as high quality. And so I do want you to know that. We do offer mentoring and job shadowing.

[00:45:14] We realize how important that is. We continue to do it, but the state does not look at that as high quality. So students engaged in work-based learning. We have two young people at the Kuma Foundation, which is the Georgetown South computer lab.

[00:45:33] So we're excited about that. That's a new partnership this year. We have our adaptive students who are doing True by Hilton, and so they help with folding the sheets, making the beds, and vacuuming. And Eric Godwin got to go see them the other day, all smiles.

[00:45:51] So that's exciting. We also have some students working at Goodwill here in Manassas, and then a number of our students are out in the field in food service throughout Manassas City. So chances are pretty good if you see a young person when you're shopping and out in a they're one of ours so feel free to encourage them and give them a little bit of love and let them know how proud we are of them so return on investment our business partners support us in so many different ways and you'll notice that our scrubs are sponsored by four different businesses as well as our EMT

[00:46:28] shirts we have women in trade speakers who continuously come in each month and talk to a group of students who are interested in a possible career path. Just this past year we had the HVAC come in and talk to our students. We had over 40 students who signed up on their own to come and listen to a speaker. They were amazing. They asked phenomenal questions. They were invested in the equipment and they loved hearing about a typical day. What a salary is? What type of education do I need? We also have a lot of involvement in the city

[00:47:05] through our committees that we sit in on, from the Prince William Chamber Education and Workforce Committee to the City of Manassas Business Committee, and then just a wide range of other things. We do try our best to be a good partner.

[00:47:22] Each year we do our best to -- you'll see on the left there it says sustaining our partnership and growing together. We provide these for our business partners, and we talk a little bit about the impact that they've made on our students and how appreciative we are of those so those do go out each year we're getting better we started slow but we're really gaining speed on those so I know this year we're gonna get them all and then of course we have the job fair we also hosted a blood drive through our HOSA our Career Technical Student Organization and so we are grateful for

[00:47:58] all those partnerships but we couldn't do it without them we absolutely couldn't they're amazing. You would be so proud of each and every one of them. So some highlights. We got some squash growing. Our community garden over at Metz was extremely generous with the squash and the edamame this year. And so we were excited to share those with our students over at Metz. We worked with our family consumer sciences program and many of the students actually got to use them in the cooking classes. And so they were well received. This year I know that Ms. Eason has

[00:48:35] already been over and been planting especially with our adaptive students they've planted the little seedlings and they're taking off already so we're excited to have them there but our community garden continues to grow and flourish we have our leadership students who've gone over and they are ready to paint the shed this year and so we're looking forward to having that done by the end of the school year new this year with CTE ambassadors and many of you you may have stopped at one of the career days at one of our elementary schools or intermediate school we had our seniors in our career strategies class serve as

[00:49:11] CTE ambassadors and talk to students about a variety of different career paths each and every one created hands-on activities for the kids and so they were really excited I have hundreds of pictures but I just chose one of the cute ones and then career strategies and again I want to talk a little bit about it this is a new class this year we have nine sections of career strategies it is for seniors. Some of our seniors, well, let me back up a sec. So career strategies, quarter one, we have the students stay on site, work with the teacher, and work on soft skills.

[00:49:48] They create resumes, they practice interviewing, they dress for success. They also interview. Sometimes an employer will want to Zoom interview, and so we support them on some of those interviews right in the classroom with the teacher. And then quarter two and three, if students have secured a job and they're ready to go out into the workforce then they can work second and third quarter and then fourth quarter we bring them back home we talk about what they learned we talk about the gaps the strengths the challenges and we help them work through those and then they complete complete a mini capstone project on their experience and so just gathering all that up

[00:50:27] from top to bottom and ensuring that they're ready to go but it's been very successful this year and and we're looking forward to next year continuing that. CTE success stories. It was so perfect about a week and a half ago.

[00:50:43] Mr. Schmitke, some of you know him, he is our 34 plus year veteran engineering teacher, got a phone call out of the clear blue from a gentleman by the name of Michael Wenzinger, and Michael took his class and graduated way back in 2005.

[00:51:01] He wrote Mr. Schmitke a very nice email after the conversation, and I included some of it in here. I won't read it to you, I'll let you read that. But his class was the first time that he actually really tried to apply himself. And so that's exciting.

[00:51:18] Those are the wins that teachers get, not always right after the class, but 20 years later, he comes back to say, wow, you made such a difference. And not only did he say, you made such a difference in my life, how can I give back? So I have a list.

[00:51:33] We're gonna check. Daniel Lave, also UVA Health. He is one of our CNA students who never thought that this would be an option for him. And so I happily share his story that he got into a nurse aid program, was certified, and it became the opportunity of a lifetime.

[00:51:55] And so he now has a full-time job with UVA Health over right here on Liberia, no suddenly. And he plans to get a nursing degree and become a registered nurse. he will be the first one in his family to go to college. That's such a huge win.

[00:52:11] And on that note, I do want to publicly thank each and every one of our CTE teachers. They are incredible. I could not do what they do every day. They are so committed. They are tireless. They give. They give back. They support our students.

[00:52:26] They have those phone calls. They have the tough conversations. They give tough love when it's needed, right? But they keep 'em together, they keep 'em in the fold, and they make sure that every one of them in their classes is successful. All right, I'm almost done.

[00:52:42] What's ahead, right? Gotta talk about what's coming up. So, Ms. Spall won't be surprised to see the aviation career exploration as she's been a very staunch supporter of our relationship with Manassas Regional Airport. But next year, hopefully for the 25-26 school year, we will be implementing an aviation-focused work based learning for our students.

[00:53:07] So we're very, very excited to see where that leads us. We have a lot of meetings ahead of us. We're gonna sell it and I have no doubt that they'll be happy to answer with a yes. 3E framework, we know that the Virginia Board of Education is making some changes.

[00:53:22] Some of those changes will put some challenges in front of us for our work based learning, but we're ready for those and we'll spend some time this summer reorganizing and regrouping and continuing to do what's best for our kids. So we're excited about those.

[00:53:37] Pathway extension, one of the things that we're going to focus on this coming school year, in 25-26, is exploring pathways or offering students opportunities in pathways that we don't currently offer at the school. We offer 11 out of 17 pathways, we're at capacity, but we know that there's other interests that are out there.

[00:54:00] So things like the aviation career exploration, Things like bringing in HVAC, welding, electrical, some of those types of career paths that we don't offer in the building, but still opening up students' eyes to what the possibility could be.

[00:54:17] So our focus will be making a real concerted, purposeful effort in making sure that we have those opportunities for kids. Courses next year, we have two new courses. One is advanced coding, which we're very excited about. It's the second level coding class, and that'll be a great addition.

[00:54:35] The other one is more VDOE-driven, and they've requested a prerequisite for the architectural drawing class, which is called technical drawing. And so technical -- you're probably telling me to stop talking.

[00:54:52] Technical drawing is the prereq, and it's more of a foundation class, and then the second level would be architectural drawing. And so next year, all students will go right into the technical drawing class. And then where are they now? I really want to know where all of our kids are at.

[00:55:08] I want to know the impact. I want to know the challenges. I want to know how we can help them better. And so we will have a very focused effort in the 25-26 school year in collecting data. So once I came on board four years ago, or almost four years ago, I'm just a month or two shy here.

