001thank you miss jackson at this point i'd like to call the meeting in the prince william county school board order pursuant to school board policy 139 school board member participation meetings by electronic communication school board member diane ralston will participate in this meeting through electronic means from her home due to a medical condition that prevents her physical attendance the clerk will show note in the minutes of the meeting the motions in order for the approval of the closed session agenda miss jackson i moved to the prince william county school board to prove the closed session agenda is recommended dover second i second william's second any discussion please vote miss ralston how do you vote yes mr also votes yes the vote is eight yes unanimous motion passed moving on to the motion enter closed session
002emotions on our miss jackson um i move that pursuant virginia code section 2.2 3711 and 2.2-3712 the prince william county school board under closed session for the following reasons one to discuss with staff the appointment transfer release assignment and promotion of specific employees and officers and employees under virginia code 2.2-37-11-a-1 two did this consult with division council patoning to actual probable litigation involving employment and educational matters as divided by virginia code section 2.2-37-11 a 1 2 and 7. 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 that's provided by virginia code 2.2-3711a and 8 and four to consult with division council and staff regarding the retention of legal counsel for collective bargaining issues under virginia code two
003point two three seven eleven a eight you have a second mr chairman williams any discussion please vote ms ralston how do you vote yes ms ross yes the vote is yes unanimous message county school board now enter closed session return open session at seven o'clock [Music] okay good evening everyone um the prince william county school board is now returning to open session from closed session and so emotions in order miss jackson i moved at pursuant virginia code 2.2-37-12 the closed session of the prince william county school board meeting of may 18 2022 be certified by adopting the following resolution now therefore be it result that the prince william county school board hereby certifies the best of each member's knowledge one only public business matters lawfully exempted from open meeting requirements were discussed in the closed
004meeting to which the 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 do you have a second mr chairman williams any discussion please vote miss ralston how do you vote yes mr also votes yes okay the vote is eight yes unanimous motion moving on to the closed session action items 8.01 a motion is in order miss jackson i move that the princeton county school board approved the appointments and releases of specific employees as presented in closed session do you have a second mr chairman miss williams second any discussion please vote miss ralston how do you vote yes ms ralston votes yes the vote is yes unanimous motion next 7.02 emotions in order for retention
005of outside counsel miss jackson thank you dr dutif i move that the prince william county school board authorized the division council to retain the services of eric paltell of coleman and saucier pa to provide the school board and superintendent with legal guidance and advice regarding collective bargaining you have a second mr chairman mrs williams second any discussion please vote miss ralston how do you vote yeah miss ross miss ralston votes yes that's fine yeah yeah um yes the vote is eight yes unanimous motion passed all right so now next to the most exciting moments of this evening and uh you heard a lot of activity out in the atrium and i'm very excited to do our launching thriving futures this is one of the favorite parts of the meetings uh over the last few months
006and and something that the community is really looking forward to tonight i would like to thank our school board student representatives first who and if you saw us earlier we were taking pictures with them up front our school board representatives have served the prince william county student body extremely well this year donya sharifi from gainesville high school charlotte flynn from woodbridge high school who is a senior i would also like to recognize our alternate michelette sarah fell from hilton high school thank you all for your dedication to this role and your representation of our students the school board has already provided them a small gift and as a side note our student reps will be giving all three of them will be speaking during student matters this evening and we really look forward to hearing
007from them and i think each of the board members may have some things to say about them at that point um and next i'd like to introduce lisa zargaport the representative from the kohl's magisterial district to recognize and we have a number of recognitions tonight so the first recognition is going to be of our forensics champion ms zargaport take it away thank you dr latif it is my honor to recognize ashley clyde a senior at osborne park high school who won first place at the virginia high school league state forensic championship in the original oratory forensics a program under the vhsl academic section is a challenging performance competition in which students engage in debate or formal augmentation the original oratory category is persuasive speech that is well researched has limited quotations and is memorized with
008an average length of 10 minutes ashley has competed in forensics since she was since she was a high school freshman and has advanced to the state competition level every year she also serves as president and captain of the osborne park high speech and debate team for two years congratulations ashley ashley would you like to say a few words i would so excuse me firstly i would like to say thank you for this recognition award without the help of prince william county teachers staff and students specifically from gravely elementary marsteller middle school and now currently osborne park senior high has allowed me to thrive and be able to speak and stand in front of you all today being the only prince william county school to represent in the vhsl state forensics tournament this year was an
009honor taking on the leadership role as president and captain of speech and debate have translated beyond the halls of osborne park high school and as an entertainment journalist youth salute leader and also a political activist because of the opportunities provided by this county i am proud to say i have committed to university on scholarship where my future will always be bright with the education and experiences of pwcs thank you [Applause] congratulations again miss clyde we're very proud of you and thank you for everything um next we're going to move on to recognize our science fair recognitions mr agapor thank you dr district thank you dr latif and i have to say it's such an honor to have so many brilliant minds in this space and it's it's just thrilling we have several science fair standouts
010from the kohl's magisterial district tony bright armand latif and gabriel ralston students at both colgan high school and the governor's school at innovation park took first place in their category and won the grand prize at the 2022 virginia state science and engineering fair their project concussion recovery in youth optimized using a comprehensive app-based program also earned a third award and cash prize in the regeneron international science and engineering fair rania latif a student at colgan high school took first place in the state fair state science fair with her project dozing off with oh boy this is where i need help uh joseph drosophila drosophila thank you dozing off with drosophila the effect of disrupted circadian rhythms and disturbed sleep on mortality mood and addiction in fruit flies this project also earned rania an air force
011research laboratory first award and cash prize in the international science fair additionally rania earned a scholarship to attend the nc state engineering summer camp jedesola akinbi and comfort oh i don't i'm so sorry i want to make sure i say these names students both at osborne park high school and the governor's school innovation park earned first place in the science state science fair for a study on biofuel production production investing methods to enhance fermentation in the production of bioethanol their project advanced to the international competition gabriella lacour and anisha rama kishnan students at osmond park high school and the governor's school innovation park alana moreno at a manassas park student attending the governor's school at innovation park won first place at the state science fair for creating novel bacteriophage solutions as a preventative measure of
012esche kira coli biofilm formation on elastomer biomaterials and medically relevant settings in vitro their project also advanced to the international competition congratulations to these outstanding students colgan principal timmy dr tim healey governor school principal dr jason calhoun and osborne park principal lisa marie kane miss williams and while i have the opportunity as chair of the governor's school of innovation park i would also like to extend congratulations from the governor's school board thank you thank you miss williams but wait there is more it's my pleasure to introduce jen wall from the gainesville magisterial district this wall thank you dr latif it is my pleasure to share some positive science fair news about ebru ah ayorgan a student at battlefield high school hebrew won first place in the state science fair with a novel visualization tool application
013to rna sequence classification ebruce project also won fourth award and a cash prize at the international science fair so congratulations ibra and battlefield principal ryan ferreira thank you mrs wall we also have a science fair winner in the brunsville magisterial district mrs jackson will share more good evening naaman agarwal a student at both patriot high school and the governor's school at innovation park won first place in the state science fair with a low-cost deep learning solution for early detection of lettuce stress and indoor farms his project also advanced to the international competition congratulations naaman a patriot high school dr bishop and governor's school principal dr jason calhoun thank you miss jackson mr wilk represented the potomac district will tell us a little bit more about our final science fair winner mr wilk thank you mr
014chairman i'm pleased to introduce to you to desmond boykin a student i originally met when he was a sixth grader at grand park middle school he is now a student at forest park high school and the governor's school of innovation park and he has quite a record of achievements as he has always had desmond won the grand prize at the regeneron biotechnology award at the 2022 national american indian science and engineering fair his project the effect of casein polymers on the filtration of heavy metals and contaminants in well water advanced to the international science fair he won a fourth award and a cash prize congratulations desmond and forest park principal rich martinez as well as dr calhoun of the governor's school all right congratulations to our science fair winners this is the first time first
015time in the history of the school division that our high school students have placed at the international science fair this is a huge deal we've had middle school participants actually placed there but this is the very first time prince william county and not only do we place once we placed four times as you've heard and won a couple special awards i would like to thank julia renberg our supervisor for science and family life education i'd like to ask curtis a few words on behalf of these award-winning students miss julia renberg good evening and thank you for giving me this opportunity to share a few short remarks tonight first i would like to acknowledge the substantial support prince william county public schools provides to students who engage in high quality scientific research and pursue academic excellence
016far beyond classroom walls we doubled the number of projects representing our division at the state science fair and now we tripled from two to six the number of projects qualified to complete the international event in itself such a tremendous increase in participation is worthy of recognition and celebration but to have five first place um and a great press winner at the state event and then to bring home from the international competition not one but three category awards coupled with two special awards this is truly outstanding and i would agree with the chairman it is a historic moment i want to wrap up by also expressing my deepest gratitude to teachers mentors school fair coordinators administrators principals and my own small team and not to forget the families of this young scientist for their unwavering support
017and dedication and to all of these young people behind me i want to say congratulations job well done thank you ms renberg your work commitment to continuous improvement dedication to our student success has put prince william county schools on the map for science education and a commitment to competition that we have never seen before and i think everyone is going to be looking at the prince william county students from here on out whether it's a regional fair state fair or a international affair i can't thank you enough and i i have to say a couple things you know we've we've had athletes come through here over the last few months and recognizing our tremendous athletes many of you know athletes practice day and night and they they they've been doing it since they were young
018they have traveled they have you know different leagues rec leagues and and they've been committed and and you don't get to achieve at that level unless you've been working on it for quite some time i have to thank our teachers our mentors starting from elementary school on up through middle school and high school our principals who are here who've taken their time out of their evening to come here and celebrate this with us in in in not just for sports you know these students also have practiced and worked hard at this from different levels and and you don't achieve at these levels unless you've been doing this for a while and so i congratulate all of you i congratulate the families who put a lot of time and commitment into this i know the students
019had a great time in atlanta that's where the science fair was they got to to mix with students from around the world and truly around the world i don't know how many it was about 70 or 80 countries participated they got to see the coca-cola factory too or the um the museum there and cnn and some other things um i will um those are conclude my remarks on this i think at this point the school board will come down and the science fair winners will come and take a picture and then we'll be done with our science for winners and we'll move on to robotics so if the science fair winners can come up and we can have the school board come down for a picture and dr mcdade sharks um here's the first one
020ready one two three another one one two three great thank you [Applause] again congratulations to all of you and thank you to our amazing principals for your work and and some of our principles will be sticking around because we have some more great recognitions um and and i know some of the students have to leave they have ap exams coming up and final exams so thank you all for coming um we are now moving on it's now my pleasure to turn the microphone back over to mrs lisa's argipur to begin our recognition of those robotics teams earning an award at the vex world's competition mrs argapoor thank you mr chairman the sharkbots of colgan high school are the vex robotics championship high school team divisional finalists in the division in the research division this team
021has been competing together for the past three years and have consistently found success in regional state and world tournaments during this time the sharkbots have placed in the top five in 16 of 18 events they won the 2020 state championship together and have won a total of 24 awards including 10 tournament championship awards and five excellent awards even during the pandemic these students were determined to build a successful robot finishing second in the 2021 virtual state skills event this season the sharkbots finished with a 37 to 5 match record they won the virginia state design award thr what is this word three mexicans three what is this word three excellence awards two time tournaments champions two robot skills awards two design awards and most recently the world championship divisional finalist award which by doing so
022put sharkbots in the top 20 teams in the world team members include zen kawaja solomon ralston tony bright jenna mink armand latif hannah yim zafon kawaja and gabriel ralston the coach is brian ikus who will say a few words good evening school board members chairman latif and dr dr mcdade my name is brian ikes i'm the proud robotic coach of the sharkbots from hogan high school on behalf of the team i want to thank you for taking the time to recognize their many accomplishments it's been said in competitive robotics that at first glance it appears that we're using the kids to build robots but in reality we're using robots to build leaders to me each and every one of those 24 awards represents something unique about the characteristics of leaders that these these students exemplify
