001on to we have a public hearing today as well as a regular Schoolboard meeting so we don't enter into the Schoolboard meeting yet we have a public hearing and so uh tonight let's see make sure I got everything in my right order here moving on to a item item 11.01 which is a public hearing on the interm appointment to the Prince County School Board of an acting Schoolboard member for the brentville magisterial district tonight's hearing is the next step of the process for the school board will follow to Temporary fill Mr tren's position why he is De vo to Africa therefore I declare that the public hearing is now open on the subject of the interterm appointment to the Prince William County School Board of an acting school board member for the brentville magisterial district
002Mr trenham retains his office during his deployment and will retake his seat and resume his duties and term when he returns we expect that will happen prior to the start of the 20178 school year the school board is scheduled to make an appointment of the interm acting board member at our meeting on September 21st this is your opportunity to offer input on the applicants for the temporary position the individuals who have filed the required application are gerica boo Davis Shawn bran Christopher Park Douglas Hunter Porterfield and Tara Anne tadlock only those individuals whose names will be only those these individuals whose names will be considered at this public hearing will be considered for an appointment as the acting school board member any citizen who has signed up to speak on the subject may do so
003when called upon candidates for the intern position who will address the school board first are asked to observe a maximum of 5 minute time limit when addressed by the when addressing the board citizens speaking on candidates behalf are asked to observe the maximum three minute time when addressing the school board the lights on the monitor will indicate your progress the Yellow Block will signify that you should sum up your position the red indicates your time is up and you should stop please use proper decor and manners while at the podium if you do not do so you'll be asked to step aside please give your name and address for the record when you approach the podium I now ass set the five applicants to come forward take their seats in the front row there will
004be four candidates just for the record the first Speaker of the first candidate that has applied is uh Mr Shawn bran Sean it is it is your time and you are able to speak good evening school board members chairman Sawyers and Dr Walts as you may remember I had the pleasure to address the board a couple times last year as the chair of the safe schools advisory Council thank you for the chance to speak with you tonight about the temporary bral schore School Board position like many of you I was shocked in June to learn that guil trm was going to be deployed for a year one of my first thoughts was how will this affect the brinville district I was honored to be considered worthy like Chris Park to fill Gill's big shoes those
005of us in the brinville district know we are lucky to have a class act in Gil trenum who exemplifies Integrity intelligence and excellent constituent service to our district as for myself I was blessed to have one of the greatest professions on the face of this Earth I was a teacher for 7even years of my professional experience I was an English teacher at Woodbridge senior High School go Vikings teaching mostly 10th and 11th grade students my goal as as an English teacher was to inspire my students every day to love writing and literature as a former teacher I know what it's like on a daily basis to be in the trenches of Prince County Schools I understand the challenges that teachers go through and the ever increasing demands that are placed on our teachers when I
006left teaching a decade ago I knew I wanted to stay active in education when my daughter Sophia started at glenkirk elementary school I had attended the advisory Council meetings simply as a parent who wanted to be engaged in what was going on in the school when boundary changed us moved us to Piney Branch Elementary School I was part of the naming committee for that school and assisted our excellent principal Kirsten Fischer and starting up the advisory council at the school I have enjoyed my leadership role as the chair of that advisory Council since the spring of 2012 assisting the administration by resolving issues of concern to the teachers in the communities that feed into Piney Branch I've also volunteer for boundary committees specifically the Hay Market in Young Elementary schools on those committees we worked
007with staff to balance Community desires and the logistic requirements that come along with school enrollments I understand the nuances that are involved with tough decisions we may have had many diverse opinions in our meetings but we did our best to work together to forge a consensus on the difficult task of School boundaries that experience has given me a greater understanding of the types of sensitive decisions that Schoolboard members must make every single month our first got to know Gil trenum in 2002 when he asked me to be part of his first District budget committee once again I had the opportunity to work with other parents in addition to teachers and budget gurus on that committee through this committee I gained an understanding of how the budgeting process works and have spent many hours looking for
008savings and ways to address school overcrowding class size reduction and teacher raises my budget committee experience has also led me to a greater awareness of what it is like to govern a school district this large and how the budget teachers and students lastly it's been a credible experience to be part of the safe schools advisory Council for serving as Mr tram's appointee and now his chair I think the I thank the council for having the faith in me to lead them last year since I've been on the council we have focused on key issues affecting our students such as mental health and bullying prevention the council provided an opportunity to work with senior level staff and looking at problems that are districtwide I believe my experience in that committee and especially cheer has given me
