Coraggio Consulting
Prince William County School Board Meeting, Wednesday, February 15, 2023

Date: Wednesday, February 15, 2023
Place: Prince William County School Board, Virginia
Length: 1h 9m (video)
Official meeting video (YouTube): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xcbRyY156RY
Official School Board page (PWCS): https://www.pwcs.edu/about/school_board/

Machine transcript (speech-to-text) produced by Coraggio Consulting. Not an official county record. Names and numbers may be misspelled; check the video at the timestamp before quoting.
Speech-to-text: whisper.cpp, model large-v3-turbo. Produced 2026-11-04. Timestamps are [HH:MM:SS] into the meeting video.

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[00:00:00] - Okay, I'd like to call this meeting the Prince William County School Board to order. Pursuant to school board policy 139, school board member participation in meetings by electronic communications, school board member Diane Rawson will participate in this meeting through electronic means from her home due to a medical condition that prevents her physical attendance.

[00:00:18] The clerk will so note in the minutes of the meeting. A motion is in order for the approval of the meeting agenda, Ms. Wall. - Mr. Chairman. - I move that the Prince William County School Board approve the meeting agenda as recommended. - Do I have a second?

[00:00:35] - Mr. Chairman. - Ms. Zargarpur. - Please vote, or any discussion, please vote. Ms. Raulston, how do you vote? - Yes. - Ms. Raulston votes yes. It's not coming up.

[00:01:02] - Yes. - The vote is eight yes, unanimous. Motion passed. - Moving on to the motion to enter closed session. The motion's in order, Ms. Wall. - Mr. Chairman, I move that pursuant to Virginia code sections 2.2-3711 and 2.2-3712, the Prince William County School Board enter closed session for the following reasons.

[00:01:22] One, to discuss with staff the appointment transfer, release, assignment, and promotion of specific officers and employees under Virginia code sections 2.2-3711A1. Two, to discuss with division counsel and staff actual probable litigation on specific legal matters involving specific staff and students under Virginia code sections 2.2-3711A7 and eight.

[00:01:43] Three, to consult with staff and legal counsel regarding the legal requirements and procedures for collective bargaining by school board employees, which requires legal advice and guidance as provided by Virginia code sections 2.2-3711A8. And four, to discuss and receive briefings by staff members related to the security of school facilities, the safety of persons using such facilities, and actions taken to respond to such matters where discussion in an open meeting would jeopardize the security of such facilities pursuant to Virginia code sections 2.2-3711A19.

[00:02:13] - Do you have a second? - Mr. Chairman. - Ms. Zargarpur. - I second. - Any discussion? Please vote. Ms. Raulston, how do you vote? - Yes. - Ms. Raulston votes yes.

[00:02:35] It doesn't come up. - The vote is eight yes, motion passed. - Okay, excellent. So the Prince William County School Board will now enter closed session

[00:02:45] and return to open session in one hour.

[00:03:50] Okay, welcome back. We are now Prince William County School Board is now re-entering open session and a motion is in order. Ms. Wall. - Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I move that pursuant to Virginia code section 2.2-3712, the closed session of the Prince William County School Board meeting of February 15th, 2023, be certified by adopting the following resolution.

[00:04:18] Now, therefore, be it resolved that the Prince William County School Board hereby certifies that to the best of each member's knowledge, one, only public business matters lawfully exempted from open meeting requirements were discussed in the closed meeting to which this certification resolution applies. And two, only such public business matters as were identified in the motion convening the closed meeting were heard and discussed or considered by the school board.

[00:04:43] - Do I have a second? - Mr. Chairman. - Mr. Williams. - I second. - Any discussion? Please vote. - Ms. Raulston, how do you vote? - Yes. - Ms. Raulston, how do you vote?

[00:05:02] Yes, okay, there we go. - The vote is eight yes, unanimous. Motion passed. - Okay, moving on to closed session action items. Ms. Wall. - Mr. Chairman, I move that the Prince William County School Board approve the appointments and releases of specific employees as presented in closed session.

[00:05:21] - Do I have a second? - Mr. Chairman. - Ms. Zargarpur. - I second. - Any discussion, please vote. Ms. Raulston, how do you vote? - Yes. - Yeah, can we use someone to help her with the mic?

[00:05:44] - Yes. - Oh, great, we got it, thank you. That worked, Ms. Raulston. All right, back on. - The vote is eight yes, unanimous, motion passed. - Okay, moving on to our public hearing.

[00:05:59] I declare the public hearing, here we go. So we have to do a public hearing for the fiscal year 2024 proposed budget. So at this point, I declare the public hearing is now open on the subject of the superintendent's fiscal year 2024 proposed budget. Any citizen who signed up to speak on this subject may do so when called upon.

[00:06:16] - Mrs. Simpson, do we have any citizens signed up to speak on this matter this evening? - No, Mr. Chairman, we do not. - Okay, thank you. There being no citizens who've signed up to speak on this matter, I declare the public hearing closed. At this point, we'll move to the Pledge of Allegiance, and this will be led by Dr. McDade.

[00:06:51] Okay, thank you, Dr. McDade. We're moving on to Thriving Futures Focus, and this is, it's time for that, you know, one of the most enjoyable portions of our school board meetings, and that's launching Thriving Futures. We dedicate this time during our meetings to recognize students, staff members, or schools who have earned an honor or award at the state or national level.

[00:07:13] We appreciate how these honorees have positively represented Prince William County Public Schools and the school board is proud to recognize them publicly for their accomplishments. Tonight, we are excited to recognize our 2023 National Merit Scholarship Program semifinalists who both attend Osborne Park High School. Mrs. Lisa Zargarpur of the Coles Magisterial District will introduce our students.

[00:07:34] Mrs. Zargarpur. Thank you, Dr. Lateef. Congratulations, Osborne Park High School seniors Shiv Malavarapu and Hamza Sheikh for being named the 2023 National Merit Scholarship Program semifinalists. The National Merit Scholarship Corporation recognized 16,000 semifinalists nationwide in the 68th Annual National Merit Scholarship Program.