[00:55:25] It went fast. have been collecting data from our graduating seniors and so we will use that data with a Qualtrics program and our partnership here with our data folks here at central office to gather some information so that next year at this time I can tell you what our kids are doing where they're at we can follow them and so definitely is something I want to do for a while so I'm excited to have that on our plate and then last but not least our CTE team right the

[00:55:58] amazing Tara Eason and Eric Godwin and I just want to take a moment to thank both of them because without them they do all this work behind the scenes. Sometimes you see Eric Godwin but lots of times you do not see Tara Eason. Tara Eason flies under the radar and she works her tail off and she's amazing, absolutely amazing. She does our credentialing exams, she does all of the curriculum and development and ensuring that our teachers have the appropriate resources that they need. And she's a whiz at money, which I love. So I'm very, very grateful for Miss Eason

[00:56:36] over there. And a sincere appreciation for Mr. Godwin as well. When I say there's 10 to 12 pieces of paper for every single student in work-based learning, he has touched every single one of those. That's incredible. Absolutely incredible. And not only does he do that, but he goes out to make new business partnerships for us, and those two are the glue that keep me together, and so we can do all that we do. So a very sincere thank you to my team.

[00:57:03] But my last thank you actually goes to the school board, and I say this with genuine sincerity. Everywhere that we go, you're there. I see you everywhere. I see you at meetings. I see you at the job fair. I see you at today when we were out supporting our Special Olympics right everything we do is touched by the school board and I do want to say thank you your commitment sometimes I wonder how you keep up right every time I turn around it's posted on social media that you've been here here here and here right every time we've needed anything

[00:57:41] anytime I've come to any one of you you have been unbelievably supportive for what I do at the school and for our students. And so I do want to send a very heartfelt thank you for your tireless nights, for the time that you spent supporting our kids, but not only supporting our students, but just in general supporting CTE. I am so proud to be here in Manassas and have you by my side. I could go a lot of different places, right? I have a commute that is a beast. I spend about 15 hours a week in the car commuting but every day is worth it every

[00:58:19] day I know that this Monaster City Public Schools is a family I know it's not perfect but I can't thank you enough for being so supportive to get to perfect right yeah so I do want to say thank you and then of course I have a great boss and I have a great team at central office and I have just all goodness all the way around and so just truly truly grateful to be able to stand in front of you today and very humbled to have had this opportunity and at

[00:58:49] that I will stop thank you Miss Taylor thank you Tara Eason and thank you Eric Godwin you do make a great team and we're very proud of you we're very proud to support CTE are there any questions or comments from the board miss miles yeah I had a couple questions and I I had them listed and you answered a lot of them but as far as businesses go how would they be able to participate in the CTE program if they were looking at this and they're like oh we want to be a participant what would they need to do oh I love that question I hope they're

[00:59:26] listening so there are so many ways some of it is well I'll back up a little second I mean you're gonna encourage every single business partner to take a a risk and trust the process right take a risk and trust the process and so it's a big leap for businesses to host an intern right but we have over a hundred businesses this year that agreed to host an intern so we could do work based learning right internships guest speakers field trips we have a lot of business partners that offer to host field trips we have a lot of business

[01:00:04] partners who might be a little bit smaller here in the city and they've offered to do job shadowing. We have a career carousel coming up, which is focused on our students who have an IEP or 504 or in our adaptive program, and Mr. Godwin is organizing that this summer, so it's a two-day job shadowing and workplace readiness program, but we've had businesses come out and they're willing to be a guest speaker, get the kids excited, or host a little information session, or teach them how to shake hands, right? And so business partners, if If it's too much like time-wise, and they don't necessarily have it, we're always willing to accept donations, right?

[01:00:43] So we do have sponsors for Scrubs. We have sponsors for our Women in Trades Lunch and Learn. And so if there's a way that they feel they can give back to our community, maybe not with time or personnel, but they're willing to make a donation, we're always happy.

[01:00:59] We're always happy. And if you see, I left my email on there and my phone number. That's a great question. Okay, so you already talked about looking forward as to the other things that you want to offer in the fall. I wanted to ask another question about the list of businesses, because you mentioned we had 100.

[01:01:22] It would be great to see the list, you know, just so that we can kind of see, oh, wow, I didn't know that we partnered with them. We'd be happy to share that. I think that would be great. We can definitely do that. And that way, if you're out and about, too, and you could say thank you to them, that's a great little positive. Yes. That would be great, yeah. just want to say it was a great presentation thanks for presenting tonight and for all your hard work with our students to prepare them for the world after high school one thing I really love to see that we're adding the mandatory career investigations course I believe for seventh and eighth graders it's seventh and eighth grade so they have to take it once before they get to Osborne High School so they can either take it in seventh grade or eighth grade

[01:01:58] and that is the class where the academic and career plan will be done completed I love that and I think it's also awesome that we're connecting our students with area businesses we talked about but the one thing that stood out to me is how we're also offering training to teachers so they can provide CTE opportunities for our elves and also for our sped students and then the career strategies sounds like a wonderful program for our seniors like I loved how you talked about how we're working on soft skills first and then helping them find jobs I mean that's just so important and so I just wanted to

[01:02:35] make sure to mention those things thank you so much thanks thank you looking down to my right mrs. Stevens not a question but as I was listening to you speak I thought about when I was first elected to the board one of the big complaints of public education was that we're not preparing our students for lives after high school to be productive adults in society we're not teaching them those soft skills and what I've heard tonight says yes we are in fact really doing that and we're getting them ready to be productive members of society when they graduate whether they choose to go to college technical school or go straight

[01:03:11] to work so this is a very promising thing and I'm so glad you joined us four years ago because I think a difference is really being made now and I look forward to seeing as the program as the CTE program grows and develops over the years and what things can be added so thank you thank you to my left any questions I just want you to thank you so much for presenting tonight you know this is one of my love languages CTE um but you mentioned Grove and NASA's and I know what that is but I never get tired of hearing it and perhaps some others

[01:03:50] that may not have heard about Grove and NASA's may benefit from hearing it tonight so grow Manassas is a program that is funded through the city of Manassas and many of our students and staff have taken advantage of it if you live in the 20110 zip code they offer a wide range of certifications across the board some are career related others of them might be something that they could use to impact like for example a teacher could impact their current teaching by getting some additional experience or information with that and so like I

[01:04:27] mentioned our student last summer who got the dental x-ray and she did it on her own she was 16 years old and now we have her placed in a in a dental office but grow Manassas is if you check out the Northern Virginia Community College website please do we have actually worked very hard this about a year ago to add 30 additional items to that list and so we've been working with Patrick Small at the city as well as Dr. Lynch to expand the offerings and I think we will continue to work on those to add additional ones but there's quite a few options so definitely check it out it's well worth it and there's no charge for

[01:05:07] those thank you and one more thing I saw your numbers for mentorship or mentors and it's low. It is. Are there any plans to make that a little bit more robust? Do we need more ideas? I was a mentor in another district that had a very effective program, one that I enjoy, so I'm wondering. I think you might be volunteering, Miss Brown. I love mentoring, but yes. Interesting, actually Miss Brescia's husband is actually serving as a mentor to our students this

[01:05:44] year so a little bit of transparency about two years ago we tried a mentoring two three years ago I apologize three years ago we tried we started a mentoring program it was a big flop we didn't do it right we didn't we thought we had a great bones we thought we were ready to go but we learned a lot of lessons along the way so the next year we paused we regrouped we reorganized we got some training and then this year we started fresh we started again this year and so So the students that were -- that are currently as mentees were suggested by their counselor or a school teacher, one of the teachers at the school.