023for every robot skills award it represents hard work countless hours and late nights of perfecting iterations of code and drive practice each excellence in design award represents outstanding design exceptional craftsmanship and attention to detail needed to solve the world's most complex problems each tournament champion award represents resiliency and the ability to out strategize and execute their plan even under pressure every finalist award and even even during a pandemic off year keeps these sharks hungry to come back even stronger these reasons the shark bots exemplify leadership excellence in robotics and truly a world-class robotics team that all have thriving futures ahead of them thank you and thank you for your support i'm going to jump in here and say they snuck in troy mink who was on this team last year and has served as a
024mentor for many years for these uh the fine these fine team members and and i'll also point out that many of these students won the state championship at the middle school level as well so congratulations to the sharkbots and um what are we doing diane are we doing a pic is it the only high school we have yeah you want to do it now okay dr mcdade said do it now you have to go home and study but drive her up excited hi everybody [Music] do a couple more one two three [Applause] okay congratulations again of the sharkbots of colgan high school and dr healey thank you very much and mr ikes really appreciate you all coming here and i think those were fine words to talk about the way ro robotics builds leadership you're
025going to see more of our robotics folks and i'll have a lot more to say about that but we you know as with the science fair prince william county has long been on the map for robotics and and as we bring some of our middle school students in here i can tell you that at the world championships prince william county was the school division with the most teams qualifying for the world championships out of a thousand teams we were among the highest so it is now my uh um pleasure to um introduce mrs arghapur of the uh kohl's district ms arghapur oh say it's such a pleasure to have so many students from the colts district to recognize it is now my honor to recognize davinci visionaries team c from parkside middle school this team
026won the excellence award during our local qualifier at bull run which qualified them to compete at the u.s open in iowa they earned their spot at worlds by ranking 9th out of 48 middle schools who competed in the state championship they finished 14th in their division at the world's event and picked australia as their alliance they also finished at the top 25 percent of all middle schools who competed at worlds in their skills challenge and brought home the judges award the judge's award is presented to a team that the judges determined is deserving of special recognition students include owen balman eric magnay jonathan cantwell and rachel zachariah coaches include marietta soma and stefan salinsky salansky who will each speak briefly hello uh thanks to all of you for this opportunity to recognize the accomplishments of
027all of our robotic students um myself and my co-coach marietta we're very proud of all of our students at parkside we have five teams and all of them made it to the world championships um and of course uh da vinci's visionaries here today um we're especially proud of uh for the recognition that they received um at as a result of uh not just their um robot but also uh their conduct at the competitions the judges and excellence awards uh really mean a lot to us um and it would have been possible except for a lot of hard work that all of the students put in including some late nights and a few weekends on occasion as well all of our student success would it be possible without the support of all our sponsors so we
028would like to say thank you to spark and lockheed martin for their financial support we would like to also thank press polaris for our banners at world and sharp solutions for one of our launches at worlds and most of all we would like to thank dr boynton and the rest of our admin team at parkside and staff and to the parents and pto we would like to give this jacket to dr mcdade as our honorary member [Applause] all right very good congratulations you all we're very proud of you well to continue our recognitions at the middle school level lori williams of the woodbridge magisterial district will recognize our next group miss williams thank you mr chairman i'm so sorry i'm so excited i love robotics as i yeah anyway so um yes fredlin middle school
029bad batch teams is the vex robotics middle middle world energy award winner excuse me winner this team worked hard all year and made it to the state tournament while it states they fought and made it to the elimination round which included includes the top 32 teams in the state at worlds this team worked hard all week and even though their journey ended with qualifying match with the qualifying matches they did earn the energy award the energy award is given to the team that shows the most enthusiasm and excitement throughout the event this team exhibited a passion for robotics competition that has enriched that has enriched the event experience for all this team's enthusiasm clearly rose above all other teams the team members include randy bennetts emily m excuse me excuse me emmett emmett hemby and
030nana i'm going to mess this up but i'm going to try m [Music] i hope it's close i apologize um coaches are aaron lowy melanie young coach lowry will say a few words and i just want to say as your board member i'm so proud of you guys and i love your design t-shirts if anybody's know each team gets to design their own t-shirts and logos and such and it's awesome thank you first and foremost i want to thank the school board and dr mcdade for recognizing robotics achievements across the county but especially for shining a positive light on fred lynn fred lane has a little bit of a stigma a reputation of being that school with those kids the school parents don't want to send their kids to but by you recognizing us tonight
031proves a stigma a reputation or a preconceived notion does not define our students or their ability to succeed socioeconomic status language barriers zip codes do not define our students or our successes we succeed in spite of all of these things all students need are the right tools a safe space to fail so that they can succeed and adults who will support encourage mo and motivate and love them so thank you again for shining that bright light on fred lynn and i also want to thank denise carroll for without her none of this happens so thank you very much for recognizing us okay next we have mr wilk the potomac uh where are you at oh my god justin welcome to the potomac district will recognize our potomac middle school winners mr wilk thank you mr
032chairman a couple years ago remember i had potomac middle school here displaying their outstanding aquaponics program but another treasure of the potomac middle school is its robotics program the potomac middle school panther bots b finished as tournament finalist at the local tournament earning an invitation to the crea create us open robotics tournament in iowa this marked the first time any potomac team competed in a signature event panther bots b was one of two potomac teams to compete at states accompanied by team a b's appearance at worlds was the first time a potomac team competed at worlds they earned the middle school inspire award uh in the opportunity division what makes these accomplishments even more special is that this was a team of rookies team members include joseph dames winner nessaio boyo kenyan cannon mila mendoza
033student mentors include dean ahmad and pierce ahmad the coach is amanda carrera the principal is mr kevin smith it is also my understanding that several adult mentors are here as well thank you so much for all your service to the students miss coach carrera will say a few words thank you mr wilk and school board more than just a robot robotics at potomac is learning and growing together as a team with the support of our parents ms carroll our high school mentors and our principal the panther bots have done an outstanding job this year we began the year with little to no experience and came together to field a competitive team with each event we became stronger wiser and more creative taking what we learned at one tournament to the next as their coach i
034look forward to what next year brings for each of them and challenge them to share what they've learned with others and give back to our robotics community here in prince william we have three hats one for dr mcdade one for dr latif and one for our board member mr wilk if the children can bring those up sure yeah always ready to take free stuff no thank you very much you guys are very kind and and we really appreciate it and let's give them a round of applause for the potomac thank you that's very cool we will hold on um stick around stick around and i think lastly um so that those were wonderful words and congratulations again now i'm going to ask denise carroll who's really the head of our robotics program um division wide
035and who's been sort of a a champion for our students committed to student success miss carroll please i ask the children to come around me because i'm just a piece in the puzzle they are the pieces that make the puzzle whole all right i have my notes down and i wasn't nervous but now i am all right good evening everyone and thank you very much for recognizing our amazing vex robotics teams all the students and the coaches that stand behind me they did an amazing job representing prince william county school at the state national and international level this is a world-class education these children are getting and they met on teams from 40 different nations and had an amazing time if you don't know me my name is denise carroll i am the robotics and
036stem initiatives specialist here in prince william county schools i was able to go to dallas with them and be the lead judge for middle and high school and then scream really loud for them i think i was a little loud um for them and cheer them on i witnessed their talents and what those children brought to the to the competition field at the international level and they just made prince william county very proud we have four trophies here and in a couple weeks we'll see two more we brought home six trophies from the world championship and the most we've ever brought home was one or two so that's amazing without the hard work of our robotics coaches last year and this year we wouldn't be in the situation we were we are this year it's
037because of the work they did last year during the pandemic that art coaches were ready to go for this year to have our kids be awesome this year at the state national and international competitions i just want to say thank you again for recognizing my kids i love them all they'll grow up with me from 4th grade to 12th grade i call my kids because they really are and without the support from the school board and dr walton everybody here and our sponsors that we have and stem and all our mentors we couldn't have the successful season we have so thank you very much um you know it it would be it would be truly hard to imagine robotics without denise carroll in this county um she has done so much to help build a
038world-class program here we're very proud of it people come here they move here to be a part of it many of these teams in these middle schools have tryouts because the the the of just the fierce nature of the competition of students who want to participate and and and i know all the schools who do this and they try to increase the number of teams and they ask for resources i would be not it would be wrong for me not to thank also spark who's provided funds over the years systemic solutions nova community college george mason for helping us as we put on camps for the summer the giants you know in in robotics and prince william mr ikus who you heard from earlier coached at osborne park and now he at colgan uh carlos
039castro who is not here was you know really one of the pillars of robotics in prince william county from woodbridge senior high school and again our partners i can't thank you all for the work you do for putting us on the map with this um it has been it's truly an honor and i can bear witness that denise carroll screamed very loud because she sat next to me during some of those tournament matches and uh and it was a it was a fabulous experience to see prince william kids all over the convention center all over dallas um just you know engaging and and working and having a wonderful time so thank you all and for all you principals parents parents who who spent the time the money to get their kids down there to participate
040you know without the parents and and and your commitment from the faculty and staff and the principals we wouldn't be here celebrating you all tonight so please make sure you thank all of them and i'm going to turn over to dr mcdade for a few words and then we'll ask you to come up for the middle school folks to have a picture our students from middle school and ms carroll dr mcdade thank you so much dr latif and thank you to all of the board members for highlighting and recognizing our outstanding students as we reflect upon the pwcs vision 2025 launching thriving future strategic plan the students and programs recognized here tonight really represent two of the plan's commitments one learning and achievement for all and positive climate and culture these programs help to ensure
041that we really are preparing our students for post-secondary education as well as the workforce all in the environment that fosters inclusivity and connectedness so i want to thank the school board student representatives as well and our alternate for their dedication for serving as an important voice for our students throughout prince william county congratulations to our state and world winners in forensic science and robotics you have represented pwcs and your individual schools and communities so well and we are enormously proud of you i also want to recognize in addition to our teachers and our coaches and our coordinators and mentors that all come together to make this possible i really want to recognize the leadership of our school principals many of them are here this evening because we know that without principles that create the conditions
042for these types of programs and support these programs for our students to thrive we wouldn't be able to have the robust programming that we have here today so i want to acknowledge neil mr neil beach the principal of gainesville high school heather abney woodbridge high school dave cassidy hilton high school lisa marie kane osborne park high school dr tim healey colgan high school dr michael bishop patriot high school rich martinez forest park high school ryan ferreira battlefield high school dr jason calhoun governor's school at innovation park in mar romero fred lynn middle school dr mary jane boynton parkside middle school and kevin smith potomac middle school thank you so much for your leadership and making sure that these opportunities continue in all of our schools for our students to pursue their talents and in addition
043as dr latif stated none of this would be possible without the support of our parents and families who continuously support our students passions and interests your engagement and encouragement not to mention the countless hours of chauffeuring from competition to competition being our students biggest cheerleaders while supporting and investing in your child's passions are instrumental to the success of each and every student represented here and the students that we have celebrated throughout this school year so to close out this special part of the meeting as i always state we are not sure on talent in prince william county and we plan to continue to celebrate thriving futures recognition segment during board meetings throughout the rest of the school year for the remaining school board meetings in the month of june so congratulations to all of our
044scholars we are pwcs proud well thank you dr mcdade i i'd just like to echo the comments on the parents i'm i'm one of the parents um and and so i'll take a little privilege on apparent that that the experience of working you know whether it's sports in prince william county schools whether it's robotics whether it's debate whether it's science fair you know the parents that other parents get to meet the folks that i get to meet the richness of my experience of meeting some of the most amazing parents has been one of the most rewarding aspects of being in prince william county schools and i know for the students if you take a look at this group up here they are diverse in obviously many ways their interests their scholarly activities across the division