[00:08:04] Students entered the 2023 National Merit Scholarship Program taking the 2021 preliminary SAT National Merit Scholarship qualifying test which served as an initial screen of program entrance. The pool of semi-finalists represents less than 1% less than 1% of US high school seniors. Students named finalists compete for one of 2,500 National Merit $2,500 scholarships. Shivn could not make it here tonight but Humza is here tonight with his family and and principal Lisa Marie Cain.

[00:08:38] Hamza, would you like to come forward to say a few words? - I would like to thank the board for recognizing me tonight and my family and teachers for lifting me to this point, for I do not believe I would be able to reach this height without standing on the shoulders of giants.

[00:09:07] - Congratulations to our National Merit Scholarship program semifinalists and Hamza, if your family is here tonight, we ask that they please stand and be recognized as well. The Sheik family. And I think at this time we are gonna do the picture.

[00:09:24] Is that right? How about we'll do one at the end and we'll bring each one up separately. Yeah, yeah, we'll do that. Okay, so our next group of honorees represent both Colgan High School and the Governor's School at Innovation Park. So Ms. Zargarpur and Ms. Adele Jackson of the Brentsville Magisterial District will recognize our students beginning with Ms. Jackson.

[00:09:47] - All right, thank you, Dr. Lateef. A team of students representing Colgan High School and the Governor's School at Innovation Park, as well as the 2022 graduate have been awarded a patent by the United States Patent and Trademark Office For an app they created, Concussion Recovery and Youth Optimized Using Comprehensive App-Based Program was inspired after an older sibling of two of the students, Gabrielle and Salomon Ralston, sustained concussion injury while wrestling.

[00:10:15] The patent program consists of two integrated technologies, a cooling helmet and a mobile app, which can be deployed as soon as a concussion occurs. The helmet is uniquely engineered to deliver a selective cerebral hypothermia or brain cooling to limit the extent of brain injury and improve long-term cognitive outcomes.

[00:10:34] The application also provides subsequent care after the incident by prompting the student athlete to complete a self-assessment for a period of two weeks. The information can then be downloaded and shared with their healthcare provider.

[00:10:52] - Tony Bright, Hamza Lateef, and Gabriel Ralston, seniors at Colgan High School and the Governor's School at Innovation Park, and 2022 graduate Solomon Ralston make up the patented team. The students said they were inspired by their teacher, Mr. Shweka or Mr. C from the Governor's School at Innovation Park.

[00:11:12] The students are here with Mr. C, Dr. Tim Healy, principal of Colgan High School and Dr. Jason Calhoun, principal of the Governor's School at Innovation Park. Can a representative of your group please come forward to tell us a little bit more about your amazing patent and what is next for your team?

[00:11:30] - And each of you can say a couple words. - First, we'd like to thank The Governor's School, Innovation Park, specifically Mr. C. and Dr. Calhoun for their guidance. And then Colgan High School as well, specifically Dr. Healy, and then our parents for helping us through the entire process.

[00:11:46] We would also like to thank the Innovations class at Governor's School for providing us the opportunity to pursue our project. Without it, we wouldn't be able to do it. And also, we think this would be a great opportunity for students all over the county. And we're actually looking forward to improving our design of our project in the next couple of years, as well as we're also looking forward to actually putting it on the market.

[00:12:24] - See it on the script, but Dr. Calhoun, do you want to come up and say a few words? Mr. C? - Certainly we want to thank the school board and of all three school divisions that support Innovation Park. Our kids are amazing.

[00:12:39] Certainly these three are exemplars for a lot of the great work that we're doing and looking to apply the STEM innovations that they're doing in class. So thank you again for your time today. - And then Mr. C, can you say a few words about the innovation class that Mr. Bright talked about?

[00:12:57] Good evening. Thank you for the recognition. In innovation, the strength we get is from all the support we get from Dr. Calhoun, from everybody in the county. I remember very briefly, I remember three years ago I was here in front of this door and the surgeon told me, you need a parking lot? We can provide the parking lot. You need a car? We can provide a car.

[00:13:27] so the amount of support that we get for our class is enormous and thank you for everything. Okay, very good. Well, congratulations to our patented team. If your families are here, the Bright family and the Ralston family, please stand so you can be recognized as well.

[00:13:47] And then some words from Dr. McDade. Dr. McDade. Good evening. I'm so excited and want to extend and a heartfelt congratulations, first starting with our Colgan team, Armand, Tony, Gabriel, and even our graduate, our 2022 graduate, Solomon.

[00:14:11] I am just amazed to be able to witness that you've earned the US patent. Not too many students can say that, so we are so proud that you've done that here as students from Colgan and Innovation Park and representing PWCS so well. Also, thank you to you, Dr. Healy, as well, for not just being here to support the students, but supporting all of the work that they're doing while at Governor's School.

[00:14:35] Dr. Calhoun, Mr. C, thank you so much for all of your work with the students and your support. And of course, a special thank you to our parents for continuing to inspire and support our students' dreams and aspirations and all that you do to have gotten them to this point.

[00:14:51] Also, congratulations to our Osborne Park High School students, Shiv and Hamza. I know that Shiv couldn't be here. Hamza, thank you for being here so that we can honor you. I want to acknowledge our principal, Lisa Marie Kane from Osborne Park, who is here to support her students.

[00:15:07] So thank you so much for being here. A lot of what our students do cannot be possible without parents and also supportive administrators and teachers in the school that support their dreams and make sure that the programs exist for them to be able to achieve all that they possibly can achieve.

[00:15:24] So congratulations to each and every one of you. Thank you so much for your unwavering commitment from our staff. Congratulations. And we are, as I always say, PWCS proud.

[00:15:40] - I'll just add in, you know, just on to add to Dr. McDade's comments, our principals, and I've said this before when we do this, but you know, Dr. Healy, Lisa Marie Kane, Dr. Calhoun, you know, we really do appreciate the work. You know, I was talking to Dr. Healy out in the auditor, on the whatever, the atrium, you know, Prince William County Schools offers an incredible amount of opportunities for our students.