[01:06:23] And then we sat and we talked to them and we had a parent meeting and we had a student meeting to explain the program because parent involvement is important and we want to make sure that they're partners with us as well as parenting their child, right?

[01:06:41] And so this year has been still another year of growth. We have still learned a lot along the way. We have a number of our students who have moved away or transferred to adult ed or the alternative program or that sort of thing.

[01:06:58] And so we have lost some students. We've also lost some business partners. And I think mentoring is a commitment for both parties. And so we're still working through that, and I think this summer, as we do our planning and CTE creates their strategic plan that we want to focus on in our initiatives, that will definitely be at the table.

[01:07:21] Yeah. Thanks. Mrs. Brescia. Thank you so much for this presentation. I will say I've always appreciated your passion and your energy, how you always have a smile on your face, and now learning for the first time tonight that you commute 15 hours every week and you are still bringing that energy and still bringing that smile still bringing that passion it's incredible thank you so much uh for choosing us for all the places you could go for choosing us thank you so much for that um i want to offer a first a testimonial one of the early slides was about the stem nights those are a huge hit and my house we love them yeah and um the

[01:08:00] exposure is to uh various engineering type programs and you know the little micron dog that came in and visited Baldwin at one point my child has she's just taking it for granted that she will grow up and design robots one day like she's just like well that's obviously what we do here in Manassas we grow up and design robots so it's really the I can personally testify to the early education I did have some questions for slide 17 your what's a head slide so the aviation career exploration the aviation work-based learning is this with the airport itself or is it with airlines or contractors there?

[01:08:39] That's a great question. So we are reaching out to partners who either have some type of commitment to Manassas City Airport, the Manassas Regional Airport. And so if they have a, and if the word is going to escape me, what do you call them?

[01:08:57] Hangar. Thank you. I knew Eric would know. A hangar out at the airport. We're reaching out to everyone who has a hangar at the airport, But there's also some businesses that they connect with that are not present at the airport, but locally they're there.

[01:09:13] And so there's about 33 businesses that we are connecting with. So this is a shared partnership with Manassas City, Manassas Park, and Prince William. And so each of us have taken 11 of the businesses, and we're reaching out here in May to meet with them and reel them in.

[01:09:31] Go get them. The other so the other questions I had the pathway extensions You mentioned some great stuff getting kids exposed to you know the six pathways that we don't have but how Like how because we can't offer you we're at capacity So what I didn't fully understand what you what the vision was. Yeah, so one of the examples that we use this year as Boland came in and we would like to Increase the participation of businesses in our community that can support students in a pathway. We don't normally have or not normally But we don't have the capacity for so Bolin does HVAC

[01:10:10] We have a we had over 40 students attend that are interested in HVAC So we had them come in and speak they brought their vans the kids got to check them out And then they also came to like our job fair They'll also be there at Career and Conversation Day and so we want to increase exposure for students to engage in conversations with the different career paths that we don't have.

[01:10:34] Gotcha. So it's not so much like trying to offer any kind of class or anything like that. No. If we had an 18 year old, they could go into an apprenticeship program. So some of our seniors do turn 18 in the fall and in which case we could place them in an apprenticeship prior to graduation.

[01:10:50] Gotcha. Speaking of graduation, that was my third question for that slide. So collecting the data on what is happening with our kids after they graduate. So are we envisioning a survey? Is this a pull from the counselor's database in terms of who's going where? Like what kind of data are we talking about?

[01:11:06] So we're envisioning a survey sent out. We have a -- we purchase a program called Qualtrics through our Perkins grant to support data from businesses, schools, parents, students, the community.

[01:11:21] And we'll cull that data and use that to make some informed decisions. So I envision a survey being posted out for all of our stakeholders. And so we want to know where our students are, but we also want to know where our community is. Have you hired one of our kids?

[01:11:37] Are they still working there? What were the strengths that that child brought to the table? Those types of things. So I think those would all be really good things to know when we go to make future decisions. That's great. I love to hear that. I love data. We love data.

[01:11:52] school board so I can't wait to hear how that goes I'll say I did attend the career fair that you put on yesterday of course I saw you there and the feedback from the businesses was very positive and somebody did specifically say like we've got great eye contact and great handshakes great resumes and I really think that the courses that we've been offering have are really making a difference in our young people and maybe the no cell phone policy too but so I I want to put that testimony out there as well.

[01:12:22] Thank you so much. Thanks. Vice Chair Spall. Hi. I've got gobs of notes here. I'll see if I can read them. Number one, I just want to say how super proud I am of the aviation career exploration that we're working on. It's going to be a really cool thing to see it come to fruition.

[01:12:42] I love the work that the CTE Advisory Committee is doing and watching those ideas come to fruition. I love learning about the outcomes of the Perkins Grant and the ability to survey our students. I, myself, was a DECA officer in high school.

[01:13:00] I don't think you and I have ever talked about that before, but it made a profound impact on me. And it's one of my favorite subjects still. I want to make sure everybody heard, you know, that we are offering 11 of 17 VDOE pathways in our one tiny high school in the city.

[01:13:19] We have no one to share it with. It's just us, and we're making it happen. My favorite thing about tonight is that you're going to follow up with students. I know it's a huge extra thing to put on your plate, and I would have never asked you to do it, but I feel like it's really important to show current students where former students have landed because it makes success feel real and attainable.

[01:13:45] Alumni stories highlight the value of education and offer motivation, direction, and a clearer view of life beyond graduation. They also build pride and strengthen the connection between students and their community, our community. Thank you to the entire CTE department for both developing and then tracking or planning to track student outcomes.

[01:14:06] And I do have one tiny question, well, suggestion. Let's just leave it at suggestion. I've seen recently some pretty stellar use of QR codes. And I wonder if maybe you might be able to impress upon some of the teachers and students to use QR codes just to show us a snippet of life inside school while it's happening.

[01:14:30] Short, brief, but it could be really cool. So, oh, well, if it's part of maybe CTSO, we could figure something out. It's a cool little window that maybe we might be able to use. well I forgot about no so sorry thank you thank you for all you're doing and I'll close it out here I'm really glad you're doing the where are they now I know some students that might be able to contribute to that and something that the board talks about a lot is telling our story and we were at JM high school

[01:15:05] in Fredericksburg last year and they had small posters on the wall with QR codes that said you know check it out and it was like a video of a young man that had graduated JM and went on to get study business and open his restaurants and now he has several restaurants and he employs lots of JM students so I know things like that are happening but I would like to be able to tell our story better and sometimes that's through video sometimes just getting out there and I know that you're providing a lot of that information but thank you for

[01:15:44] doing the where are they now yeah okay all right I think that's it on to our next item on the agenda is facilities and maintenance now mrs spall had said her favorite thing tonight but mr helton hasn't even presented yet um mr russ helton director of facilities and maintenance will provide an update on the construction of the new jenny dean elementary school good evening everyone my name oh chair seberg vice chair spall members of the board

[01:16:23] dr cassada my name is russ helton i'm the director of facilities maintenance tonight I'm presenting the March report from our partnered construction management firm, Skanska. For the month from March, we've had a lot of activity. We're starting to see a lot of progress. We've had very good weather.