045and the richness of experience each of them have had as they've made new friends and cross borders whether it's state or country borders for the work they're doing has been a true benefit and so again one more round of applause for them as they come up and we'll take some pictures all oh [Applause] um i mean okay three thank you [Applause] my thank you [Applause] good job angels see my little run it's all around okay i would like to now call this meeting the prince william county school board order we will start with the pledge of allegiance ms donya sharifi please lead us in the pledge wonderful thank you all thanks for your patience it's been a um a tremendous year for prince william county schools whether it's in athletics and academics we've accomplished much
046and thank you for allowing us to spotlight these wonderful students we're very excited to always spotlight our student success next we're going to move on to the approval of the public meeting agenda moving on miss jackson thank you dr dutif i move that the princeton county school board approved the public meeting agenda as recommended do i have a second mr chairman mrs argoport i second any discussion please vote miss ralston how do you vote yes mr ralston votes yes the vote is eight yes unanimous motion passed next moving on to the adoption the consent agenda of motions and order miss jackson thank you dr chief i move that the prince william county school board approved the public meeting consent agenda is recommended do you have a second mr chairman mrs williams second any discussion please
047vote miss ralston how do you vote yes that's right yes the vote is six yes two no wall will motion passed sorry um citizen comment time those citizens who signed up in advance with a clerk may address the school board this evening when they're called to the podium the citizen comment period for regular school board meetings limited to one hour first half hour reserved for comments on agenda items in the second half hour for comments on non-agenda items or other topics germain to the operations and policies of prince william county schools citizens signed up to speak on agenda items must speak to the agenda item is and they have identified or they'll be asked to step down we have four speakers on agenda items and eight on non-agenda items speakers have three minutes to speak
048please use proper decorum manners while at the podium if you do not do so you'll be asked to step aside also i'd ask the audience to please refrain from any clapping or cheering or jeering as um and if so we may have to clear the room if that happens when you were called to the podium please state your name and address for the record today in agenda items first i'll call all four up they can grab a seat up front front jalen custis eileen eileen devereaux aveda scott caroline zimmerman jalen custis alrighty uh good evening dr mcday chairman mr chairman and school board members um today i'm talking about i believe it's 12.04 it's the revisions to the 2023 the 22-23 um code behavior although that i'm graduating this year i believe that i should
049have i should put some input on the revisions and i believe that even though this is the final decision uh hopefully you take this into consideration for the 2020 uh three to 2024 um it looks like in the revisions an unexcused uh tardy is car issues and i believe that should be an excused absence due to the reason that especially in high school that my friend she got into a car accident and she comes to school and it's an unexcused absence which i do not believe is fair because people get into situations of course obviously if it is violated and overused then that should be upon the school to monitor that obviously you can't have call troubles every single day you know um also this also i believe that there should be a policy implemented
050in order to probably possibly create a program for teachers to understand the environment because it says in the code of behavior students rights and not a lot of students use those rights because they are afraid of what teachers would do or say or how to administrate or handle it it says that students are supposed to have a positive environment and teachers and adults respect them obviously there's all teachers out there you cannot control every single teacher but i do strongly suggest that the school board does something if they can create some policy and classes or something so these teachers know how to deal with certain situations because this is a new generation there's a lot more issues that goes on in this school than it did 10 years 15 years ago mental health being one
051and some teachers not understand that because we have older teachers so some inflammation upon that that is all i have thank you for your time and i hope you take these uh comments and considerations in a into consideration for uh whenever you guys next uh code of behavior or whatever thank you and you guys have a good evening thank you mr custis miss eileen desvarieux good evening i'm allen devereaux from the gainesville district i'd like to speak to you today about the 20 code of behavior and our code of behavior it states that students have the right to a caring nurturing and enhanced positive relationships curriculum instruction that provokes opportunity for rigorous educational experiences attend schools that are welcome safe conducive to a positive learning environment for staff and students in courtesy respect and fairness
052for adults of another students to include their cultural beliefs and differences among other rights however i believe these rights are dependent on the support of the student's educational team which includes administrators staff and support staff but more importantly parents the code of behavior recognizes families as partners specifically it states it is the duty of the parent to prepare the child to assume responsibility in the school environment this includes responsibilities for learning and exhibiting conduct that does not infringe upon the safety and rights of others our children are part of the most diverse school district of virginia our children deserve a quality first class education that equips them for the knowledge to succeed yet we struggle as a community with understanding the value of equity and social emotional learning culturally responsive teaching there are people that
053villainize these concepts and fight against inclusion in our school's curriculum they want to report educators for teaching accurate history they want to remove certain books on the library and ultimately marginalize certain communities in certain schools we have educators and administrators that minimize recognition dates such as african-american asian american pacific islander jewish american hispanic heritage month and more these days pass with a little fanfare maybe a book in the library by an author of the same ethnicity but no real commitment and emphasis the contribution of these communities well when we ignore we're indifferent and even neutral on these issues we are taking a stand we are telling our students that only certain history stories and experiences are to be revered and the rest may be at best irrelevant well on saturday may 14 10 people were
054murdered by domestic terrorists and a visual that would have been in school this time last year he specifically targeted most of his victims for the color of their skin it's a tragedy but it's not as isolated we can ask the hispanics in el paso blacks and charleston asians and atlanta jews in pittsburgh lbg2qia and orlando just to name a few but the compounding tragedy is that some of prince williams say oh this is not us but it is us because it's our responsibility to teach our children to be kind decent inclusive and empathetic it's our responsibility to models those behaviors as educators and parents in support of curriculum that speaks to the value of all mankind this is the true code of behavior and our very lives and existence depend on it we need all
055students to be educated and connected not just to succeed or be well-rounded but to be safe our actions our priorities have consequences let's make ours for good thank you over scott good evening ladies and gentlemen of the board mr chairman dr mcdade my name is olivetta scott and my address is on file with the clerk as a member of the fred lynn family for over 14 years i am so happy to finally see some of my students recognized by the board for their success but tonight the members of these of this board will vote to approve the revisions edits and additions to the code of behavior the code of behavior outlines an expectation of conduct for students during their school day i am here to advocate for full enforcement of the code of behavior by
056building admin and the area associates for the remainder of the year as well as next year now you may say that the code of behavior has been implemented however this school year teachers and staff members have witne witnessed an upscale of extraneous behaviors throughout the middle and high grade levels administration has been very merciful to these pandemic students and it has not created a change within the learning environment many bus drivers teachers and staffs have endured disrespect cursing fighting drug use and tick tock challenges students have damaged school property brought weapons and made serious threats of violence toward teachers and classmates teachers bus drivers and other staff don't feel safe coming to work due to the out of control actions that some students have exhibit this year it is time for accountability of these extremes
057actions to maintain a safe environment we cannot continue to use mental health as an excuse as a condition for the hazardous manners that have impacted the school year riding the school bus and having a cell phone is not a right but a privilege as stated in the code of behavior and it needs to be enforced if a student brings drugs a weapon or make a threat that student must be removed from that school what is the message when disruptive behavior is giving chance after many chances what the message that i am hearing is it's time to retire or quit education thank you ms caroline zimmerman miss zimmerman okay next we'll move to the non-agenda items uh the first four speakers we marry jean kellogg carol fox richard jesse jeffrey sisson miss mary jean kellogg i'm
058mary jean kellogg and my address is on file good evening as a 45-year resident taxpayer and a retired prince william teacher i continue supporting schools volunteering and through their fundraisers i was fortunate to work in a school where we referred to our community as family like many district schools the children spend over half their waking hours with school personnel during this time parents want the best for their children learning not just academics but to be productive successful citizens in a challenging future world the pwcs staff provides a nurturing caring beginning for the children teachers and assistants expand children's growth in numerous ways engaging their minds in academics physical fitness and important social skills always wearing many hats bus drivers are entrusted with their safety to and from school office staff and nurses are real problem
059solvers with their feel good counseling food services provide nourishment to get through the school day and beyond custodians work tirelessly keeping buildings clean and sanitary maintenance supply services ground keeper mechanics security all work together with increasing expectations for the largest county employer how many of you visit your schools and other departments to actually talk with staff to learn their issues not just for special events how can you make life-changing decisions for thousands if you don't know the impact collective bargaining is your opportunity to find out what's working and what needs improvement it allows you to hear the concerns of the thousands who keep the district progressing the board's april 27 collective bargaining statement supports key components of the strategic plan quote promoting a positive climate and culture and quote staff will be empowered supported and
060engaged with a strong sense of belonging your statement continues quote the school board is committed to seeking ways to improve working conditions pay and benefits you can do even better working together at the table will be seated representatives to negotiate for all 10 000 plus employees in every department not just for the selected representatives these open discussions will lead to a better understanding of the issues and concerns on both sides of the table and be resolved through compromise collective bargaining offers solutions that benefit not just the entire pwcs family but the children who spend a huge portion of their early life with them please join all of the family thank you for listening thank you miss carol fox good evening i'm carol fox from the gainesville district my address and everything is on file thank
061you for letting me speak i want to talk tonight about collective bargaining should prince william county approve such a plan well as we all know unions began in this country in 1794. their purpose was to secure better pay hours benefits and job and healthy health and safety for their employees private sector unions began simply because private employers were treating their employees very badly they they work employees worked very long hours sometimes up to 12 hours a day brutal conditions and for little pay it made the private business rich private sector unions were instrumental in passing child labor job health and safety laws as well as leave and pensions for the union members many of the reasons that that this happened has now brought labor labor unions private sector labor unions have been dying out enter
062the public sector unions the public sector employee works for the taxpayer through the government entity you're the government entity that is where the problem arises private public sector unions using the political process can exert a greater influence over the government employers than over the private employers public sector unions such as pwa would negotiate with elected officials for their share of the tax revenue that comes into the county in 2020 and 2021 the nea contributed 66 million dollars to political organizations and in addition 117 million dollars for contributions gifts and grants this is money that comes from the employees that means you will most likely receive money from public sector unions the nea for your election re-election to the school board if you so choose and then you will bargain with the pwa on how they
063want the taxpayer money spent if you want to retain your position on the school board you will give the pwa what it wants and the agenda of public sector unions is inherently in conflict with the interests of the taxpayers such as masking and students and closing of the schools for this past year students unions negotiate inefficient work rules and have insatiable appetites for more public funds without improving without necessarily improving the reading or math scores of the children they are supposedly educating take a look at washington d.c each they spend thirty one thousand eight hundred forty three dollars per student but has the lowest test scores in the whole united states they do have a very good union though see how much money they make parents send their schools to school to learn to read
064and to write the last time i met i asked you i asked you and spoke to you about how you already complying with pwa why do you want to add the drama of allowing pwa to become a formal bargaining union pwa already has the right to bargain with you they don't need to be a union to do that thank you very much have a nice evening mr richard jesse good evening my name is richard jesse my address is on file i just want to hit a couple of points this evening one i've sent and asked the board several times about revamping citizen time and i ask that for next year you consider it it takes three board members to get something on the agenda i want to thank mrs uh jackson for contacting me to
065uh we're going to talk about the recommendations that i have but i ask that other board members consider it and let's do something different it's one of the few items where even people on different sides we all seem to agree that we would like a better system for citizen time a gentleman last meeting talked about books and banning books i hope that this is not going to become an issue here in in the county but if it does i would recommend that you consider two things one everybody has a right for the kiss and what they want the kids to see and read however you don't have a right to tell me what my kids are weak and that's what some of these people are trying to do what i do recommend that is if
066we do go down that road we have like a reserve section or a section in the library that kids cannot get to unless their parents have agreed to let them read the book and something like that the other thing i would recommend is that our kids the parents of the school a certain percent a high percent has to agree that the book should be banned or in that restricted area the other thing i'd like to ask talk about is the emails to the board members when i send send an email to the board members i don't feel is going to the board members the new system that you have seems like it's being reviewed by somebody on the staff and maybe it gets to you and maybe it don't so i would like somebody to