[00:16:04] And it's a lot like your phone, you know, you might only use 10% of what your phone has, but our school division does have enormous opportunities and our principals, our teachers, our staff are there to show the students, you know, how to take advantage of those opportunities. And there's so many great things here.

[00:16:21] And it's great principals like we have here in this room and great teachers and staff who allow the success to happen the way it does. And I can't thank all of them for all their great work. and I know the board is extremely appreciative for how much you all do to make our students achieve and succeed at such high levels.

[00:16:36] So at this time, we'll bring up Hamza first and we'll take a picture of the board

[00:16:40] and then we'll do the other students afterwards.

[00:19:49] Okay, thank you everyone for that. We will now move to adoption of the consent agenda. At this point, motion is in order on 12.01, the adoption of the consent agenda as well.

[00:20:05] Adoption of consent agenda. - Thank you, Dr. Lateef. I move that the Prince William County School Board approve the public meeting consent agenda as recommended. - Do you have a second? - Second. - Second, any discussion? Please vote.

[00:20:23] Ms. Raulston, how do you vote? - Yes. - Ms. Raulston votes yes. - The vote is seven yes, one no.

[00:20:38] Wall, motion passed. - Okay, moving on to 13, citizen comment time. At this time of citizen comment time, these citizens who've signed up in advance with the clerk may address the school board this evening when they're called to the podium.

[00:20:53] The citizen comment period for regular school board meetings in one hour and citizens may speak on the agenda items or on topics germane to the operations and policies of Prince William County schools. Please use proper decorum and manners while at the podium or you'll be asked to step aside. We ask that the audience please be respectful of each speaker and refrain from any clapping, cheering or jeering to avoid disruption of the meeting.

[00:21:11] If you do not do so, the board will recess and I will ask the room to be cleared to restore public order. Tonight we have six citizens signed up to speak. When I call your names, please come to the podium, state your name and address for the record and we will go ahead and get started. The first person is Andy Khoury.

[00:21:33] - My name is Andy Khoury and I live in the Gainesville District. Wait, should I get my speech? Oh, I'm in seventh grade at Borough Middle School and I live in the Gainesville District.

[00:21:51] I came to this meeting today to ask for your help preventing data centers from being built in schools and residential areas. Don't get me wrong, we need data centers, but they should go in industrialized areas, not in rural areas or near schools or houses. Plenty of land in Prince William County is zoned for industry. They already have all the water electrical infrastructure why don't we put them there also as i'm sure most of you already know data centers emit noise i even decided to do my science fair project about this i chose four data centers in loudon county to conduct my experience experiment on i found out that schools will experience 10.5 decimal levels more than they would experience if data centers are built at or less than 500 feet data centers will produce a significant amount of noise pollution that

[00:22:30] would be disruptive to students learning if they're allowed to be built as close to schools This will affect and disrupt the learning environment. We can't have this. A few weeks ago, I had a cold and put a humidifier beside my bed. It barely emitted any noise, but I still couldn't fall asleep. It was driving me crazy. This is what people and students will experience.

[00:22:47] Data centers will surround Chris Young, Tyler, Pace West, Gainesville High School and Middle School, Piney Brands and Bristol Run. Maybe more are planned, not yet made public. I can't imagine looking out of my classroom window and seeing buildings that look like prisons and hearing noise like a roaring jet engine data centers near schools harm principal and kids also i was fiddling around with ai today and i got to write this poem about data centers the first one is the quiet menace and rural lands where peace abounds a new threat rises from the ground with buzzing fans and whirring sounds data centers disturb the peace that found even ai knows that this is wrong

[00:23:23] please help us in the fight against data centers near schools thank you thank you kara kloss First of all, do you have my picture that I provided for you before my time starts?

[00:23:40] I'm sorry, Kara Kloss. I have Kara Kloss. Go ahead and restart the clock, please. Ms. Kloss. Good evening. My name is Kara Kloss.

[00:23:56] I live at 13580 Heritage Farms Drive in Gainesville. And I'm here tonight. That's my son. So he's a tough act to follow. But data centers have no business being built next to schools. It's as simple as that. the health and safety of our children is at stake.

[00:24:13] And I realized that the data center PR campaign was already here with their dog and pony show. And we saw this at the Board of County Supervisors, so there'll be money for schools from data centers. Have you seen data centers? Have you gone out to Loudoun County, even driving down here from Gainesville and Prince William County Parkway?

[00:24:33] They're largely windowless buildings, they're industrial, and they are proposed to be built near our schools. The Board of County Supervisors is going to hear the Devlin Project, which was heard last week. It's coming up again. It's been rescheduled for March 7th. That proposes to put data centers around three sides of Chris Young School.

[00:24:51] Once they put the chillers on the top, they're close to 100 feet tall, and proposing to put them as close as 100 feet. Think about that in a Major League Baseball game, 90 feet to first base. How close is that? Right now, also March 7th, the Board is going to hear the John Marshall Commons, which will we'll put data centers surrounding Tyler and Pace West.

[00:25:12] Okay, we already know about the decibels, which is just the sheer noise is a problem, but it is also the monotonal frequency. As my son said, like the humming of his humidifier, imagine the humming of your refrigerator, it doesn't stop and it's in the frequency that is best heard by human ears.