[01:16:39] If you were to visit the job site, you'll start seeing the building foundation coming out of the ground. We have lots of concrete and masonry. The trades are starting to come in on the backside of the school. We're starting to add sewer pipe and water piping for the main utilities.

[01:16:56] Things are moving forward, and we are tracking on time. Moving on, we have some pictures of building materials. We'll see some masonry and some concrete, machines that they use to mix and pour. You'll see some footers, and very exciting.

[01:17:15] Now we can see some things coming out of the ground. So as we move forward, we have good weather. We are going to continue to track on time. That concludes my update for the month of March. Any questions or comments from the board? I know we're getting these regularly now, but not down here.

[01:17:32] Thank you. Oh, Mrs. Spall. Yes, my favorite words are progress on time. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Helton. Our next item is policies, and I'll go to Mrs. Stevens, the chair of our policy committee, for that.

[01:17:55] Thank you. As I said, the policy committee met on April 10th to discuss model policy updates from the VSBA, the Virginia School Board Association. 31 policies were discussed. the majority had cross-references and/or legal citations updated, or the verbiage was changed slightly to be more in line with other policies. I did want to just point out a few policies.

[01:18:24] JECB, this policy is not new, but was updated and relates to admissions of non-public students for part-time enrollment in mcps there were two options mcps has adopted and that was not at this meeting but previously option one that authorizes part-time enrollment of students not attending mcps or who are homeschooled second one i wanted to discuss was originally a mo a policy that was modified for mcps it's bbb student representative to the school board it requires the superintendent

[01:19:02] to create a regulation to address procedures related to the appointment of student representatives. When the VSBA updated it, it now fell in line with our modified policy, so our policy will no longer be modified. And I wanted to draw a little bit of attention to a new policy that when you first hear of it, you kind of have a question or two in your head.

[01:19:26] JHDA-M, the M means it's modified, is a new policy to MCPS and it relates to human research. I know when you first think human research, your eyebrows might raise a little bit. Human research in the terms of surveys, analyses, and evaluations of students.

[01:19:43] And I highlighted what I need you to know if you're concerned about this, that such research will be conducted or authorized only after the student and the student's parents or legally authorized representative give their informed consent as evidenced by a sign and witness informed consent in accordance with Virginia code in addition all instructional materials including teacher manuals films tapes or other supplementary material which will be used in connection with any such survey analysis or evaluation will be available for inspection by

[01:20:18] the parents or guardians of the students involved so any kind of research that's done and this is research that involves evaluate may involve evaluating students completing surveys doing observations will not be conducted without specific parent consent and parents will have the opportunity to review any and all materials related to that research before the research starts and essentially that was the policies it's not as exciting as Miss Taylor's presentation was or mr. Helton's presentation was because policies are

[01:20:54] not very pictorial or interesting as we get into them. But if anyone has any questions? Seeing and hearing none. Thank you. You're welcome. Okay, now we have some unfinished business school board operating protocols. And we'll go to Mrs. Brescia, who is chair of the board development committee.

[01:21:17] Thank you. Let me find my paper. There's a lot of paper up here. Okay, nope, that's the wrong paper. oh my gosh where did it go there it is okay so we have had many meetings uh on this topic but i think we are able to i think we are we're very close i just wanted to the draft posted everybody has been able to read everyone will be able to offer their comments on it

[01:21:50] i do want to make one suggestion section four public comments protocols uh that we move the second paragraph individuals or groups may address the school board for longer than three minutes the section was developed way we did have a gentleman come who was interested in discussing you know uses of the old Dean building we didn't really have a place to put him I'm suggesting that we move this from section 4 to section 5 work sessions just a copy paste situation so that is and I've talked to most of you about that but I'm happy to answer any

[01:22:28] questions about it you have one nope you're good okay yeah i just this is okay this is my first time hearing this so i haven't been able to process it but um i thought that the work sessions were for different are we now saying that constituents can come and present to us on a regular basis on work sessions is that what we proposing if you have some kind of proposal or partnership to share like for example we had the example with the old dean building

[01:23:04] A gentleman had a non-profit that he wanted to partner with us to try to develop that into a CTE center. We didn't really have a way to give him that space. And so this is a way to give him that space. The original proposal was to put it in a regular meeting.

[01:23:23] But since we have reworked what is going where, individual school board members under this protocol, we are putting our presentations in the work session as well. And so the idea is that... Well, we haven't voted on that yet. No, we have not voted on it, and we'll have an opportunity to comment on that, too, if you'd like.

[01:23:41] But that is a suggestion just so we have any kind of movement, anything that requires processing, right? So if somebody comes, like, for example, yesterday I was at the career fair, and there were some people, proprietors of barbershops there.

[01:23:57] They wanted to talk to us about barbering, and they said, Is there a way that we can come give you some of the whole school board some ideas about how we can partner with you and barbering?" And I said, "Very soon, we might have an opportunity for you very soon."

[01:24:15] But I would see something where they would come develop their proposal, come to our work session, and if we decide to proceed, we can give the guidance to our staff members, Dr. Newman or whomever would be in charge of developing that partnership to then give us a later update in the context of a regular meeting similar to what would happen to any member-generated item.

[01:24:42] And it does say the superintendent has a discretion to determine whether a requested topic from an individual or group is relevant to Manassas City Public Schools. So, I like that. I'm just concerned that this work sessions are becoming a little bit of a burden Because now it's not just members, because we're not allowed to put things on the general agenda.

[01:25:08] So now we now have to compete with outside presenters to get our issues elevated or addressed. That's my concern, but I'll digress at this point.

[01:25:25] I understand you and I share very similar concerns about the balance between the regular meeting and the work session. And I would support having a later conversation on this topic, finding a way to broadcast or livestream or post what is happening in the work session, since we have changed a lot about what the work sessions are and what we're accomplishing there.

[01:25:46] You know, it's only fair to be clear, my eight pillars of trust, clear with people. So I would support that. And I don't, you know, I do want to find a way to hear from people, personally speaking just as myself, who are, you know, graduates of our old barber program and who want to try to get something new going.

[01:26:07] You know, I do want to make space for those folks and the gentleman with the foundation who wanted to come work with us on old Dean, right? Like, you know, I think that they're, you know, I am interested in doing that. I understand your concerns and respect. Yes, but I've been duly elected and I also need a space.

[01:26:24] And so I'm very concerned about all of these. But since we're proposing things, then if we are not to put things on the agenda, but just go through the work sessions, can that be a choice from any board member that they can choose whether or not they would like to elevate a concern or issue on a regular agenda?

[01:26:46] Or if they choose to work it through the work session, could that be a proposal or revision under this process? Since we're proposing new things. Yeah, of course. We're here discussing. It's a discussion time.

[01:27:01] So your discussion is welcome. So that it would be my choice, and I still will have some choice or some ability to bring up anything that I believe is important.

[01:27:19] So to clarify so that everybody understands the question, the proposal that's being forward, I want to make sure everyone understands, you would like the agenda section to, section three, the agenda section to reflect that it is up to the originating member to decide whether to discuss first a work session or first at a regular meeting.