067look in that the other thing i talk about is boundaries i also would like three board members to consider let's do something about having boundaries particularly for next year because you have occacon school coming on board i think you have a new school that you visited the groundbreaking on and its parents i think should know ahead of time not at the year before the school open that the boundaries should should be changed and the last thing about 25 seconds would be i think on the website it would be useful if there's something that clearly states where a person goes to file a concern right now if we go there it's very difficult and i have no idea where to follow concern or complaint if i want to thank you jeffrey sisson all right the next
068four will be marianne jensen brandy provenzano jennifer roberts and chris vonderberg miss miss jensen my name is marianne jensen i appreciate being given another opportunity to speak before the board tonight unfortunately i'm here to address what seems to be a recurring theme i've been hearing from scores of parents across our county a growing frustration at the lack of interaction we are allowed to have with all of you our elected officials to be clear you work for us the parents of the children attending the schools that we pay for with our tax dollars the same dollars that pay your salaries i might add i say this not to be adversarial but to ensure you remember the fact as you face us this evening it's important because from the perspective of the parents there seems to be
069an unwillingness to engage with your employers that's a problem so my goal here tonight is to ask you some questions that are that are designed to get an outcome-based solutions help you better connect with the parents and ultimately provide a better educational environment for our children first why is there no effort made to interact in a meaningful way with those who elected you the phrase we the people should have special meaning here as you all should be representing the interests of the people who elected you those in this room we're taking our time to talk to you why shouldn't we expect the same you are accountable to us that's the way this process works instead this board operates in de facto secrecy as we are given no heads up no chance to provide input and
070have our message routinely reply to with auto replies and blank stares take the code of behavior for example there has been no inherent no parent involvement no discussion with your constituents on why these changes are terrible and actually more destructive to our children this is not a healthy relationship and speaks volumes to your character since it basically tells us you do not care second why can't this board take the posture of proactive elected officials around the country and hold forums like town hall meetings where we can discuss things unscripted maybe seeing an honest attempt to engage on your behalf even if we don't agree would at least show that you have the best interests of the children as your priority third you're late for meetings that you do have nothing shows contempt for voters more
071than disrespecting our time the last three meetings not tonight thank you but have been started on average 30 minutes late pull it together this is embarrassing for you and for our county and only serves to embolden people like me to come here and call you out publicly i shouldn't have to remind you of the basic rules of etiquette when dealing with those who elected you to summarize the big issue here you need to make yourselves more approachable november 2023 is not far away we are mobilizing and unless you change your approach and actually interact with parents all of you are set to be tossed out like countless school boards across the country i'm also still waiting for a response from miss mcdade on why she misled me prior to my last performance or appearance but
072that's a conversation for next november i suppose remember we hold the receipts brandy provenzano brandi provenzano jennifer roberts good evening superintendent mcdade chairman latif members of the school board and other prince william county staff members thank you for the opportunity to speak this evening my name is jennifer roberts of the gainesville district and i want to lead by saying a special thank you to my board member jen walls for interacting with me on the issue that i'm going to speak about my name my name is jennifer school safety reaches far beyond the physical environment all students mental and emotional well-being must also be protective protected by proactively creating school cultures and climates in which all students are seen heard and validated regardless of skin tone or cultural background one way to protect students against the
073cancer that is racism is by proactively creating school environments in which racism is regularly discussed and by equipping students staff members and parents with anti-racist educational resources many prince william county staff members are disempowered and ill-equipped to implement effective initiatives that will help educate all students about prejudice and racism in the world and in prince william county too much is at stake and our silence is shameful we as a school community should not have to wait for a heart attack moment like the tragic racially motivated mass shooting that happened this past weekend in buffalo new york to prioritize conversations curriculums and school culture that normalize healthy discussions about racism and its dangerous effects i am asking that all prince william county staff members be empowered with the tools to assess and address the inherent prejudices
074that we all have and to take responsible action when verbal and physical racial and cultural assaults are heard seen and excuse me and reported i am asking that professional development opportunities for staff include effective training on cultural competency white fragility microaggressions and the like and that staff members be held accountable for applying what is learned in the training i am asking that you partner with families and community leaders to create in-school networks that racially and culturally support students of color especially students of color attending predominantly white schools i am asking that you listen to and partner with parents who tell prince william county administrators that their child was the target of racist be excuse me behavior or that white students were laughing and joking while slavery or jim crow was being discussed in social studies
075class i want you to proactively protect the students and the parents who see no value in even reporting racial and cultural violations because they know that nothing will be done i am asking you to prioritize protecting all prince william county students against this cancer thank you that is racism thank you chris frenderberg [Applause] hello my name is chris funderberg and my address is on file in the two weeks since we last spoke only two of you found it worthwhile to respond to me since then i've had radio silence i'm the father of five children in county schools and i'm trying to warn you about the problems you're getting ready to face and the damage that it's going to do based on my research of pwcs policy 738-5 and the vdoe transgender model policy several issues
076are apparent school staff are forbidden from notifying parents of their child being trans queer without the child's consent robbing them of the ability to get their child help they are also required to lie to parents they must use the child's given name during the parent communication and then their trans queer name in school school staff can report parents as abusive to cps if parents don't affirm their child's preferred gender identity this is shockingly draconian and designed to scare parents into complaints bathrooms and locker rooms will become an issue just look at loudoun county students are allowed to use facilities based on their preferred gender id what about staff vdoe's transgender model policy forbids school from questioning a student entering the wrong bathroom i can't imagine anything wrong with that like the multiple rapes in loudoun
077county do parents know that their children are sharing bathrooms and locker rooms with someone of the opposite sex have we got forgotten why we have sex segregated facilities and they are sex segregated not gender segregated students who misgender a trans queer child can be accused of sexual assault as defined in title ix our children can be labeled as a sexual assaulter simply for using the biologically correct pronoun and given stiffer penalties under the code of behavior beyond simple bullying which generally isn't much anything this is also forced speech these things will further deteriorate trust between parents and the school system at a time when it is needed the most school staff are required to use preferred pronouns and names again this is forced speech which is much worse than being denied the ability to say
078whatever you want louden was recently forced to rehire a teacher that was fired for refusing to use preferred pronouns the model policy also encourages trans queer after-school clubs to further normalize deviant behavior and it is deviant behavior the definition of deviant is departing from usual or accepted standards especially in social or sexual behavior trans queer make up about 0.3 percent of the population which falls into the deviant category the trans queer agenda sacrifices the safety and well-being of the 99.7 of the population for the questionable safety of trans queer students telling children that believe in santa claus and the tooth fairy that they can change genders will cause long-term and possibly even lifelong damage to them and that will be on you end this farce remove the books stop the clubs shut your mouth and
079prevent activist staff from indoctrinating our children it's not hate it's the truth let me have some order in the room i don't expect anyone from the audience to make comments and i certainly don't expect speakers at the podium to address members in the audience that'll be the end of citizen comment time as he's our last speaker if that happens again at the next meeting we'll have you escorted out both from the audience and our podium speakers proper decorum is expected as we are trying to model good behavior for our students tonight is the last meeting this year for our current student representatives donya sharifi a junior at gainesville high school is joining us on the diocese evening we also have our other student representatives charlotte flynn and all our our alternate michelette surafell joining us
080today joining us today since this is their last meeting we'll give each of them an opportunity to speak and let's start with our senior well actually we'll start with donya because she's here first and then we'll we'll we'll end with our senior let's do that let's start with our senior don or with with let's start with donya who's up on the dice donya good evening to the school board chairman latif dr mcdade and the prince william county school community i'd like to thank you all for allowing the student representative to speak for our last time this year tonight as a reflection for our past year coming to the student representative position i hadn't known exactly what i was going to do just a few bullet points on the website and a couple questions answered at
081the interview but i was still foggy as to what the day-to-day operations of this position entailed i walked in into the end of the summer to do an interdiction video where i met charlotte and mclee and i knew that immediately we would be able to see eye-to-eye and go towards our goals this year it was at the first school board meeting where we were faced with the reality of what being part of the school board was not only are we to represent the students voice and our best ability but to see how the school board addresses citizen concerns and votes on certain agenda items it is so gratifying and such an amazing opportunity to sit here on the diocese with school board representatives and members and have the chance to give back to the community
082i've been a part of since the age of five entering kindergarten and next year when i graduate walking across the stage i look forward to every time that i get to come here to win the school board meetings and my favorite part as we've seen today is really the thriving futures focus that we've introduced this past few months to see those students get recognized in sports like swimming and wrestling and in robotics and scientific competitions is really just a heartwarming thing that prince william county school does and i know it means a lot to them additionally i like seeing the reports and breakdowns of academics between different county and grades and see how the school board is really combating the dynamics of grade distribution against different student backgrounds as for what we've done as soon
083representatives i love working with miss viola and mr girvin our sponsors meeting bi-weekly with the other reps and actively working towards our goals this year from getting the chance to attend coded behavior council meetings regarding dress code with miss diggers and working to raise awareness about the dress code modifications to creating social media accounts with the reps to connect with other students to working with dr neil on the school start time survey has been such an amazing opportunity with the future goals i hope the role of student representative continues for the years to come as it's such an amazing opportunity for the students to really engage and be part of this community um we hope that this future student representatives really get to get more involved and get more student leadership involved on sunday shout
084outs on social media pages similar to thriving features new lunch menu varieties to accompany different diets dietary need holding fall convention for students to speak upon different topics a website for the student rep and senate to be able to contact and promote leadership amongst our younger students all in all this has been one of the most milestone life-changing opportunities that i've had the opportunity to leap into as i applied and have grown in this role throughout the whole year i loved how i got to learn about the prince william county school school board and education system along with getting the ability to learn myself better and pushing myself out of the comfort zone to try new things i cannot wait to see what the future holds and i would like to thank you all for
085making this possible and for having the chance to speak tonight as this has genuinely spiked my interest in the fields of education public policy and government thank you and have a good rest of your evening very good donya next we'll let's uh hear from eklet sarah fell from hilton high school if you want to come to the podium mrs micklin thank you mcclee it's okay good evening i'm super glad to be here i've been a lot of two minutes of time to recap this year's student representative impact two minutes is simply not enough time but neither was 42 weeks in my 42 weeks as an alternate i was not concerned about the next thing i would say on the dyess but rather how the prince william county student body reacted or adapted to the structure
086given by district policy this year i had to recognize my own confirmation bias about what education meant to me someone who has only been exposed to traditional k-12 institutions prior to being a rep to clarify i have a 4.0 gpa as many of my peers do i'm surrounded by students dedicated to their education their extracurricular activities and above all their community i don't say this to set myself up for compliments and praise rather i speak only of my subjective experiences because i find myself representing the majority of students in prince william county that are struggling out of sight the ones that are set to the side because they'll be all right i now know that although this number 4.0 reflects a perfect grade point average i am far from a straight a student i get
087on average five hours of sleep a night i have 87 tardies and i turn in almost every single assignment late not because i want to but because i can from what i've gathered after countless conversations with teachers administrators and students from all backgrounds i've concluded that a fundamental problem in education is identifying when a student's error is of behavioral or academic origin and specifically how that coincides with prince william county's lack of an equitable late work policy when an institution allows administrative decisions to be made on a branched-out level there tends to be many inconsistencies prince william county has excellently identified that late work is a behavioral issue not academic as students cannot know that can know the content but not reflect that in a timely manner via given assignments however the broad policy section