[00:25:28] Think about all of our children, especially those that need extra support, we're talking about Pace West, those with special needs. Thank you to board members Wall and Jackson sounding the alarm. This is happening primarily in the Gainesville and the Brentsville districts. Please, I'm here tonight to implore you, implore you to get involved for the health and safety of our children. I have one student at Battlefield and as my son that just spoke, he's at Bull Run. Those schools are not presently threatened, but I have heard so many stories, even just last week at the Board of County Supervisors, parents of students at Chris Young that are terrified

[00:26:04] what is about to happen to surround these schools with industrial facilities think about the construction and the noise and yes they do look like prisons is this the environment that we want our children playing in as i said the financial gain from this is even questionable based on a lot of the studies that have been done we don't know how much money is going to be gained but i assure you even if the school district ends up getting some money out of this it is a faustian bargain of unimaginable consequences and as i said i'm here tonight to absolutely implore you to get involved before this is it's a runaway train at this point at the board of county supervisors

[00:26:41] prince william county especially in the western part is is just a proliferation of data centers and it is harming our children in these schools please stop any construction of data centers near schools thank you thank you richard jesse my name is richard jesse my address is on file i want to first of all congratulate the pwea union for winning the election i do recall on

[00:27:19] november 15th i spoke about the fact that they were concerned if they could win the election and i told them at that time that you should be able to win this election if you get out there and fight and obviously they did so and i want to congratulate them i also want to talk about the potential new high school that's coming on the east we haven't had a new high school for about 45 years uh or a little longer in on the east and kogan was a model school we built the

[00:27:52] swimming pool we have a grand piano in the uh all the turret on there and i would like to say from an equity standpoint we should consider buildings not only as specialty programs but consider and i know money is tight but as i recall part of the funding for the pool and so forth was funded i believe part by parks and recreations and so forth so one suggestion for consideration and to look at

[00:28:24] is the possibility of an indoor track for this new high school as i understand not positive there is not an indoor track in the county and it's something that is needed i would also say that it would be useful if we start planning ahead and by that i also mean not only the staff but as i said many times the boundaries we should go ahead and start defining the boundaries now because people will base a lot of decision on that, and if you want input from the community,

[00:29:01] it should be input from the community that will be serviced by that school, and if we don't know what the boundaries are at this point, that's going to be hard to get. So, you know, I think the county is doing a good thing, and I think we will have a wonderful high school because I know Dr. McDade. It is going to be a good high school, but from an equity standpoint we need something besides just a regular football field and track there we need something special to balance out the equity from uh colgan with the swimming pool

[00:29:37] and as i understand the swimming pool was supposed to be self-sufficient as far as operating costs and hopefully with the same thing thank you carol fox carol fox from gainesville i want to go down memory lane briefly with you to remember the gentleman with white hair in the blue suit came here and talked many many times about the wonderful money that you're going to receive if you would just help pressure the board of supervisors to build those data centers down pageland gateway

[00:30:17] well before they approved that plan in december of 2020 they did approve a plan to build day four data centers almost exactly across the street from tyler elementary school and they also approved a plan at that same night to build data centers right across the street from those data centers just about a block away six more data centers and in the 2040 plan four more data centers are already planned to be built in that area right there so we have a total of 14 data centers that are going to be built right next to Tyler Elementary School and Pace West those data centers are right now under construction and I provided you a picture of them that show

[00:30:56] you that the picture and I was standing there at the sign of Tyler Elementary School you can see the construction site for the four that are right under construction. They have already torn down the bushes and things on the other site to begin construction there. So soon there will be 10 data centers there. Now what's going to happen, and I'm asking you, are you planning? You're going to have to start planning. You're going to have to start planning right now for the money that it's going to take for the noise attenuation that's going to be created by the huge air conditioners and things that are on top of these schools. It's estimated that the noise can be up to 86 decibels, which means that When the kids get off the buses, they're gonna have to have earmuffs on their ears

[00:31:34] to get into the school buildings. They will not be able to go outside the school building without ear protection on. What's this gonna do in Pace West, and how much money is it gonna cost you to put windows, new windows in, and new bufferings and things around the schools?

[00:31:49] Well, you gotta start planning. The estimated cost is somewhere around $20 million per school. You have two schools there, that's only $40 million of that $60 million they promised you on Pageland. So, and there's a total of 11 schools that could be affected by the whole build-out.

[00:32:06] The Virginia Department of Environmental Equality has found that this area will not have enough electricity to handle all these data centers, homes, businesses, schools, hospitals, et cetera. They will now allow the data centers to run their diesel-powered generators, zzz, extra, like more, like five or six of them at a time, huge ones, not little ones, for up to six months at a time to provide electricity for these data centers.

[00:32:31] so this is going to add air pollution more noise to this area that you're going to be responsible for in about two years you're going to have those first switches on of the first data centers those just think of that 60 million dollars and that extra money promised and remember that every dollar that you are spending for data attenuation and noise attenuation on the western end of the county will not go to that wonderful high school that mr jesse wants on the eastern end

[00:32:59] thank you so very much have a great night sam villa sam via 15522 exmoor court woodbridge as you're already probably aware the cdc last week added the covet vaccine to the recommendation for school requirements for children to attend public schools and as if history is any indicator

[00:33:36] school boards follow these recommendations to a t i'm here tonight to respectfully request that that you ignore this recommendation, and this is why. The myocarditis has been directly linked to mRNA vaccines in young males 18 and younger.

[00:33:54] And I did not find this on some obscure website. This is from the CDC. These vaccines are also linked to complications with young girls' menstrual cycles. And again, this is not from an obscure website.

[00:34:11] This is from the NIH. If these vaccines are having problems with, or creating issues with menstrual cycles, that means they're affecting hormones. And if they're affecting hormones, then we have to ask ourselves to what extent, and if that's the case, like are they having effects on reproductive systems or maybe potentially menopause later on in life?

[00:34:42] I would love to say no, they are not, that's impossible, but according to the NIH, we don't know. The American Academy of Pediatrics has stated that one, kids have a very difficult time contracting COVID, and two, even if they do get COVID, they have a 99.73% survival rate.

[00:35:02] Thank God for that. But it does not justify inoculating every single, or requiring every single child with this vaccine. And to top it all off, the inventor of the MRNA platform that made these vaccines possible, Dr. Robert Malone has stated time and again that these vaccines are not safe for children.

[00:35:25] They just have not been tested to the extent where it's justifiable that these vaccines, that these children should be inoculated. Now, maybe it's your staff that you're concerned about. And if that's the case, that's fine.

[00:35:42] I would imagine at this point your staff has, your teachers have already been mostly vaccinated. And if that's the case, they do not require a child to be vaccinated in order for their vaccine to work. Once you are inoculated, you are inoculated, no matter what anybody says.

[00:35:59] These experts are contradicting themselves. And until they get their stuff together, we really should refrain from vaccinating these children with this vaccine. The benefits do not outweigh the risks. Thank you so much for your time.