[01:27:39] So that is the question. I can offer my thoughts, but I don't know. I want to give other board members an opportunity, or I can go. I can just keep talking. I would just say that because it's only a 15-minute, I believe 15 minutes that they get, that that wouldn't break away from what we're going to discuss.

[01:28:04] Perhaps we could discuss maybe having only two per meeting, that way it doesn't take away from our discussion so we put a cap on it you know so that way no one feels like their voice isn't heard that's a good idea dana um moving the public comments for anyone who would like to speak for more than three minutes and then miss brown's question um would

[01:28:43] this create additional burden for work sessions i think those are things we definitely need to think about I would like to think about them before making any decisions we've had many conversations about work sessions and about agendas and I feel like every time we have a meeting something new is added or a different option is proposed so I think those are things that need to be that I need to think on dr. Jones was first yes I just wanted to say I think we discussed last week that we would

[01:29:23] bring things the board to bring things to the work session I don't think it's appropriate to change that tonight so I mean if we're not going to go what we said I think we need to go back to the board but I think it's not a decision that you made abruptly for tonight and I also like Mrs. Miles suggestion that there'd be a limit or maybe you only have people come from the public on a certain every quarter or something but I do think I don't think that if we're making big changes I don't think that should be done tonight okay and it's just on for discussion tonight so we're just talking about it and miss Brescia you had

[01:30:02] something you wanted to say that was number one like this is we are this is for discussion and we can keep the draft as it is we can we're here discussing the proposal to, you know, cut and paste where public comment goes.

[01:30:18] I will say, and I want to, you know, say to my board members here, say to anyone in the public who has either watched the, who came to our work session or has since listened to it, I did make an error in not bringing this up then. I'm sorry that this was something new that the committee recommended.

[01:30:37] And I didn't draw the group's, it was written down. I didn't draw the group's attention to it, and that was my bad as a proctor. So I'm sorry for that, it's definitely no sneak attack intended, but here we are. I wanted to, in terms of, so I think it is, if the balance of the board has decided that things get their first, that substantive measures get their first hearing in a work session, that that's where the public, that that's where any presentations for partnerships would come in.

[01:31:12] So I support the cut and paste. i do have some hesitancy about giving a choice there just because i think that it's better to just pick one and perfect one version now i will say the instated for the record i said it in the work session but i'll say it here i do i am if on a personal level in favor of putting the substantive items on a regular mess meeting first and then moving it to a work session that's where we've spent all of our time where do things go first they go to the regular meeting first they go to of the work session first the balance of the board has decided its work session I personally if it was you know if I had if I had my own personal school board I

[01:31:51] would write it the other way but that's not how that goes and so that's how this draft came about and so I do plan to support it even though I do have some hesitancy about it and I hope that we can get I hope that we can get there Thank you. Vice Chair Spall? Yes. Would you like to go first?

[01:32:23] Well, I just want to say for the record that I cannot support the proposed protocols. Since I arrived in January, there was a lack of clarity, consistency, and procedural transparency. This is a fundamental violation of governance norms for any board member to be denied the ability to place an item on the regular agenda.

[01:32:46] The agenda is not the property of any one individual or subgroup or the power of four. It is a procedural tool through which this body fulfills public duties, deliberate, advocates, and takes action. I have questions as protocols.

[01:33:03] As I mentioned, they contain a significant amount of subjective language, which has resulted and continues to result in a lack of clarity. I offered refinements initially just to make sure that we could all read and understand what was being prescribed as the process for all board members to follow.

[01:33:23] I was told that the moral and right thing to do was to sign and adopt them as written. I disagree. My objection to the lack of clarity to these protocols and my proposed refinements have come at a personal cost in the form of a tax to my character and my intentions.

[01:33:41] But despite these tactics to deflect from the court, I would like to reiterate tonight that we are seven equal voting members, whether you're Latina, white, black, Democrat, independent, or Republican.

[01:33:57] Each one of us have a legal and ethical right to request that matters be placed on the regular agenda. And that right must be protected and safeguarded without procedural obstruction. So I would remain committed to upholding the principles of a fair process in equal representation.

[01:34:14] If the protocols are voted as is in May, and if these work sessions continue to be the only in principle vehicle for any board member to discuss or elevate matters for discussion, then I'm asking for us to consider and to make sure that we streamline these work sessions.

[01:34:32] We have a duty to be transparent with all constituents. Vice Chair. I just want to say that I sincerely appreciate the school board members of this committee for their dedication to reviewing and refining our operating protocols.

[01:34:49] Their leadership supports transparency, accountability, and student success, which is helping to move our district and community forward. I'm not prepared to discuss the changes tonight necessarily, although I'm liking the change to the draft.

[01:35:08] And I want it, I guess, on the record that I do support the work session idea. And I think that it would be nice to be able to give it a chance because it really is still very much in its infancy. Thank you. Thank you, Mrs. Spall.

[01:35:24] So, Mrs. Brezha, you will make the change. So this is, I'm glad you're asking. I was, because I was going to ask. So do I want to, so I can develop for our next meeting basic, because we discussed, so I can edit this if everybody is comfortable with the cut and paste I talked about from public comment to work session, but I wasn't clear that everybody was okay with that, so if that's okay, then I'll go ahead and do that, and I don't know

[01:36:01] how everyone felt about the limit to two speakers as well. Yeah, and I mean, really, this is just historical data I'm sharing. We have not had, this has not been used. it's not right it's not been it's been used once this year right shouldn't this go back to the committee that is working on this or we can we can put it back to the committee and then it goes on action well I'm just asking for procedural purposes because everything gets twisted here so I just trying to follow we proposed two changes tonight yes it appears that we have support for one

[01:36:38] change but one of the people on the committee has concerns so I'm not sure if this should go back to committee and then propose again or if this is just going to be pushed through a vote next month I agree with Miss Brown and and one of the things that she said was we need to ensure that our work set that we streamline our work sessions and ensure that they don't become too burdensome or what was the word how they to ensure that they don't become a burden and

[01:37:17] school board member initiatives would end up competing with outside sources so I would like to discuss that and I think it would be in my perspective a wise choice to bring this back to the committee and discuss that because we do need to make sure that number one work sessions do not become too bulky and burdensome and that our constituents members of the community the citizens of the City of Manassas have an opportunity if we're adding more to work sessions

[01:37:51] to access the work sessions even if they're not able to attend in person I love committee meetings we can have more we can have as many meetings that sounds good all right so this will be referred back to committee when you guys are ready to bring it forward again we'll we'll discuss it again thank you okay moving right along and let's see who board members comments and I'll go first to Ms. Bland. Good evening. I would like to remind everyone as testing season is

[01:38:31] approaching, stay calm and get enough sleep. It's important to keep a clear mind in order to excel and do well in areas you may need improvement on. Last Saturday I had the pleasure to volunteer at Baldwin Elementary for the Community Connections event. It was filled with learning opportunities, crafts, music, and sustainability. My favorite part was playing with the therapy dogs.