088600 code 661-3 renders head of subject departments responsible for the consequences of late work to quote teacher teams shall work together with their educational leaders to set reasonable guidelines for turning in late work and encourage the completion of missing assignments end quote this policy does allow for flexibility for the student to explain reasons for late work such as being a caretaker caretaker or working after school however it completely dismantles the teacher-student relationship and allows the development of poor habits such as procrastination for individuals who don't have pressing responsibilities to develop to clarify the teacher-student relationship ideally revolves around enlightenment compassion and mutual respect the aforementioned policy reinvents teachers as administrators rather than educators it is also conflicting as even though it is agreed that late work is behavioral the consequences are academic with repercussions including
089letter graded deductions and points taken off as student representative i began the caleb project which allowed me to explore non-traditional education and the opportunities presented within in honor of caleb crosby a student at hilton who took his own life and my dear friend i had the distinct pleasure and honor of touring independence non-traditional school with dr icorn independence is a school which models the perfect balance of specialized education in a comprehensive setting a genuine school of excellence i'm sure all of you have had the pleasure of visiting granted the school is specifically dedicated to providing a custom educational experience for students but even underneath broad regulation independence managed manages to cultivate an environment that is consistent and mutually beneficial in the teacher-student relationship how do they achieve this communication if the policy were to be
090altered along the lines of students may only turn in formative assignments late before its corresponding summative assignments with the excuse of communicated conflicts between the teacher student and the parent it would allow the flexibility the previous policy already provides while ensuring only those who need extensions are granted them it eases the burden of teachers who are swamped with late work and added communication strengthens the teacher-student relationship late work policy left up to the various departments of education might allot the delegation of responsibilities and prevent a dramatic shift from the norm but it also renders inconsistent as certain behaviors are tolerated in one class while praised in the next it is not structured and to leave it up to a student's self-discipline and time constraints which is what it eventually comes down to is the most
091silent threat and consequential disservice to education of all no one wants to say this no student wants to come out and declare we need more structure and we need it with a grain of compassion but it has to be said or reality of a professional environment will take out the generation of students prince william county fosters for decades to come thank you thank you mikley next will be our senior charlotte flynn and look forward to hearing from you ms charlotte thank you good evening school bird members and prince william county it has been a pleasure to serve this community as one of the student representatives for this school year thank you for giving me the opportunity to represent your students and let their voices be heard it has been an honor to serve within government
092and have this experience within public policy for my final speech i would like to leave a couple of parting wishes for the future i wish the future representatives and student senate the best of luck as they continue to work within government to incite change and spread awareness to a public forum the results of the starting time survey will be analyzed in due time and i hope that change will occur to respond to the needs of students and that other future mental health endeavors and initiatives will be considered and implemented to provide relief i wish that prince william and its families continue down this path of current success and i hope our community is proud of and recognizes the accomplishments it has achieved this year i hope the path to recovery after the pandemic is short
093i know many students have suffered because of doubt and uncertainty but the strides we have made since last year and the achievements we continue to make are incredibly important and amazing lastly i hope the issues that are still prevalent within our county will be resolved whether it be racial injustice inequity poverty or gender inclusivity i hope our future student leaders work together to provide solutions that will support our students it has been such a privilege to work with donya and mccleat this year i hope they continue to provide this county with insight from our schools and speak their minds i'm incredibly grateful and proud of them and i can't wait to see where they will end up and what they will do they have inspired me and i am so happy i got to work
094with them thank you for giving me the opportunity to speak i appreciate your time thank you [Applause] so i think i can speak for the whole board um we have been and certainly if other members want to say things but um we've been well served by you all i think the students have been incredibly served by you all and um not to show my bias but i'll show my bias if we get to a point where the start times are changed i will give full credit to you three and ben kim from last year for uh making sure that uh this got done and and all the students for the work you've done on that so i i can't thank you all enough you you've put social emotional learning mental health student start times at
095the top of your commitment for the students this year uh we have heard it you continue uh mccleed to even bring up things this evening that this school board and administration need to pay attention to we appreciate it you are serving your students well and serving the student senate as well and and we really truly appreciate it we hope nothing but the best for your futures and look forward with our juniors to working with you again you know over time whether you're working in your school as a activist or a student leader or on the senate or or wherever you may find yourselves into ms charlotte flynn we wish you the best as you leave prince william county to go to the university of virginia and we're excited you had your pick of some of
096the best institutions in the country we're excited you picked to stay here in the state in the commonwealth we're very excited and we wish you the best and uh i can't thank you all enough for all the work you've done um i think you know it it it's you know it's been said over and over again this is not an easy time to serve on a school board um you guys served in some of our first few meetings which were highly contentious and um and and and served in in a capacity where you showed tremendous courage and character and a commitment to your to your student body and and we really appreciate it and i hope you leave here and remember always the work that you've done has made this place a better place um
097miss williams thank you mr chairman um this is one of my favorite moments of the school year as um an originator of the idea along with ms jesse to have student representatives on the board it is a moment that continuously fills my heart with a lot of joy and pride to see the evolution of the program and specifically with you three ladies how you have taken this role and made it your own and continue to be the voice of our student body your ideas the way that you are able to communicate with the student body and then communicate and turn effectively to this board but also to the public fills my heart with joy every year this board gets questions of why do we have student reps on the board and do we think this
098is a good idea and as someone who has advocated continuously for a voice for our 90-some thousand students you ladies definitely epitomize why it's so important to have student representatives on the board you bring valuable insight create wonderful ideas and remind us regularly what it's like to be a student in prince william county schools in such a professional and outstanding manner not only that with the real world practical experiences that you have been exposed to while beating students on the board and to do it all so gracefully is just it just does my heart good i'm specifically proud i'm sure our board is as well i don't want to speak for everyone else with for that matter but i hope i say this to all of our outgoing board members i hope that you will
099come back that you will share your experiences as you move on to college ms flynn your experiences next year as seniors in high schools excuse me in seniors in high school and that you continue to advocate for your fellow peers it just this program is just amazing and to see i would like to see more coordination with our student senate and our student board as well and i think you know that's wonderful i would love to see a website or other means of social media communication for student representatives as well as i hope that in the future the state will recognize and provide more continuous learning opportunities for you besides i think the only thing that was vsba conference which you guys didn't really get a chance to do because of cove but i wish
100you all the best of luck next year and many successes and please come back and let us know what else is going on and how how your experience has been freshman year charlotte thank you so much okay with that we'll go to uh oh miss jessie i just want to say to these young ladies you are not only intelligent and bright you are very brave i remember the night we were huddled in the back room and miss flynn was there and she and you guys were like well it's just another day and all of us were just so concerned about our own safety and you guys just hung in there and dr mcdade sat with you but i think they were less concerned than you were doctor they they were just young women who who
101understand that some things happen and you have heard everything on this board you've heard citizens uh be upset about items you heard the good the bad and the ugly and i think it prepares you when you go to college because it's a different time for you you're going to learn a lot of things from different people it was an honor to work along with ms williams with this idea but we were not the only ones on this board who wanted student representatives there were other members of this board who also supported it sometimes you have an idea but in this board you have to have five votes for anything so i just wanted to say that the uh the emphasis on students uh dr mcdade tonight with all these students it took some time but
102it was really worth it because these are the voices that we really need to hear as an elementary principal i realized if i wanted to know what was going on in that building i would ask the students if i want to know why you didn't pass the sol they would tell me oh i thought it was a oh did i mark c mrs jesse oh i thought it was a it was a simple solution but you have to if you want to know the answer to things ask the people who are affected no those are the students so i'm honored to have you on the board and it's been a real lifetime experience for all of us to have you on this board and i think you added much to the community thank you dr
103mcdave thank you dr lucifer i would like to just commend each of you for your leadership this year for being an advocate for all students in prince william county you were so responsible in making sure that you were representing the voice of the students that you served on the board but also your leadership in your individual schools so i'm looking forward to continuing to work with mcleet and donya and best wishes to you charlotte on your journey we are looking forward to seeing great things from you in the road ahead of the road ahead and just appreciate all of the time that you've spent with us this year working on critical issues to make sure that student voice is elevated in this school division so thank you so much for your service and for your
104leadership wonderful well now we'll move into superintendent's time dr mcdade thank you dr latif may has been a month dedicated to many special recognitions and celebrations which includes asian pacific american heritage month and jewish american heritage month i would like to close out the month of may honoring the immeasurable contributions of our asian pacific americans and jewish americans that they've made to our nation and local community as a reminder may is mental health awareness month you've heard us talk about mental health throughout this month it's incredibly important part of our overall well-being and critical in our ability to support our families work effectively participate in school and contribute to society in meaningful ways i was honored to participate in two recent events shining a light on the importance of taking care of our mental health
105a couple of weeks ago i joined several students many hundreds of students as a matter of fact staff members and community members for the forest park high school suicide awareness walk both events serve as an example of the importance of destigmatizing mental health issues what was most inspiring was the entire event was coordinated by our forest park student leaders also special thanks to forest park teacher shannon garrity who is the student sponsor for this initiative i would like to share a short video highlighting the suicide awareness walk i appreciate the efforts of the forest park student body and community to organize this annual walk to honor those that we have lost and give hope to those who continue to struggle with mental health challenges one of my students had lost a family member to suicide
106and she suggested that we do a suicide awareness walk to destigmatize mental health and it's important to the kids and they run the whole thing i'm so proud of them i'm here because i feel like suicide awareness is an important subject and it's not talked about enough especially for young people today i'm here to let people know that it's okay to ask for help and to look for support in the people around you i really thought it was important to just join something like this something way bigger than myself to help others and to be aware that i can talk about my mental health as well as others can too i just want to bring awareness to you know mental health and break the stigma and let people know that they're not alone and that
107we're all in this together we're all fighting together about 90 of those that do attempt suicide have treatable conditions and just need to be made to feel that they're not alone and that they can reach out and get the support they need i've struggled with suicide in the past to be completely honest and transparent with you but i was never forthcoming with it i thought i was gonna be shunned and ridiculed and laughed at i was scared i am a survivor and i want to work with others to show that they can survive i don't want anybody to ever feel like they are alone ever again we will walk to give a voice to those who are no longer here and we will triumph as we stand together to bring awareness to this epidemic help
108us end this stigma and remember you are not alone this saturday freedom high school will host the mental health and wellness expo from from 10 a.m to 2 p.m several community organizations have joined with pwcs in sponsoring this event that will feature student and community performances exercises food games and important mental health and wellness resources for the entire family and community i encourage everyone to attend more information can be found on our website at www.pwcs.edu [Music] as shared previously may 25th is the 2022 pwcs signing day celebration pwcs will recognize and celebrate the accomplishments of graduating seniors who shared with us that they have obtained full-time employment or committed to military service we are excited about celebrating these outstanding accomplishments our career and technical education programs are critical in preparation of our students for life
109after graduation in partnership with prince william county fire and rescue students in the firefighting program at unity reed high school are learning a combination of traditional classroom instruction and blended field experience the program is available to all pwcs high school students as a transport specialty program through cte through this program students obtain the knowledge and skills to help prepare them to become a volunteer or care firefighter career fight firefighter let's check out more in this video we're here at the public safety training academy with the prince william county fire cadets today we're cutting cars learning a little bit of vehicle extrication and you know playing with hydraulic tools like the jaws of life the cutters and stuff which is pretty cool the cadet program is a one-year firefighter program for prince william county school high
110school students it presents them with the opportunity to become familiar in the field of the fire and emergency service and they also have the opportunity to become certified as a firefighter if they meet all of the educational requirements learn a lot whether it be from fire hoses or how to search a room or how to talk on the phone to people uh some highlights would definitely be going into a burning building that's pretty cool putting out a fire tearing some ceilings down it's a it's a fun program i get to come out here every other day i get to exercise a little bit learn something new probably my favorite part is cutting the cars and doing the fun stuff putting the mask on going inside the burn building the highlight of my entire high school