[00:36:16] - Joy Lynch, Joy Lynch.

[00:36:34] - All right, one more time, Joy Lynch. Okay, and she was gonna be the last speaker. So at this point, we will wrap up with citizen comment time and move on to 1401, which is the office of the Chief Operating Officer and Student Housing.

[00:36:51] This is on for action, Ms. Wall. - Dr. Lateef, I move that the Prince William County School Board approves the Rosemount-Lewis Elementary School Boundary Planning Committee's recommendation, commonly referred to as Plan 2, with the superintendent's suggested revisions to it as presented on February 1st and permits rising fifth grade students to remain at their currently assigned schools to which busing shall also be provided for school year 2023 through 2024.

[00:37:27] - Do I have a second? Ms. Jackson, she beat you. - I'm sorry, I have a second. - Ms. Jackson seconds and you want a third that Ms. Zargarpur? We'll give a third for Ms. Zargarpur. Okay, discussion folks, who would like to go first?

[00:37:44] - Ms. Zargarpur. - I just wanna thank all of the parents that worked really hard on the boundary committee and for the parents who met with me on this, outside of those times with their concerns, the parent liaisons who helped coordinate some of those meetings and make sure that we had all of our information correct.

[00:38:07] I really appreciate the time that everybody took. Dr. McDade, I also appreciate the time that we took to give that extra feedback because it was really important. And everyone in the division who did all the work on, you know, from the very inception of all of this to what we have today.

[00:38:24] So just being quick, thank you so much for all of your work. - Ms. Jackson. - I also want to echo the thanks to Dr. McDade and her team and to the boundary committee. I'm grateful that we were able to have additional time to consider the additional community feedback.

[00:38:39] And thanks to my board member, Zagrapoor, for meeting with people and to both board member, Wall and board members Zagrepoor who drove with me during separate times weeks apart to look at the community so we can have a better understanding at the map it is my hope that the community will remain engaged through the naming process which is coming soon and I want to just send my appreciation to a principal Stroud for everything she's done to prepare the school and I maintain mindfulness about the difficulties to procure supplies so I just again thank you to everybody miss wall thank you mr. chairman I want to

[00:39:17] also thank the committee volunteers for their hard work on this it did take a lot of time I know having sat on these committees before and you do it as a volunteer which is just greatly appreciated I also want to thank division staff who worked very hard on this entire process which has been a very long process also want to thank superintendent and dr. Brown and others who also provided some really valuable input as we work together to get a really good solution I I like what I see here I think it contributes to efficient transportation of students I think it balances enrollment very well it moves

[00:39:56] the fewest number of kids with an eye to future needs a plans ahead for where our future growth is expected to be we have a means to evaluate annually the enrollment trends through the CIP process to account for the possible addition of a new elementary school in the Yorkshire area in 2032 there are a number of reasons why I think we've come to a good, a good workable solution with the proposal.

[00:40:22] And so I will be supporting it. - Thank you, Ms. Wall. I will just, any other comments? Okay, I will just echo the process worked extremely well. I appreciate Dr. McDade weighing in with Dr. Brown.

[00:40:37] I think it was really important. I think the fact that you've put forward a plan, the committee, the board members, we have no citizens here speaking or any emails this week with any objections to this. I think that we have really taken this process to a place where the community is satisfied.

[00:40:59] And I think I'm fully gonna support this plan and I appreciate all the hard work that's gone into this. Thank you all. So please vote. Ms. Raulston, how do you vote? - Yes. - Ms. Raulston votes yes.

[00:41:22] - The vote is eight yes, unanimous, motion passed. - This time we have our student representative. Tonight we have Danya Sharifi from Gainesville High School, our senior, she will make comments. Danya. - Good evening to the school board, Prince William County community, students, and everyone else.

[00:41:38] As mentioned, I'm one of the student representatives for this county, and I'm happy to announce that soon the student representative applications will open around February 27th and run until April 2nd for this upcoming school year. Any student from Prince William County that's a rising junior or senior for the 2023 to 2024 school year is encouraged to apply.

[00:41:57] I know that it may seem intimidating and you may think that you aren't qualified, but trust me, it's been a learning process and you'll learn quick enough. You never know unless you try, so you might as well try and go apply. It's definitely a formative experience and I've enjoyed my past two years as student representatives.

[00:42:12] As well as students who aren't chosen as student representatives may be considered for an alternate representative or part of a student senate. And for those of you that don't know, the student senate is comprised of a high school senior from each of our Prince William County high schools. They meet together and do similar things to the student representatives and are really essential as well.

[00:42:30] I guarantee that there's no harm in applying and even if you get the chance to get considered for the student representative position as well. As for the application, you will be able to find it on the Prince William County School website along with around the school. The students' tenants are gonna post a few flyers to try and get the word out and please help get the word out if you can.

[00:42:47] We want as many students to be able to apply and have the opportunity to be the student voice for Prince William County. The application is online and once you make it past the online application, there will be interview with a panel of Prince William County school staff. Then you'll hear around June if you were selected.

[00:43:03] Again, I highly encourage anyone to apply and more information will be coming soon from the Office of Teaching and Learning. So remember, February 27th, it opens up. So definitely apply. If you have any questions or concerns, feel free to reach out. We would love to hear from you. Thank you and have a good rest of your night.

[00:43:20] - Thank you, Donya. Move on to superintendent's time, Dr. McDade. - Thank you, Mr. Chairman. This week, February 12th through 18th is National Random Acts of Kindness Week. And schools across our division are extending goodwill through a variety of learning activities.

[00:43:37] And I look forward to the creative and innovative ways our schools will spread kindness throughout the week. I also want to thank all stakeholders who have shared their opinions and perspectives on the fiscal year 2024 proposed budget and capital improvement program. Your contributions to our ongoing discussions are invaluable and we appreciate your input.

[00:43:58] A school board work session on the final markup on the budget will be conducted on March 8th. On March 15th, the school board will consider approval of both the 2024 budget and CIP during a public meeting. Upon approval, the budget will be forwarded to the Prince William County Board of Supervisors.