[01:38:54] overall the event was a great day of fun for all ages looking ahead prom is this Friday night I would just like to thank all the students staff and parents that are putting together this event as well as after prom if you have not bought your prom ticket upperclassmen please do so by Thursday and I have a quick of a couple of quick dates and reminders senior scholarship night is on May 20th

[01:39:25] at 6 30 p.m um actually let me backtrack rock fest is on may 3rd at 7 p.m if you want to join us in the auditorium for some good music um and then the senior trip to bush gardens is on may 21st and finally graduation is at eagle bank arena on may 29th at 2 p.m so make sure to come out for that and lastly i just have a quick little reminder teacher appreciation week is next week please

[01:40:00] take the time to think and show your appreciation for any teachers that may have made it a positive impact teachers truly do not get enough credit when i was in kindergarten i said i didn't want to be a teacher because i grew because when i grew up because they don't get any recess i think i was very ahead of my time with that comment teachers indeed never get a break and do so much more outside of school for their students than we may see so please thank a teacher next time you step in a school not just during a

[01:40:34] teacher appreciation week thank you thank you miss plan miss Breeden good evening I want to congratulate my the various peers who not only accomplished getting awards and medals in skills USA and I think it was the coding club but also the opportunity to get involved in the community, in the school community, and explore the enriching programs that our school has to offer. And the next I would like to highlight the Special Olympics that took place today, which I had the pleasure to participate in alongside

[01:41:13] countless other buddies, friends, staff, and volunteers, and family members. I want to shout out to all of them that made this possible. Osborne got to host it, and I also saw Dr. Jones and and Cherisee Berg there, but nonetheless, it was just a great event that got the whole community involved and provided a day for all the Monassah City Public School education classes to get together, have a good time, as well as spread the joy of sports and inclusion to everyone, as that is what our Monassah City Public students deserve.

[01:41:45] And then next, I would also like to recognize the job fair that took place yesterday and give a well-deserved highlight to our CCE and Work-Based Learning team who presented earlier, they did a great job, And as Ms. Taylor stated, over 35 businesses came to the annual job fair thanks to the communication done by our CTE team.

[01:42:05] They also ensure that internships and scholarships are readily available for all students. I also found it very encouraging hearing about the ways they can start supporting our EL and SPED students and get them in the programs as well. Because like I said, we need all students to be included in these different opportunities at our schools.

[01:42:24] It's a very important part of Manasseh City. And overall, it is just evident that the work-based learning team truly likes the work that they do, and they really work hard for the students at Manasseh City Public Schools. Not only are, not only the kids currently at Osborne, but they are also looking out for the rising generations of our students to come through our school systems.

[01:42:45] Mr. Godwin, Ms. Taylor, and Ms. Eason, so they truly love their job, and specifically our students. Thank you all for your dedication. That is all I have for tonight, thank you. - Awesome. And now I'll go to Dr. Jones.

[01:43:05] I want to say congratulations to all the SkillsUSA and CyberPatriot team awardees tonight. I hope you all enjoyed your spring break and I just wanted to share that I helped chaperone 37 students on an HBCU college tour during spring break and this time was rewarding because I saw students, many of them visited colleges and universities for the first time.

[01:43:25] One student was accepted and received a $20,000 scholarship to Clafton University and another student learned that he would be accepted into a college with a GED. So overall, students learn about possibilities beyond high school. And then to have Ms. Taylor come behind that today and tell us the great work that Osmond High School is doing with the CTE program, it's also a program that helps students grow and students benefit from the programs and the work skills that they're being taught.

[01:43:54] So we are doing many things that we can do in the community for our students, and I think we should just continue to do those. I started my teaching career in special education, so I was glad to see students and adult participation special Olympics today special thanks to all that helped plan and execute the day for our students and it was a perfect day although it was rained out a couple times also want to thank the leadership prince william 2025 for celebrating our community with connections this was a fun activity for the entire family and the garden dedication was part of this event on saturday at Baldwin elementary the gardens will provide great learning opportunities for students teacher appreciation

[01:44:32] week is Monday starting on Monday May 5th and it runs through Friday May 9th this is a perfect time for us to let our teachers know how much they are appreciated Becky Pringle NEA president wrote educators you are leading the way guiding and protecting nurturing and supporting our precious students all across the nation every day all day you provide our students with the tools they need to build a future that will help them live lives into into their wildest dreams this is a perfect time for students to write a thank you note and parents you can also write a thank you note also provide feedback to school administration about all those great teachers we have volunteer in the schools and even prepare a small snack

[01:45:11] for our teachers I wanted to personally thank all educators in our schools your work does not go unnoticed and our students benefit from your services on a daily basis and also may will be a very busy month so please take time to mark your calendars to make sure you don't miss any of those concerts showcases and the scholarship program and more so make make sure you have everything in your calendar as we are moving towards the end of the school year thank you thank you dr. Jones mrs. Brescia thank you so much so first I want to congratulate our

[01:45:45] spotlights skills USA and cyber patriots both of you I don't know the mouthful right cyber patriots you know both of these organizations I love the opportunities that our kids are able to have and to explore and most importantly and there is still one adult and there's still an adult in the room who mentors and works with those kids I mean all of you do obviously but you know to take volunteer time to do that really is incredible so I want to express my appreciation for that coming up I've there's a whole bunch that's coming up because we are here in the spring the governor's school research symposium is

[01:46:23] coming up on Friday from 8 a.m. to 11 a.m. at the Freedom Center so I can't I believe it's that time of year already, but go see what our kids have been working on. It's some really high-level stuff. Of course, first Friday here in our community, there is, I believe, a health expo at METS.

[01:46:38] That's going to be on Saturday from 9:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. Robotics open house Wednesday, May 7th from 5:00 to 7:00 p.m. Go check out our choir on either May 8th or 9th. May 8th at 6:50 p.m. has a special opening act from Hayden Elementary, so go check them out.

[01:46:58] May 8th and 9th at 7 p.m. at Osborne. The Manassas Reads Festival is coming up on Saturday, May 10th, 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. at the Harris Pavilion. And also, the Boys and Girls Club is having a fundraising golf tournament. So if you are interested in supporting the Boys and Girls Club, I have foursomes for sale.

[01:47:15] You can purchase those and go golf and support our kids. This organization does a lot of great things for Manassas City public school students, but also they are partially federally funded and they're a little worried about that too. So, if you have ever been thinking about your charitable contributions, I recommend that one.

[01:47:34] The -- since our last meeting, I had the pleasure of attending the Connections Community event hosted at Baldwin Governance Training in Charlottesville. We are -- we're -- we have developed a lot of these protocols, and also one of the things that we have talked about there is the percent of time that you use.

[01:47:52] And so, I do have the time. I've been timing everything, and I'm going to send a report out to everybody when -- for discussing student outcomes in particular and to try to maximize the time where you're talking specifically about student outcomes. We did, we had a governor's school board meeting.

[01:48:09] We had an immigrant and refugee student update meeting where we did tackle some I think really good and substantial issues about some accessibility and translation issues that were coming through the registration process. So I'm happy that we were able to bring those things to light and talk those things through and hopefully some things will really concretely change for our students who are accessing our school, who are needing to register and access schooling here.

[01:48:38] And of course, many of us went to the Rise Dinner too, so congratulations to our support staff who were honored there and the Osborne Career Fair yesterday. The final thing I want to mention is that four of us were able to go to a VSBA training on trust, and this is my, there are eight pillars of trust.