111career right now is this class so you come in every other day a bus will pick you up after your first period and you come here we're either in the classroom doing lectures or we're out here doing practicals usually it's a mix of both interested in becoming a firefighter this is definitely a great program you meet a lot of people that you might meet out in the field get your name out there and kind of help you get your foot in the door this class is great i couldn't recommend it enough especially if you wanted to go into the fire service afterwards if you're interested in more information about the high school fire cadet program you can check out our website and also find us on twitter we have photos and videos of the activities
112we do in class [Music] to close out my report tonight i would like to introduce miss rita goss our associate superintendent for teaching and learning and denise hebner associate superintendent for special education and student services they will come before us to share critical information about this year's summer school offerings good evening chairman latif vice chairwoman jackson and school board members mrs hebner and i are here tonight and we are excited to share about the reimagining of summer school this year this slide gives you an overview of what we're going to be talking about tonight we're going to share about those reimagined learning opportunities as well as the professional learning and support for those instructional programs we're also going to talk a little bit about the logistics uh we're going to talk about really reimagining this
113is the third semester of a year long of learning that includes all of our students but also our teachers leaders and our families our summer school plan aligns to the strategic plan all four of our commitments learning and achievement for all by addressing the unfinished learning as it was laid out in the unfinished learning plan also by looking at how are we providing equitable learning experiences for our students and providing high quality curriculum and resources to all of our students during their learning during the summer providing that professional learning to support that high quality instruction providing a positive climate and culture through promoting scholarship and success and learning all year round engaging our families in authentic partnerships and having opportunities for our parents to learn alongside of us and participate in important conversations about the
114needs of our students and where we are in our learning and achievement and then also ensuring that we have that organizational coherence and that planning across schools and and offices as well as in the community along with being focused on the cycles of improvement that are really an important part of our strategic plan this year summer school has really two pieces the launch program which is similar to our traditional summer school where we will offer in-person learning for our most intensive really remedial classes that really support all of our students kindergarten through grade 12. for our high schoolers of course we're trying to propel our high schoolers towards graduation and this will include credit recovery for discovery which is uh our expanded enrichment opportunities this summer that we're so excited about uh students will have
115an opportunity to participate in person and virtually as well as some independent learning opportunities these learning opportunities and the discovery portion are not only provided by our own pwcs staff but also in partnership with some of our partners in the community like our parks and rec folks the summer school launch programs this lists out those programs at all three levels at elementary middle and high school and establishes the time frames for each of those this year those programs are from three to six weeks in length for the mathematics of the launch program at k-8 where we are providing that more intensive support for our students to overcome that unfinished learning our mathematics program in elementary is really going to focus on the areas in our data that show that we need the most support a
116number and number sense for for k through 2 which includes number identification and representation whole numbers and decimal rounding for grade three we'll be focusing on multiplication and division for grades four and five we'll be focusing on fractions for grades six through eight we'll be focusing on proportional reasoning or that comparison of ratios to help solve problems for our english language arts we will be really focusing on building really strong readers writers listeners and speakers for elementary students we'll be focusing on improving fluency comprehension our text analysis and also skills to reflect on what students are reading we will in the middle level be focused on really strengthening skills building readers and writers that really have stamina to read and write and can do that independently this it really is a strengths based program that
117really looks to not only build the skills that students need but also build their confidence and their excitement about being readers and reader writers and learners the launch program as it's outlined here provides courses across all of our four content areas and includes classes in mathematics english language arts science as well as history and social science the discovery enrichment experiences again these some of these are provided by our own pwcs employees and we've expanded those opportunities and you see some of those here on the screen that lays out our fairy tales camp our tall tales theater camp we have pwc history camp we have coding camp we have cookology we have a lot of exciting opportunities for students in the arts with our orchestra camp and and also our choir camp just to highlight one
118of our partners the prince william county parks and rec they have a number of opportunities that they are partnering with who offer those experiences of enrichment to not just students but also families one of those that i want to highlight tonight is every monday this summer parks and rec is offering at ripon lodge ben lomond and the principal courthouse an opportunity for a student along with two adults to accompany them for free and take that chore and learn more about prince william county's history in addition to what you've seen for students we will have professional learning for our teachers and leaders to ensure the success of our summer program some of what we will be working with our teachers and leaders on our conscious classroom management the canvas courses and around the canvas units that
119will be utilized this summer uh that professional learning will take place june 13th through the 15th we will have we are partnering with outside uh experts in scholastic list can lit camp we have pam allen we've partnered with dewey these folks will also be supporting our family engagement series which will be part of our discovery opportunities it's really important that we provide opportunities for our families to participate in all types of learning that will be there to support them as they support their learners this summer and as we support all learners and overcoming uh that unfinished learning that we've been talking a lot about this year that will include book talks videos podcasts and conversations with both folks from the community but also national experts on how to support our students in all areas to
120ensure their success and at this time i'm going to ask my colleague mrs huebner to come forward and talk about the logistics thank you miss cause so partnership has been the name of the game as we plan for summer school it's taken teamwork so our teams are very active in working with communications to promote summer school our parents have all been notified electronically through our student our school messenger system schools are following up individually with letters to parents and the schools are available to answer any questions from parents who might wonder should my child be a good candidate for a program or need summer school so i encourage parents to reach out directly to their schools for more specific information parents whose students qualify will be continuing to receive reminders through our school messaging system
121and the frequency of those reminders will increase as we near the end of the registration date our registration is currently open and that will close on june 15 so that we can recalibrate and we will have late registration on june 20th as well and i'll have that highlighted later on in the slides we will be serving meals breakfast and lunch at our 21 central sites we will be community feeding sites for this which means that not only our students attending summer school are able to eat but any student under the age of 18 or any community member under the age of 18 will have access to food at those sites the meals will be packaged in a format that is grab and go or the option for grab-and-go so that we can maximize the instructional
122time we realize that summer school is a short amount of time we want to pack as much learning as we can in so we have designed the menu mr shiroki's team has designed the menu so the kids can take those meals with them to maximize the time our transportation team is working hard we will have stops that are consolidated but transportation will be available and will be free and we will have um information i'll move this right along so you can see this there you go information posted on our website once those routes and those schedules are available so i'd encourage anyone who's looking for more information to really visit our website we're trying very hard to make sure that everything is captured on our website and updated so very quickly i'll show you an
123overview these are our central summer school sites it's important to note that all of these sites will have the launch program and the discovery program will be at select sites as the programs are offered so this is an example of what our web page looks like where you can visit and register the website is located there underneath the symbol and is available if you go on to our princeton county schools website if you just put in the search summer school registration it should pop up for you and if you have any questions or difficulties with that please reach out to our office at student management alternative programs we'll be happy to assist you with that or again you can check with your school additionally there's registration information for discovery that is available on our website
124as well and there's the contact information for our office and our direct our coordinator for summer school you know boyd is happy to assist any parents who are in need that concludes our presentation thank you questions miss jesse then miss williams first of all i want to thank you for a comprehensive summer school program the things that i noticed that were really exciting is the enrichment expansion that you're doing the virtual option the family engagement and i'm glad that you're not having breakfast and lunches because i think it just destroys the instructional day just the travel time is really very difficult so i want to thank you for that a couple of questions that i have that i didn't have during our uh sessions uh and i know that maybe you answered this will there
125be site will sites you know in the past we've had site summer school then we had central office summer school is all going to be one summer school from this summer school is going to be it so our students needing the most intensive support we are having all of them attend the central summer school sites but mrs jesse our schools are able to offer enrichment programs and other programs such as our title ones elementary schools are offering the rising kindergarten program so we will have unique programs being offered at many of our schools okay the other question that i have i noticed that the uh two-week enrichment programs and are there costs for the summer school i'm sure you answered that earlier but i just want the public to know for for the majority of
126these programs they are free to students okay are there specific ones that are costs there's a cost uh there there are some that have have a cost to them but all of our schools have and our summer school offices and our instructional offices have an opportunity that we will provide the tuition if you will for students who are receiving are economically disadvantaged or are receiving freedom-reduced lunch well again i i think it the word reimagine is i could not imagine a summer school this as comprehensive is so specifically driven in terms of looking at of course the strategic plan i think she knows the fourth i think you can recite them in your sleep can't you the four pillars of the four commitments i saw you last night and i i'm just pleased to have
127a strategic plan everything is aligned and i appreciate everything that you guys have done thank you thank you miss williams thank you mr chairman um i am very excited by this summer school program i think it's high time and beyond time that we are able to provide not only an academic program but an enrichment program as a parent going through round number i have no idea now of trying to find summer programming for not only my own child but for many of my bonus children the fact that the county is able to provide enrichment to families free of charge in a county where it can cost at i think the low end maybe 150 dollars for four days of a program up to 300 and some dollars to do stem camps for a week it
128is out of range for most families especially families that i work with on a regular basis let alone if you have multiple kids it's just impossible sometimes i also appreciate the fact that we are providing transportation ms goss if you would do me the favor of repeating what you just did for miss jesse because i know of so many parents who choose not to send their students to summer school because they hear that there is a cost but they don't hear about the part where if you're on free or reduced lunch or economically disadvantaged that we assist them i don't think we have ever promoted that or stated it out loud at a board meeting so if you don't mind so absolutely so our programs are intended to be free but those that do have
129a cost with them our instructional offices or summer school office we will be ensuring that no student who wants to participate is not able to because of the cost and so if a parent needs that assistance they can certainly reach out to to me or to a member of my team in teaching and learning in the office of student learning or can certainly contact the summer school office and they can route them to the folks in my office who can support that need thank you i appreciate that i will commend the summer school office already as i have peppered them with a plethora of questions um trying to do enrollment for my own child but also coordination with summersack programming there's a lot of moving parts that i don't think everyone appreciates i do very
130much as a parent of a young student now i appreciate the coordination that princeton county schools does with sac the transportation that's provided i think that's also something that we don't talk about in a lot of parents have their students enrolled in sac and don't know that your student can also participate in summer enrichment programs i think that's very valuable information to them i do want to know for um virtual parents who are not on school messenger or do not or have not received anything all year long on school messenger how are virtual parents going to be notified if their students should participate in the academic portion or about these programs in general because the system information for infor laying information is very different for virtual students so all students should be notified by their
131base school those who qualify for the summer school that is generated through our student information system there are lists that are monitored and the schools individually are reaching out through their counselors teachers so the base school should be reaching out and notifying those parents do we have an estimated on when that occurs because most parents of young students are just parents in general we've already started planning for the summer if not completed planning for the summer by this point in the school year um so i think it's important that if a parent hasn't received notification or if notifications have gone out that they go back and look at that could you give me like i'm not going to hold you to it goes out on may 17th but is there i can say that i
132made it i know that we have made the initial um the initial notifications and schools are in process of that i know most parents should have been notified by now so if they have not received confirmation from the school you know there's a letter that goes from the school as well please reach out to your school and inquire about the status of your child's need because that has been in progress it should have been happening more than one time there should have been notification by now so if a parent is in question please reach out to your base school thank you i appreciate that because this is like at the start of the year and the end of the year the two busiest times of year it's very easy for a parent to miss something