[00:44:17] More information on the budget and CIP timeline can be found on our website at pwcs.edu. With the board's vote on the the Rosemount Lewis Elementary School boundary plan tonight, we will continue to reach out to parents and guardians of students who may be impacted by this change.

[00:44:35] The procedure for the official school naming will begin shortly, and we will keep the public informed of this important process. As today is National School Resource Officer, or SRO, Appreciation Day, PWCS would like to acknowledge and thank our devoted SROs their commitment to our school safety and community well-being.

[00:44:59] Our memorandum of understanding with the Prince William County Police Department is a critical community collaboration. This agreement provides our schools with school resource officers who work in partnership with our schools to ensure the safety of our students and staff.

[00:45:16] As a reminder, we are inviting families and community members to attend one of our safety and security briefings to engage in our ongoing discussions about our comprehensive approach to what we call defer deter detect and defend including the use of new preventative technology the start time for all community sessions is 7 pm the dates and locations are as follows the first session will be held on february 22nd at gainesville high school the second session will be held on February 27th at Freedom High School and the third session will be on February

[00:45:53] 28th at Woodbridge High School. The division will also host a webinar on March 2nd for those who need a virtual option. I encourage all constituents interested in our current security measures and the potential use of the new screening technology to attend one of these informational sessions. The school division will use a variety of platforms to send reminders about these sessions so be on the lookout for emails texts look at our website social media as we will continue to share more information about these community engagement efforts in conclusion i

[00:46:29] would like to observe school board clerk appreciation week often overlooked our amazing clerks work wonders behind the scenes keeping us connected informed and on schedule on behalf of of myself and all of Prince William County Public Schools, I want to thank Bea, Anna, and Liliana for their unwavering fortitude in fulfilling our commitment to organizational coherence.

[00:46:53] Thank you. Mr. Chairman, that concludes my report.

[00:47:05] - All right. At this time, we will move to board matters. We'll start with Mr. Wilk. - That was quick, okay. I know, it's like a record. Thank you, Dr. Lateef. Thank you, Superintendent McDade.

[00:47:22] Just kind of a quick recap of what's happened in the last two weeks. So starting on February 3rd, Dr. McDade was gracious, attended a Potomac High School Blue Blood basketball game, a very fun event, victorious over Garfield.

[00:47:40] Mayor Derek Wood of Dumfries was also there. Dr. McDade took a photo with both teams. I did not, I took a photo with Potomac. So she did well, good job there. But thank you for attending, we really appreciate it. The day after, a really special event to me, many of you know my oldest son is moderate to severe in a self-contained autism classroom.

[00:48:03] And one of the great programs we have going for the last 10 years in our county is the Unified Sports Program, which is all about promoting inclusion with our special needs students. And of course, our general ed students participate in that event as well.

[00:48:18] And so the annual Unified Basketball Tournament, which had a number of our teams and a number of us attended. So some of you might comment too, but it was a great event. Congratulations to Potomac and Forest Park's unified team, the students, Kelly McCann at Forest Park for her devotion to this program.

[00:48:39] It's been phenomenal. On 2/6, I was able to visit Swans Creek Elementary, do some rounds with the acting principal there, visited some second grade classrooms and the gifted classroom. On the seventh, it was a big game.

[00:48:55] Forest Park played Potomac basically for the champion of the regular season in the Cardinal District. So congratulations, Forest Park. It was an exciting game. On the eighth, a really nice event. I'm encouraging more of our schools to do this.

[00:49:10] Potomac Shores had their first ever spelling bee at night. I thought that was a really neat event to be there and partake in that. You don't see it as often. I know it happens a lot during school days, but I really enjoyed that event. On the 11th, there were the VMEA District Honors Choir concert for the high school and middle school students.

[00:49:32] I want to thank the Laura Britton for inviting me to do the welcoming remarks for both the middle and high school and thank you, Ms. Wall and Ms. Zagapur for venturing out and supporting the students as well. Then finally, on Valentine's day, I was asked to come to Forest Park, didn't know what it was, but I got to be a part of the Valentine's day cupcake contest.

[00:49:55] So that was a lot of fun. The students competed in a contest for Valentine's day out of three teams and we picked the winner. Finally, congratulations to PWA on their resounding victory last Friday. And I also wanna mention and thank our SRO's chief Newsham.

[00:50:14] I've been a major supporter of them and I just can't thank them enough for what they've been doing in our schools. Thank you. - Ms. Zargarpur. Dr. Lateef, I wanna recognize that our cheerleaders from Colgan High School went to the national championship.

[00:50:29] They did not prevail, but I love that they represented Prince William County schools at the national competition. Yeah, the VMEA District 9 chorus concert was amazing. One of my favorite activities is watching all of these kids from all of our schools.

[00:50:46] I don't think people realize, they get their music, they have a very short time to practice and prepare and put on these amazing concerts. they get to work with great clinicians. They're fabulous events and I love going to those things. Wanna talk a little bit about what I was up to last week.

[00:51:01] Went with VSBA, that's the Virginia School Board Association. There were representatives from districts across the state going to basically lobby members of Congress on a number of issues. So we went there, we wanted to talk about IDEA, IDEA funding. That's where our special education funding comes from and the federal government doesn't fund a whole lot of it.

[00:51:20] We talked about what that would mean to us as a state and as a local community to be able to be funded better on those things. We did talk about how the universal lunch program was fantastic during the pandemic, and we would love support from that as well. We got a good long talk about mental health, both for students, our communities, our families, our employees.

[00:51:44] It's a big topic. So there are some things that Congress is considering. We'll just have to kind of keep our eyes out and see what they're looking at. I do believe it was Congresswoman Spamberger's office that talked about how she is looking at some grant money that school divisions and counties could use.

[00:52:02] So that's something to maybe look forward to. We did talk about the shortages of employees in terms of the teacher pipeline. We talked about shortage of bus drivers. There are some things legislatively they could do to help us get bus drivers and get their CDLs a little bit faster than what we do now.