[01:48:54] I'm going to carry this around with me everywhere. I regret to inform you, I have a new thing. but I do think that there's a lot that we can learn particularly you know through this meeting we already were talking about clarity endeavoring to do that as much as possible so I'm I'm really feeling a lot of good forward momentum about where we are going as a governance team and that's all I wanted to say thank you thank you Mrs. Brescia Mrs. Stevens thank you I'm the liaison for the safe and healthy schools committee the committee met on the 24th of April and And while I was not able to attend, I would like to share some highlights or updates from

[01:49:33] the meeting. The first is the Health and Fitness Expo. The Health and Fitness Expo will be held on May 3rd at Mets Middle School. The purpose is to highlight portions of the health and PE curriculum for the community and to engage community partners who support MCPS and community partners whose mission is to support health and physical fitness.

[01:49:56] The next thing that was discussed was the parent E3 series program and Master Police Officer TJ Rodriguez, who's sitting in the very back of the room, presented information on the program. It is rooted in 21st century policing initiatives.

[01:50:14] Officer Rodriguez explained that the program was initially implemented through the help of a grant, but the program's success has led the MCPD to absorb the cost and maintain the program as part of its operating budget um some of the things that they have covered include uh hidden in plain sight how to identify um substances in your household in your child's room that may be dangerous harmful uh gangs internet safety human trafficking mental health youth violence and chronic absenteeism it has the partnership between mcpd and mcps has allowed

[01:50:54] for simultaneous translation in spanish so it's accessible to more community members the next e3 event will be september 2025 i don't know yet what it's going to be about but i do recommend attending they're very informative everyone i've attended i have learned something new that i haven't been able to use in my family life or when i wear my other hat as a teacher the next thing was presented by heather was nisky the clinical nurse coordinator about vaccine school located vaccine clinics the next school located vaccine clinic will be

[01:51:30] may 6th at osborne high school for rising 12th grade students the map clinic which is located the monassas park community center is offering appointments for mcps students on may 13th 2025 and the mcps community resource fair is scheduled for august 2nd and the plan is to offer some vaccines at that event with the assistance of the prince william county health department nurse gina bellamy provided us with legislative updates as far as legislation coming out of richmond is concerned and miss carroll the georgetown south community manager shared that

[01:52:09] community has significant needs for dentistry medication availability and optometry services they'll have a back to school night in the fall for residents and this may be an opportunity to provide community partner information and available services so if you know anyone or any organizations that can provide dentistry medication availability and optometry services please reach out to miss carol she would love to hear from you and then like miss breja i did attend the um sorry my brain stopped working there for a minute thank you sorry i have these in order and

[01:52:49] i changed the order i was going to speak so over the break i was able to travel to charlottesville where we did have the trust uh edge experience we learned that trust is the cornerstone of success and that successful organizations are built on trust and the greatest outcomes occur when there's a foundation of trust through discussion and self-reflection i learned that i still have a lot of work to do and that's my focus moving forward then last week i had the opportunity to attend the all city orchestra concert last week at osborne and i was sitting there watching

[01:53:23] the kids play and listening to it it was amazing they were incredible but all i could think was you you hear negative things being said about our school division. But what people aren't talking about are the amazing things our students are doing. The orchestra, Baldwin, Mayfield, Metz, Osborne, they were amazing.

[01:53:44] And one of the things that really impressed me was Mayfield and Baldwin Intermediate both have orchestra. They don't normally practice together. They had only practiced together once when both orchestras came together and played a piece as though they had been playing together forever.

[01:54:03] They'd only practiced that morning. So please, I encourage you to check out the orchestra event online. I'm sure you can find it on YouTube. And I really wanna thank Latoya Lamonts for Osborne High School. She has done a fabulous job of teaching and leading her musicians.

[01:54:20] And Mr. Reed and Mr. Stackhow, they've done a wonderful job as well at teaching and guiding our young students because many of those students at Mayfield and Baldwin going to be lifelong instrument players and the outlet that it gives them to be creative in a musical way is really quite amazing so if you have the opportunity look them up on YouTube it's a wonderful wonderful show and I walked away just so happy and proud of our students so thank you wonderful miss Brown good evening I would like to begin my comments again by congratulating the

[01:54:58] Osmore Skills USA and the Cyber Patriot team. Also congratulations Ms. Bland for completing your clinical hours. I'm so proud of you. And thank you again Ms. Taylor. Your work is wonderful.

[01:55:15] Thank you for everything that you do. And Mr. Russ, thank you for keeping us on time and on budget. We like that. And Mr. Masiak, congratulations on finally getting the Special Olympics three times a charm and I'm sorry that I had to miss it but thank you for doing that I know that takes a lot of great coordination so I appreciate it inclusion is one of my love languages that thank you so much for everything that you do I just I'm gonna be brief tonight I just want to say that it has been a very busy April and I'm just gonna highlight some of the events that

[01:55:53] I attended with my colleagues I attended the board training on April 9th but also after that training I had the great honor to attend an event at the Meredith House where Old Town Strong granted MCPS found education foundation a donation of fifty fifty four hundred dollars I just want to take a second here to thank them again for investing so much in our students it's greatly appreciated I also attended a leadership training with state Virginia Latino leaders on April 12th and believe it or not I was able to steal some time for my grandkids during

[01:56:32] spring break that was much needed rest so I hope our teachers also got some rest I right after spring break we attended the second immigration and refugee action committee and we conducted the student interviews which was delightful. Thank you to all the students who wanted to serve and came to be interviewed by Dr. Jones and I. Let's see I attended a work session on April

[01:57:09] 24th and also believe it or not I had the joy to attend Arbor Day on April 25th which was out of my work day so it was really great that I was able to steal some time from between doctor's appointments to do that I attended the community connections garden dedication of Baldwin on April 26 and just on Sunday I co-hosted a Hispanic children's day celebration along with councilwoman Yesi and Maya from Manassas Park where we were able to meet and greet about 80

[01:57:47] families and their children so that was a joy. I look forward to May and I look forward to celebrating all of our teachers. Thank you. Thank you Miss Brown. Miss Miles. Yes I have quite a few comments but first I just want to give congratulations to all our SkillsUSA participants who won medals and those who participated and I appreciate the law enforcement officers who are investing in the success of our students so thank you so much for that congratulations to our cyber patriot team for all their accomplishments I hope everyone had a great spring break my spring break was spent in Hawaii so I'm very thankful for

[01:58:24] that we saved up a lot of money to go there and my daughter and I were enjoyed it very much but I was also able to go to a lot of events oh right when I came back there were so many but I enjoyed every one of them first I went to the gifted and talented Advisory Committee meeting and it was actually the last one of this school year held at Baldwin intermediate and they talked about the gifted and talented at Osborne talked about their experiences and gifted over the course of the year the things that they enjoyed and one of the highlights

[01:59:02] I really enjoyed from the meeting was when METS students from the interdisciplinary research class presented their community outreach project buddy baskets they're actually collecting items to give to moms in need and they're actually going to be able to be presenting other project next month so stay tuned to that a few other things I learned from the GTAC meeting was Baldwin will be hosting a shark tank themed enrichment program for our gifted students for the rising third to the rising seventh graders in June transportation will be provided for that and students in the GT process if they're in the GT process right now who are found eligible will also be able

[01:59:38] to attend and last week I also was I also attended the staff rise awards congratulations to all our nominees and this year's winner Louis River and Wong I hope I spelled I pronounced that right a custodian custodial shift supervisor at Weems Elementary so congratulations to you for your hard work and it just goes without saying that as a school board and governance team I know we appreciate all you do we talk about our teachers and our admin but we would not be able to have our schools work the way they do without our paraprofessionals, our clerical administrative staff, custodians, food service workers, transportation staff, health and

[02:00:16] technical service professionals, and our skills trades employees. So they're very important. So I thought it was great that we recognized them with that award. I know that not all school districts do that, so I thought that was really great. The other thing that I got to attend was the all-district band and orchestra concerts, and I agree with Ms. Stevens when and she said how wonderful they sounded.