133as important as that and then um [Music] i i also want to note that i think it's important that parents look when i first reviewed this this information i misunderstood thinking that my student could go in an enrichment program at a summer school and i think you have to look closely at what grade level your students in and the school and the calendar programs laid out i just wanted to say that to parents while they have the opportunity because i missed it in a rush trying to be excited for all the new opportunities i was like let's sign up for everything um but i i think this is a fantastic start i look forward to growth in the years and i appreciate all of the hard work that goes into this because it takes months
134and months and lots of coordination and i just wanted to praise you for all of your efforts as well as dr mcdade for bringing another opportunity for our students to participate in the summer because so many who can't afford it would have never had this opportunity so thank you very much any other questions miss wall i just have a couple of clarification questions for my greater understanding of the program um one is if i'm looking at slide nine professional learning and family engagement um so i'm curious um under the family engagement part partnership with dewey facilitate division-wide family events platform available podcast books videos etc does a family need to enroll in the discovery portion of this to access some of these things like books videos promotions fun family events or is that separate is
135this is this separate from the discovery section so we we actually are going to advertise on the discovery those parent sessions we have not advertised those parent sessions yet we're still working out the logistics with some of our national experts and authors who are going to be joining us so as soon as those logistics are worked out with them we will be advertising those and we will ask that that parents um really go through a process to let us know that they're going to be participating in those opportunities that's also it's a great question because i also want to make take the opportunity to make a note to all of our parents that those family engagement sessions will also be interpreted in multiple languages so that all of our families can access those opportunities and
136by asking our parents to go through a process to let us know they're going to be participating it also allows them to let us know if they have any language needs um that we would then make sure that we have a channel set up for that for that language uh when the opportunity takes place okay so thank you so what i'm understanding then is that in order to access these kinds of family engagement things a family does need to register through the discovery through the discovery program right those that are offered by us yes now some of those um offered those family experiences offered by some of our partners there isn't a registration for example that every monday opportunity that families student and two accompanied adults can take advantage of they can go um to
137that place that doesn't require the registration okay i think i i understand um any i my other question is then for the discovery section because this is new right absolutely it is so is there a plan to help folks understand what this may look like or what the advantage would be to enroll your child in it i i'm just imagining a scenario where you have a student who's a good student but maybe you want to keep them occupied or busy or challenge them maybe they're an advanced student and but what is going to be i guess the education piece for the parents to say hey look this is going to be great i i don't apart from enrolling in it and actually kind of taking a leap of faith so you may have seen in
138the slides that were shared by mrs hebner the marketing and information that's going out about the sessions uh we are um promoting this uh as an opportunity for all students right that year-round learning uh so it certainly is and hopefully the parents that are listening tonight are also hearing me say that those enrichment opportunities are really for all students even those that are in the launch program there are some enrichment opportunities that they also can participate in of course the parents will need to look at the schedule to see if those line up with what their summer schedule is looking like but we can certainly make sure that we also put out some additional information through our school channels uh in in other ways um to ensure that parents uh understand uh the exact thing
139that you're asking about because we certainly want parents to take advantage of these enrichment opportunities i will say that we are already having a pretty robust a registration for those so i think the message is getting out but of course we want to really like i said reimagine and rebrand summer school as an opportunity to to learn year-round so we take on the challenge of putting out some additional communication around that okay great thank you i have one more question if that's okay sure um do we have um for obviously for the um launch it will be you know maybe you pass your sol or you pass your class or something like that but for the discovery do we have some kind of incentive structure or is there going to be like a certificate or
140so there are going to be absolutely so there are going to be a variety of incentives that we put out over the course of the summer that will include perhaps certificates but also a number of challenges where where students can get earned books or some other pieces that we're hoping to connect to those opportunities and so there will be those incentives posted as we move through the summer and get closer to the time of those enrichment opportunities so thank you for bringing that up because that's an important way that we're going to keep encouraging our students i also want to take the opportunity to just say that we're not limiting our students to those enrichment opportunities so students can certainly sign up for for more than one and we hope they do thank you thank
141you very much for answering my questions jackson thank you ms goss i'm excited about this extensive and change um i'm hoping that we will consider collecting feedback at the end of the year from participants or parents so that you know we can reevaluate it for next year because this is just this is great um i just one clarifying question because a bunch of my questions were kind of addressed and that's on page six and um it has to do this is gonna sound a little silly but are we front loading skills or are we reinforcing them because it is it though emerging third graders or current third graders because it says multiplication and division and i just want to make sure i'm reading the slide correctly because i it hasn't been covered in second grade
142so when we do um summer school for elementary students um that is for the grade that they're coming out of so they are getting those those skills again if you will but we are working on them in both ways that you just identified so we are looking to accelerate their learning but we also will be providing some interventions um through through summer school as well thank you okay great thank you both thank you very much thank you dr mcdade we will move on next to um 1601 approval of the board poll action um emotions in order miss jackson i moved that the prince william county school board confirmed the may 9th 2022 board poll supporting smapd's recommendation to reassign student sr 222-054 as discussed in the may 4 2022 closed session to have a second
143miss jesse seconds any discussion please vote miss ralston how do you vote yes mr also votes yes the vote is eight yes unanimous motion passed next we'll move to an update on the governor's school at innovation park by madam chair williams from the governor's school board thank you mr chairman before i start mr chairman is there anything you'd like to add from the last governor's school board meeting no you know we just got a report on where we were on uh admissions they were finalizing admissions for next year and um more calendar related stuff and budget stuff okay thank you i asked because i unfortunately had to attend a different meeting so i wanted to make sure the public was aware for the governor's school at innovation park not only did we have a meeting
144but one of my favorite things which i think i was this was my second time maybe third time attending but was the 2022 research symposium held by all of our students at the governor's school innovation park this was on may 13th student groups presented and had displays for [Music] 66 projects of varying topics that range from everything the average person could understand to some things that i think i need a research scientist to explain to me as i was there but the students did a fantastic job of making their projects understandable and communicating with those of us who don't live breathe sleep science research on a daily basis beings though i was there and had the opportunity to attend i picked up some student brochures i'd like to highlight i want to mention i was
145not only joined there by staff from the governor's school but there were members of the public who were there who were spoke so highly of our students as well as the chairman the first project i'd like to share is the ambro box these pamphlets and student projects were all done by the students this project in particular was a storage type of container designed by the students that had an led screen an indicator that informed you when whatever it is that you put in this box and then plugged into the led or at the top when your food was expiring and it also not only told you by date and time on top but there's light indicators as well um the next one i stopped by was the drop and drink which is an automatic uh
146intake on automatic recycling machine which would eliminate the need for multiple recycling containers you just drop your item in it automatically sorts it and voila [Music] another topic another presentation was called air touch it eliminated the need to touch screens this was generated of course due to covet so you would simply place your finger or an item in front of in this example it's an elevator and do a little motion like this the button would light up the device would work and it would be um contactless um this one was pretty fascinating i walked up to the student he said my project's pretty simple and i said simple is awesome sometimes most often actually this is an uh pen for individuals who suffer from rheumatoid arthritis the devices used by individuals with this particular condition
147often are larger to alleviate symptoms but the emphasis on this project was to take an existing device which is a writing utensil whoever is using it would then be alerted to the time that they should be using it to write before causing themselves for their harm and injury the next project my youngest son i had to share with him he thought this was great as his responsibility was feeding cats and asked me when could i buy this was an automatic cat feeder excuse me it was an automatic cat feeder that not only could put your cat on a diet depending on which cat walked in it identified the cat by weight it dosed food appropriately and then also could tell if that same cat went back for repeat feedings and would not feed that cat
148to keep the cat healthy and for those of us who own cats know that also keep your cat from being mad at you so so i thought this was pretty interesting i picked up the brochures as many as that i could find to show members of the public here these are our students these are student generated ideas we don't tell our students this is a list of projects you have to take and make your own this is what comes from them they are then mentored provided teaching sometimes they work with partners in the community they have to be able to explain their projects to the average citizen that walks by um they it is also on display because prince william county schools nasa city mass park also bring in younger student high school students so
149that they have the opportunity to view these projects to get excited about the governor's school once again i just want to say i'm so very proud to be chair to be able to participate in the academic life of these students but just proud in general that these are our students our prince william county students who developed and created these projects also with manassas city and manassas park and i want to forget them but this is what our students are capable of so it's not just thomas jefferson as the school that we hear about the most where we talk about stem and steam activities we have this right in our backyard we should be so extremely proud of our students who participate in the governor's school and all of the extra work that they take on
150to participate in the governor's school and if you have the opportunity i would encourage you to attend next year because it is open to the public it's held on george mason campus at innovation park in manassas and just really i mean it is something to see and very amazing and to end i just want to say an early congratulations to our governor school students who will graduate on friday from the governor's school because they graduate on mason's timeline they're not done with high school period but they will be done with their governor school program that will be this friday at 8 30 a.m i just want to say congratulations in advance and how much i look forward to participating they along with independence non-traditional have students as the main focus of their graduation and i
151look forward to hearing our student speakers every year they always produce such amazing speakers one year actually several years before kovid they they used facetime to opt in a student to graduate who could not be there and the students all gathered around and carried an iphone i believe it was or an ipad to walk him ceremoniously to receive his um credentials and this was pre-covet so the things that our students do if we get out of the way and allow them to have accountability for their own academics and mentor to and support them is just amazing and noteworthy thank you mr chairman excellent all right fantastic thank you miss williams we're going to move on to what matters uh mr wilk we'll start with you okay thank you mr chairman a lot to kept catch
152up on um last session i a lot of time to miss jesse to have that recognition which was great at the end of the night just a couple events i want to praise that i attended shortly after last board meeting i do want to recognize so a lot of times middle school productions don't you know for performances and stuff you know of course a lot of middle schools have cafetoriums and such and you know it's not as glamorous as a high school auditorium to put on a show but i have to commend uh grant park had a phenomenal performance of beauty and the beast i've never seen a turnout like there was for that show and it was a great job and i do want to recognize the actor bell actor actress belle who has
153i think a great future in musical theater phenomenal work um forest park seen a lot of attention rightfully so for the forest park suicide awareness walk that was held on 5 7 a number of my colleagues came out to support as they always do including members of the bocs congressman conley dr mcdade and so i think this was a very again a timely event given the spike of suicides depression other mental concerns that are impacting our students today i do want to also mention that yesterday i was able to attend with dr mcdade a great event the fourth annual forest park police appreciation dinner this is police officer appreciation week and as always you know i'm very thankful for the sros we have in our schools last night i was with the sro force park
154along with the other police officers for their shift as forest park students actually fed the police officers interacted with them went on tours of the building and the news station it was just a great event and it was great to be part of and respect those who serve in our law enforcement both the men and women it's a great opportunity at the beginning for students who are interested in that career hearing from the police chief and others about those opportunities lastly i want to recognize a couple people uh potomac high school's own chef ronald evans he received an award for education excellence in the entire state or the commonwealth of virginia so major credit to him and some of the great programs uh the way he was able to finesse around the kitchen for uh
155when he was doing virtual uh was amazing the cameras he set up and all that stuff is great uh and then also i've noticed a lot of potomac recognition with some of these county-wide videos that have been put out ashland watchdogs which i'm biased i think is one of the best watchdog programs largely thanks to a strong military community there nurse elizabeth gonzalez of forest park for nurses appreciation and then of course shannon garrity was interviewed for the suicide awareness walk so thank you all i'm looking forward to next meeting thank you miss sagable thank you um you know we talk at this time of year a lot about our seniors graduating and moving on and uh over the past couple weeks i got to see a lot of the parents who are also going