[00:52:22] And I guess the last thing we kind of reminded them is how we're funded here in Virginia, that I think a lot of people are siloed in their own little efforts of what they think schools are, and we have to remind our elected officials, both on the national and on the state level, how we are funded, because the localities are well aware of it.

[00:52:41] want to also say thank you to all the SROs in our buildings I'm gonna have a meeting with Supervisor Vega and some constituents in the near future to talk a little bit about that I want to thank the parents at Yorkshire for inviting me in to talk about their concerns about the boundaries and oh yes and congratulations to PWEA on your fantastic votes that show that you are now going to represent our employees and collective bargaining I hope everybody has a great and fantastic rest of this wintry wintry month we're in here 70 degrees miss jackson

[00:53:18] all right thank you i also um want to thank students staff and families who support unified sports i was also able to attend the unified basketball tournament and it was the highlight of my week land usage is not within the purview of the school board however before the technology vote uh technology devlin park vote i did submit a letter to the pwc um supervisors asking to delay to vote until the impact on neighborhood and schools are known and to please consider revising their planning procedures to include the school division on projects that are adjacent to the

[00:53:53] schools and that would impact schools i also emailed the school division regarding the mention that chris young elementary is in the proffer for the proposal in preparation for the blasting in october the school board voted for collective bargaining and shortly thereafter the vote for pwa filed a request for certification and I also want to extend my congratulations to PWA it continues to be budget season and I want to take a moment and say thank you to those who came last week to the budget public meeting and extra thank you to members of the superintendent's team for all their hard work behind the scenes I know that it starts in the summer and I just

[00:54:31] appreciate all of the work that goes into it and all the answering of our questions that we submit. Thank you to school SROs and the service to our students. I appreciate everything that you do to keep our students and staff safe. It is board clerk appreciation week. The board office is essential. The school board members do not have individual staff but Miss Simpson, Miss Udata Tay, Miss Beckham work tirelessly and I could never summarize everything that they do between setting up for the meeting, managing board docs, answering questions, increasing accessibility to our constituents, managing our calendars and that's just a few of the things that you do so your service is

[00:55:10] invaluable and I appreciate all three of you very much and then last week with school counselor appreciation week and I know I've spoken to the vital role of school counselors and social workers before but I just want to end on this thought tonight like where would we be without them their role is expansive and fluid they're vital from providing classroom lessons mediators schedulers IEP team members, liaisons, community resource connectors to individuals who must quickly adjust and assess to meet the needs of the situation in front of them.

[00:55:42] So I just simply wanna say thank you. And I know that those words do not do their role justice, but I appreciate them and have a good night. - Ms. William. - Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I also want to say happy National SRO Day. I want to thank Chief Newsham and Dr. McDade for their continual work and progress towards safety in our school divisions.

[00:56:04] The MOU has evolved into a wonderful working agreement between the division and our police department. And as someone who's followed it consistently for years, I'm very proud of the direction that we are headed and the direction and where we are now. February is CTE month and I am so excited as a champion for CTE programs within our school division.

[00:56:25] We have so much going on. We have diverse programming and there's just something for everyone to choose from. Some upcoming events that pertain to CTE, we'll have a career fair on March 9th in Gainesville. There's an upcoming employment fair in April.

[00:56:42] Signing day, always my favorite, to celebrate our CTE students is in May, again for the third year in a row. And then we have our summer internships. If you are not aware of the diverse body of CTE programming that we have throughout our county, I highly suggest you take a look, it's amazing.

[00:56:58] I also want to give my congratulations to PWEA for all of the hard work that they put in to win the right to represent our two bargaining units in the upcoming collective bargaining process. And along with that, some events that I attended, I was able to attend a bingo night at Featherstone.

[00:57:18] If you've never been to an elementary school bingo night, I highly suggest you attend. It's fun for the entire family. In addition, those types of programming support additional projects within our school divisions. I also, with Mr. Wilk and Ms. Jackson and Ms. Wall, attended the Unified Basketball game.

[00:57:39] I had the pleasure of attending Titan One Night at both, for math, at both Marumsco and Featherstone, and I want to congratulate Featherstone on inviting in Innova to provide a presentation to their parents. It was the first time that they ever did that, and it's very rough when you start a new program.

[00:57:55] I also want to give a special shout out to the virtual school for their virtual zoology night. the theme of the night was animals finding a mate. I thought that that was really on point for February and it was a lot of fun for all of the elementary school families because we do still have virtual students and their programming is up to par with same as our in-person programming.

[00:58:17] In addition, some upcoming things we will have, this weekend I will be participating in an HBCU HSI Labor and Entrepreneur Fair. It is a community event. It will be held from 10:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. at the ANOVA campus in Woodbridge. It is targeting our minority students to try to provide some exposure on what life like is at an HBCU or what life could be like if you, excuse me, if you took a labor job.

[00:58:43] Other upcoming events are the Governor's School Meeting, which will happen tomorrow, Racial and Social Justice Commission also tomorrow. Dr. McDade touched on our community safety presentation, so I won't go over that again. And lastly, I just want to say, as we come to the end of Black History Month, I would encourage our public to review the state standards that are out for comment or about to be out for comment.

[00:59:05] It's important that we all learn our history and black history is American history. Thank you. - Ms. Jessie. - Thank you. First of all, I think I have a photo of Mrs. Martinez. Is that on the screen?

[00:59:22] Mrs. Martinez is the parent liaison person at Occoquan Elementary. And when I got to the end of my tour, I had three cups left, so I gave out three cups. And she was the first office person that I ever given this cup to.

[00:59:38] And Jessie Sholley, who's a fifth grade teacher, was the first male recipient of this cup. And third grade was Marsha, I'm sorry, Marsha Infante at third grade received the cup. I also attended, you can take that down, thank you. Isn't she beautiful?

[00:59:53] And I also attended a celebrity reader program at Occoquan. And you know, being a teacher and having, I love authors. I introduced them to Don and Audrey Wood, our husband and wife team who wrote "Hackety Peg" who broke her leg and I introduced them to the napping house and we had a good time with those students.