[02:00:38] My son actually plays a saxophone for Mayfield, and they played one song, but they played it so well, no one squeaked, and I remember playing my first band, and we squeaked, and I was a clarinet player, so just hearing how beautiful they sounded, and the orchestra, and the jazz band, oh my goodness.

[02:00:56] I look forward to hearing them again, but it was very encouraging to see that. And just a shout out to all our band and orchestra teachers and art teachers. was able to go to the art show we just have some talented students here and just just that I was looking at one art art project I was like oh my goodness I can't believe that's an elementary student so we just have a lot of talent and Saturday morning I was able to stop by the connections a celebration of our community held at Baldwin and I enjoyed talking to the Manassas therapy dogs booth that brings therapy dogs into schools I love dogs it was it was nice I think they had three of them there and they say they currently are at round

[02:01:35] elementary actually participates in this program and I'm hoping that one day we'll be able to get them at other schools I also stopped by the pink space theory booth and they were able to explain their program and they bring after-school enrichment stem programs to girls and that's another thing that I'm hoping that maybe one day we'll be able to add to our our list of after-school programs but I want to give a little information about our work session highlights last week at our work session I presented a proposal to the board of an idea of having town hall meetings I gave three different types of town hall meetings that have been used successfully in other school boards and

[02:02:14] the idea is going to be discussed further at an educational support committee meeting in May so we should hear more information about that but next week we are celebrating teacher appreciation week I want to encourage parents and students to thank a teacher next week whether it's a homemade card I get a lot of those as a second grade teacher a flower a gift anything I know everyone everyone here can think of one teacher maybe two maybe three that impacted them I know I can think of three my fourth grade teacher my fifth grade teacher and I know I remember their names so I know they're we have students that are impacted every day by the teachers that give their time their

[02:02:53] dedication to our students teachers have a life-changing impact on our students they are valuable I want to say thank you to all our teachers in Manassas City we value you value you excuse me whether the collective bargaining didn't go the way that you wanted it to go don't forget that we as a school board value you and behind every child who believes in themselves a teacher believed in them first and I believe that so some upcoming events to make you aware of of baldwin intermediate is sponsoring a shoe drive fundraiser all shoes will be donated to people in need and the school gets 40 cents per pound of shoes donated

[02:03:32] and to give you kind of an idea a bag of shoes is 25 shoes in a bag and for a bag it's 40 cents per pound so if you have shoes you're trying to get rid of bring them to baldwin they'll have a box outside of their door thank you thank you Mrs. Miles. Vice Chair Spall. Thank you chair. Number one, I just want to say how about the school board reps? They did a great job tonight. They do a great job every time and I'm really proud of them. Number two, I wanted to thank SkillsUSA, Cyber Patriot team. I could spend

[02:04:11] plenty of time talking about garden dedications and Arbor Day celebrations and governance training episodes but what I really want to discuss tonight I think is the budget and the vote that's coming up for our council as vice chair of the school board and as someone who deeply values the history and future of public education in our city I feel compelled to speak clearly about where we've been where we are and where I feel we must go with respect to our budget in the late 1990s, under the leadership of school board member Bob Oliver, whose daughter-in-law is a current

[02:04:49] teacher at Manassas City Public Schools, Manassas operated under a 56.7% revenue sharing model that reflected a strong commitment to our schools. That model shifted during 2008 recession to a 3% annual increase, not out of neglect, but as a temporary measure to weather one of the most challenging financial crises in modern history, yet today that temporary fix has become the norm and our schools now receive just over 40% of the city's general revenue, far below the 57% or more that neighboring districts invest in our children. The opportunity before the council to

[02:05:25] contribute an additional $1.7 million is more than a line item. It's a reflection of our community's values. I urge our elected leaders to vote with courage, clarity, and conviction to show that Manassas is ready to invest boldly in the success of every student we serve.

[02:05:44] I get a little disjointed here, but not long ago I spoke with a man, Mr. Lee, a retired teacher who shared a glimpse of his past, and when he started his career in Manassas in 1956, his salary was just $4,000 a year, but dinner only cost 50 cents and a haircut was a dollar.

[02:06:02] Times change, but some advice never does. As Mr. Lee and generations of Manassas City students have said, please go to school. It's the best time of your life. Consider this, five years ago, a starting teacher in Manassas earned $50,000. Today, that number has climbed past $59,000.

[02:06:20] My personal goal is to start at $70,000. I ask each of you how do we get there if not together. I would ask you guys to look for supporting our staff flyers that are available, neither the school board reps down front or at the table in the lobby.

[02:06:40] And I think I'm gonna leave it at that. Thank you. Thank you, Vice Chair. All right, I'm going to wrap it up here because we still have to go into closed session. I'm not going to repeat everything because we've all been all over the place, but I do hope that everyone had a safe, fun, and or restful spring break.

[02:07:00] Since the last meeting, I did attend the Finding Nemo play at Hayden, which was just delightful. And these third and fourth graders, they did a really good job with their stage presence, their acting, and their singing. Regarding professional development, it's very important to me to participate in the school board professional development opportunities whenever possible.

[02:07:20] And recently, some of us, as it's been mentioned, participated in the Trust Edge experience. And it was time well spent. I'd like to thank Mrs. Stevens, Mrs. Brescia, and Vice Chair Spall for their participation and dedication to board development. The All City Orchestra and Band got to go to both.

[02:07:37] Orchestra was lovely. Band, Dana, the Mayfield Band was spectacular. They did not sound like a fifth, sixth grade band. it was it was great um on the 21st attended the rise awards recognizing our recognizing inspiring school employees awards and that has been posted and all over the place and they're wonderful arbor day was a great beautiful day may is sure to be a busy month with teacher appreciation week end of the year activities and graduation if you are a parent of a senior stay tuned to the osborne

[02:08:15] class of 2025 page for more updates thank you to all that are sharing your support for full funding of Manassas City Public Schools the school board will have only one regular business meeting next month and it will be Tuesday May 13th and with that I conclude my comments and I'll ask for a motion to go into closed session chair I move that the school board of the city of Manassas enter closed session pursuant to exemptions from open meetings the lab by section 2.2-3711 part a paragraph 2 of the code of Virginia 1950 is amended for the following purpose. Discussion of candidates for the school board student representatives for the

[02:08:53] 25-26 school year. PERS 2425-23, PERS 2425-24, PERS 2425-25. Second. I have a motion by Mrs. Stevens, seconded by Mrs. Brescia that the school board of the city of Manassas enter a closed session pursuant to exemptions from open meetings allowed by section 2.2-3711 part a paragraph 2 of the code of Virginia 1950 is amended for the following purpose discussion of candidates for the school

[02:09:23] board student representatives for the 2025-2026 school year PERS 24 25 23 PERS 24 25 24 and PERS 24-25-25. Is there any discussion? All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Motion carries 7-0. We will head into closed session.

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