156to be moving on because they have their last of their children who are in whatever their thing is music sports whatever and i just want to say thank you to the parents who spend all this time volunteering at school putting in all these hours and hours of time to make sure that their students that our students have opportunities to excel in sports or in something academic or in music it just struck me as i was going to some of these final events at some of the schools that um we we also have parents who are sort of matriculating through so thank you to all of you who do those things um i got to do some interesting things this week i was at the dale city civic association where i also heard our police chief
157talk about just various things and we did spend a little bit of time talking about future careers for our students there's a cadet program that i think would be really interesting for our kids to take a look at you cannot become a police officer until you are 21 but they have programs that will sort of get you in the in the career and and take you through so i encourage people to take start taking a look at that um got to also do the suicide awareness walk and that's going to connect with some other things here in just a second um also i spent some time at hilton high school this week their counseling staff was doing different things during their lunch period and one of the things that that one of their staff members
158their one of their counselors came up with uh they found out um there are scholarships available for people to be able to pay for medical or mental health services so there's a an organization called to write love on her arms that would be t-w-l-o-h-a-dot-com they have a scholarship that pays for somewhere around three to six months of mental health care and it it'll it'll pay that money directly to uh the therapist or organization you need a guardian to help fill out the application so you can't just do it by yourself it's meant for people 18 and under if you need a higher level of care like an iop which is called intensive outpatient care they will look at funding those too but i encourage you to look at that because i know mental health is
159expensive and once you can find someone that you want to work with if you would like a little help in paying for it i encourage you to take a look at that last thing i want to mention is congratulations to all of the kids who are working on graduating here they're going to be your future's wide open i um i always get kind of teary when i go to graduations it's like one of my favorite things but i wish you all lots of luck in whatever your future endeavors do thank you miss wall thank you dr latif so i'm going to start out by talking to the students um testing season is upon us as you know so i would encourage you to do your best work and get a good night's rest eat a
160good breakfast and remember if you've been working all along this whole school year you're going to do fine and don't worry and and just say a prayer and do your best i'm looking forward to the end of year concerts and performances graduations and events this is a really exciting time of year last year was such a touch and go situation with covid and and everything else you know if if you recall we were you know weeks before graduation we're going to ensure if we could have it in person so i'm really excited about this year i'm really looking forward to honoring graduates being able to give those handshakes and hugs in person and graduates i just want to celebrate you and your accomplishments some happenings that i was able to attend this last two week
161period unit unity braxton renaming ceremony was last week it was a beautiful event that's a school in my district right on the very edge of my district and i was happy to see the successful rebranding of the school and feel the excitement there i was able to attend all these elementary schools color run on saturday i got a t-shirt for that and it was a color run so everybody ended up colored in color not me though because i didn't my shirt on but um the best thing about this was the community came out it wasn't for like awards or anything but everybody just came out for it little tiny kids all the way up to grandma and grandpa and the adults were the ones that got the most color like all over them the kids
162were just targeting them and it was it was just really a lot of fun fun tradition um one of the things that i'm so happy about being back in person is that we can have these fun traditions that pull us together as a community and build that fun love of being a school community and that transfers into the classroom at least i believe that it does it just came from senior awards night at battlefield so rewarding to hear the students accomplishments and the different scholarships and awards that they had been given so shout out to all those students i'm looking forward to tomorrow evening there's a graduation celebration night for the cassette program at battlefield high school that's a specialty program there and also to the governor's school graduation ceremony on friday i want to
163say thank you to our school nurses last wednesday was national school nurse day my family's been personally affected by im impacted by fantastic school nurses and i just want to say thank you to the nurses all around our division i continue continue to be concerned about academic progress and challenges that many students are facing i continue to have concerns about collective bargaining please reach out to me if you have thoughts and that you want to share on that topic i'm very interested in your thoughts about start times as always i am accessible by email and phone and i am willing to meet with you i will meet with anybody in my district who wants to talk with me about anything that they want to talk about um miss jackson and i are looking to set
164up additional office hours we've done this in the winter we want to do it again where we you can come and meet and talk with us and set up a time if you're interested please reach out to me we'll set something up if you have comments you want to make email me reach out to me send me a text and we'll schedule a time to talk thanks very much everybody and have a great evening ms williams thank you mr chairman since the last meeting i was able to attend the fourth annual multicultural night at freedom high school i want to specifically thank mr akbar for putting this program together it was amazing and fantastic the number of countries the pride in the student families that were represented freedom is one of the schools that received
165students who were afghan refugees i was told that that was one of the first nights that those students felt like they belonged and were included and it meant so much not only to them but to all of the families that participated there was food to try which i tried it was great um the fashion show exhibits the amazing outstanding artwork that was on display i mean just fantastic thank you mr agbar for advocating organizing and putting this together with all the other staff that helped you and thank you to mr rolong for pulling me aside to meet all the students who were selling the goodies and the food and supporting the school as you always do i want to give a special shout out to denise carroll as a parent i started with robotics when
166it first came into this county participated robotics team at rockledge have gone back to many robotics competitions i think that she is an invaluable resource to our robotics program and as for someone who has been involved or around robotics for so many years it is just amazing to see how well this program has grown and all of the students who come back once they graduate to support the younger students who participate in robotics i also was at the suicide awareness walk amazing event as usual it was the seventh annual i want to also acknowledge that i went to the kathleen seafeld awards miss jessie was a presenter i want to congratulate the art teacher from fanny fitzgerald who was nominated and won an award i also want to take a moment to congratulate all the
167students who so far have participated in the various student walkouts across our school division to protest the upcoming or the leaked decision for roe vs wade that was something that was codified into law that allows students to participate and use their civil rights and i am so proud for the students who did and um i also want to make note to the code of behavior received a lot of comments and let people know that a lot of that is driven by the vdoe and not the school division itself we add on but the majority of that comes directly from the virginia assembly and the decisions they make there i would encourage you to reach out to your state legislator about those parents if you are in my district title one nights are coming up for
168summer enrichment math on various topics please sign up and register i encourage all their students students out there good luck with their sll and exams the meeting for racial and social justice commission was supposed to be held tomorrow it is cancelled summer please register for all the summer programs fall registration is open now for sac if you have not registered please encourage you to do so and i want to take a moment to say to all of our students who are not graduating who technically should please don't give up there's always summer graduation independence and so many other opportunities thank you thank you mr williams miss jesse uh first of all i want to thank uh miss william for uh highlighting the fact that hilton performing arts had their first they've always had this award
169ceremony for businesses and this is the first time they've actually had an award for teachers and the teacher's name is dr laura cherry she works at fannie fitzgerald she's an amazing art teacher and i do have a slide for aviation maintenance if you put the slide up for me please okay this is brian fields brian fields is the first recipient of the aviation maintenance award or a scholarship for fifteen thousand dollars his mom was there uh he did not know he was going to be selected and uh you can put the slide down now thank you but i wanted to just chat a little bit about this program because this is a program that marian dobbs cohen she and i connected because we were doing this black history program for prince william county and she
170had entered she called me when she started her job at aviation and said come out but it was doug wright who said lily you you always want everybody to go to college you know that everyone doesn't need to go to college and they can make great a great deal of money mr ossie harris who is now the who took mrs dobbs place said that these students could make up from 60 to 100 in repairing airplanes so i'm very excited and i want to thank heather abney it was a long haul it took us two or three years to get that program into woodbridge high school so i'm very uh pleased with that i also attended the future kings uh these are students who are interested in their 12 and 13 and 14 year old kids
171and they're interested in all kinds of things including robotics and gaming and i want to thank mr eric king for his his leadership in that program unity braxton i just want to take some time i know i'm not going to get to all the things that i've attended but unity braxton was very meaningful and i i want to thank you guys uh for jennifer and dr ev everyone who made that program exciting it was very personal for me and my husband because our first church that we attended and when we came here as a couple was first baptist and i was baptized there and the deacon and deaconess at that church were the braxton and so her life when she passed away no one knew that she had done all these things in civil rights
172and my husband is a member of the moffat point marines and if you don't know what that means that uh marines who were uh african-american initially were not allowed to train with the other white marines they were sent to moffat point and mr braxton is now 98 years old and very very alert and with that i'm going to close because i don't want to go with my time and i'll cover the other items next at the next board meeting thank you miss ralston um the only thing i can say is that i'll be glad to see you all have a great time and we thank you for everything you've done thank you miss ralston miss jackson i just want to take a moment and say thank you again to our student representatives um you three
173are exceptional human beings and i know that you can besides being current change agents you're going to go on and make a big difference so thank you for your service this is the one more month of school good luck to all students taking their end of the year exams sols and ap tests have fun and safe time during your end of the year events on may 11th where school nurse appreciation day so thank you again to all prince william county nurses the past few years you've maintained your regular duties while helping at immunization clinics and contract tasting and countless other coverage related duties so thank you also a huge thank you to our law enforcement officers for all that you do to serve our community congrats to ms hernandez for patriot for her recognition as
174student as excuse me as school lunch hero through the no kid hungry virginia also it's national physical and sports month thank you to all athletic trainers coaches and physical education teachers for teaching students how to be active healthy and to be good and kind sports congrats to all those students who came today for the robotics and all those who participate over the past few weeks i've had the privilege to watch some very talented students perform at pennington and brunsville district high school while watching the performances what struck me was the commitment of staff students and families and the hours of practice i also witnessed the beautiful support of staff family and friends this support made me reflect on the importance of a support network and how a support network can look different for everyone and
175the correlation with the mental health and awareness month a support network supports us at our school events after school events and also can help us navigate events that may weigh heavy in our minds as we get closer to the end of the school year it is my hope that everyone can find someone to reach out to there's also i hope you consider going to the mental health expo that dr mcdade spoke on and i hope everyone has a great night thank you okay great wonderful um great great meeting tonight thank you all for your patience for letting us honor and recognize uh with our launching thriving futures group with the students that we've had up here um you know one of my mantras when i decided to run and serve on the sport is student
176success student success is something we should continue to celebrate it's been a tough couple years with the pandemic but i commend these students these families for pushing through continuing to pursue their interests their dreams and it's been very exciting to watch and see to see again i want to thank our student members who've been outstanding this year and i really hope you know i think you'll have some legacy items that will be left here once this is all said and done over the next couple years as we sort of work through school start times and so i look forward to working on that it's been a great couple weeks i did get to attend the robotics tournaments in dallas with so many of our students just putting on their best behavior modeling you know outstanding
177scholarly work competitive spirit just just having a great fun time i watched much of the international science fair virtually in atlanta that took place which was outstanding went to the science fair symposium the science symposium held by the governor's school always a great place see some of the innovation from our students i continue to see great success on the lacrosse fields by many of our high schools baseball is in the middle of district finals lacrosse as well our track and field students are doing terrific and we have we continue to see success in girls soccer and whatever other i think if i have missed any of the other spring sports but outstanding effort by all around um to our seniors you're up on your last couple weeks of school commencements will start uh wrap up
178your stuff get your graduation stuff in i wish you all the best it's been um an incredible time to be in high school i don't know about incredible good just incredible in in in your experience will shape how you think about the future and how we behave the next time something like this comes around and so the the damage done the success that may have been learned from some of the things we did will be something that you'll have to think about as you grapple with this kind of situation in the future and and help us lead our way through this kind of thing so your experience is going to be incredible and to our student members who saw this work out over the course of this year in the last couple years you know
179again i wish you the best so with that all being said to our seniors i wish you all the best and i hope you have a great um the next time we'll see you as a commencement have a great week weekend memorial day weekend everybody thank you meeting adjourned