[01:00:13] Spring was had its nest celebration you know all these schools now have this celebration of the different houses and I was able to participate there they gave me a cape I didn't bring it tonight but I really enjoyed that celebration. Jenkins had a second awards second quarter awards celebration I attended that Woodbridge basketball team freedom one of course what I'm going to say there was a little guy I think he was number one this kid was really bad Lakeridge Orchestra there were so many kids in

[01:00:48] this orchestra that they actually had to have two two programs and the one we attended there were 125 students are in that particular celebration I want to congratulate them to PWA and to all the teachers in Prince William County and staff members and bus drivers and everyone my I extend my congratulations for your hard work earlier you don't comment on what people said citizens time but my husband said something that I think is really important because I know many of you were saying why do you guys want 50% of these people to participate and these numbers because

[01:01:28] now you can say that not only did you win but you have a large number of people who supported you. So I'm looking forward to working with you and working with the teachers. Thank you very much. That ends by, thank you, Mr. Chair. - Thank you, Ms. Jessie.

[01:01:43] Ms. Raulston. - I'm gonna pass. - Thank you, Ms. Raulston. - Thank you. - Okay, I will wrap up here. Oh, I'm sorry, I was doing that, Ms. Wall.

[01:01:59] - That's okay, no problem. I want to first of all, begin by thanking the school board, clerks office, Bea, Ana, and Liliana. We're not an easy bunch to support, you do a great job and we really appreciate it and you make us look awesome so we'll awesome some of the time at least if it's not awesome it's our fault not yours um and we have gifts for you in the boardroom so you can collect your gifts afterwards but we what the biggest thing we can say is just how much we appreciate you and we notice all the things that you do so thank you

[01:02:36] i also want to thank um the schools for their bright creative posters that decorate the boardroom that's very much appreciated it's a very colorful place right now in here second i want to thank all of those who show kindness to others it's national acts of kindness week those who show kindness without notice and without reward the kind of person you are becoming above all is extremely important and it is through those small consistent acts that we build character the greek phrase is bean by bean the sack is filled and that is true for building character and it is also true

[01:03:16] for mastering skills and knowledge in the classroom um today is um the school resource officer appreciation day as our superintendent mentioned so thank you to our sros for keeping us safe you provide a very valuable resource and i very much appreciate your service to the kids and the staff at the meeting on monday of the safe schools committee we took a close look at the ai technology that we're looking into and investigating for student safety and I strongly encourage my district to attend the meeting that will occur at Gainesville High School which is very close to where we are on the 22nd so that's next

[01:03:53] Wednesday at 7:00 p.m. I strongly encourage you to show up come out check out the things that we're looking into I really want to know what you think I really want to know your thoughts and I want everybody to be well informed also So this was a big week for the Bobcats.

[01:04:11] Congratulations to the Battlefield wrestling team. They are going on, they won regionals and they're going to states tomorrow. And the gymnastics team won districts and regionals and is going on to states on Friday.

[01:04:27] So good luck to both of those teams. The girls track team won districts and regionals are this Saturday. The girls swim team won regionals and states for dive are tomorrow and swim is Saturday. So if you know an athlete in one of those sports, please congratulate them on getting as far as they have and wish them good luck as they head into states and bring honor to themselves and also to Prince William County Schools.

[01:04:53] I want to highlight a couple of events and I guess I'm out of time actually. So have a great evening. You can have 30 seconds of my time. All right. So I'm going to go quick, folks. Thank you to our clerks, eloquently stated by Vice Chair Jen Wall.

[01:05:13] Thank you to our SROs for all the work they do for both real, keeping us really safe and also making us perceive that we're safe as well, which is very important and provides a peace of mind for all of our students and staff.

[01:05:28] The Unified Sports Program is always a great program. I think it's one of the greatest programs, the school division and our students participate and I continue to encourage and challenge all of our schools if they're not participating in Unified Sports to participate in it and do more sports and even consider maybe unified theater.

[01:05:50] You know, I'm gonna leave sort of last with the fact that we are in Black History Month. You know, my parents immigrated to this country. They were born in the late 1930s. They were probably 18 years old in 1948 or so. Came to America in the 60s, which was a fairly turbulent time.

[01:06:11] And, you know, and I was born in 72, and, you know, I came of age in the 1980s. And I think, you know, if you remember 1980s, and the reason I say this story, because when you talk about black history, right, it's history for not just America, it's the world history.

[01:06:29] So when you talk about, you know, in 1980, U2, U2, which is the band U2 from Ireland, came out with their song Pride in the Name of Love, which was their first top 40 hit in the U.S. It starts out with, and if you don't know this, but you should and you should look it up, but when Bono wrote it, he wrote, one man come in the name of love, one man he come and go, one man come he to justify, one man to overthrow.

[01:06:55] It was written really about Jesus, Martin Luther King, Malcolm X. And he wrote about them because like my parents and like I who was raised, you know, with immigrant parents, the idea of this country, and I'm going to read you something that Bono wrote. I know Jen Wall likes to, she's great with quotes and really like nice scholarly academic types. I'm going to go with you two tonight, okay? Bono wrote in 2012, he gave a speech at Georgetown University. Ireland's a great country, but it's not an idea. Great

[01:07:34] Britain's a great country, it's not an idea. That's how we see you around the world. As one of the greatest ideas in human history right up there with the renaissance right up there with crop rotations and the beatles white album the idea that the idea the american idea that you and me are created equal and god love you for it because these aren't just american ideas anymore there's no copyright on them you brought them into the world these truths your truths they're

[01:08:08] self-evident in us and you know and i say that because we are in prince william county the 10th most diverse county in the country um we have students and families that hail from all parts of the world and so when we talk about black history or we talk about hispanic or latino history or latinx history or who's ever history or women's history the history it is the history of the planet because we lead the planet and that's how the rest of the world looks at us and so I just encourage everyone to you know realize that the history that we have is in our

[01:08:42] arts in our music it's in our students work you should see their work in in everything you do it's in our curriculum and it's there because you know this is what we as Americans have always believed in which is why people come from every corner of this earth and they die to get into this country literally they die to get into this country so I'll leave you with all that this this evening, have a wonderful evening, have a great week, thank you.

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