009insight into what many of our students and our faculty face I would continue to make sure that our system focuses on issues such as mental health challenges and Bully and prevention as this experience has shown me what we can do collectively to make a difference in my 18 years living in Prince William County the majority of which was in the Eastern end of the county I have experience as a teacher helping to guide students while balancing the rigorous demands placed on our teachers I have parent experience as an advisory Council chair in shaping an individual school and supporting our school staff I have experience of tackling contentious issues with my work on Boundary and naming committees I have experienced on the brinville budget committee working with the cross-section of parents teachers and citizens to find
010ways to reduce class sizes and increase teacher compensation while staying within our challenging budget I have experienced at the systemwide level cheering the safe schools advisory Council working on the countywide issues such as mental health and bullying prevention I believe all these years of experiences and Leadership roles has may be well prepared to step into the role as temporary acting school board member one of the most important leadership skills that a school board member can have is the ability to listen listen to students listen to parents listen to teachers listen to the community I am ready to listen and work with staff and other school board members to make Prince William County schools a worldclass system I thank you for the opportunity to be considered for this role and I thank you again for the
011opportunity to speak tonight thanks thank you Mr BR our next speaker is Christopher Park Mr Park you you will have five minutes as well good evening uh members of the board Dr Waltz uh thank you for the opportunity to speak this evening for those who may not know I was one of the three people that Mr tramas has stepped into a seat during his deployment it was an honor to be asked as a resident of the brinville district I feel it is important that we have a voice on the board and it has B been wonderful to receive the support from the district and around the county Mr TR trenham had a town hall a few weeks ago to fill us in on his personal status and the status of the school board position the
012word I heard several times was trust Mr trenham could be trusted to do what he said he would do the people of brentville District have put their trust in Gil and elected him three times to his school board seat I know we're all anxiously awaiting his safe return and I'm grateful that he chose to trust me to act on his behalf before I tell you about myself I wanted to point out one lesson learned we as a community must ask our legislators and this board to clearly Define a process that protects our service members or anyone who must temporarily step away from their position on the board now a bit about me I grew up in Northern Virginia and attended Fairfax County Schools my wife and I moved to noville 17 years ago the smaller
013schools and tight-knit community in the brentville district played a large part in where we chose to move our daughter started as a kindergartener at the old noville elementary school and this year started the 9th grade at brentville I've been active in the parent teacher organization from the start I served as a year as Treasurer and a year as PTO vice president through the PTO I met many parents and recognized that even with our different backgrounds we all shared a desire for our children to receive the best education possible I've been a member at The Advisory council at the noville school for several years and serving as chairman last year working on the advisory Council gave me the insight into the processes and decisions about Staffing budget and testing that must be made by every principal
014at every school I've had the experience in leadership role to work with staff and parents in supporting a school I've also worked for the past four years on the brinville Gainesville school budget committee Mr trenam and Miss sat white brought together a diverse group of citizens and teachers to work together to see where our limited funds could be has put to use working on this committee has helped me to understand the county budget process from the start I learned how money is allocated and how each department and each school had to manage their money the questions we asked for those first couple of years led to realistic numbers going forward this committee has saved the school system and the taxpayers money always keeping the goals of classroom size reduction and teacher compensation as priorities I
015understand the tough decisions that board members must make every budget season it was through that committee that I met the other people other two people Gil had asked to step up none of us thought this was a competition just that he wanted to have someone Sim with similar views that he could work with and whose intention was the betterment of the school system I would ask that the board look closely at me me and Mr brwn as individuals that now Navy Commander trenum trusts as individuals have both worked to improve education in the county and as individuals that have our District's support I would ask that you respect Mr tren's wishes and appointing a temporary replacement I have experience of working in a leadership role at my community schools and working on budget I feel
016this experience is invaluable to anyone considering stepping into a role at the school board I will continue to Advocate both for our students and our teachers either as a member of the board or as a member of the community thank you very much thank you Mr Park our next speaker is Douglas Hunter Porterfield thank you chairman sers and the rest of the school board appreciate this opportunity to speak to you on behalf of the inim position of brinville school board representative I've lived in brinville for 16 years come this October next month and I have three boys in the school system at this time they went to Cedar Point Elementary School two of them are now in marstellar middle school and the third one started Patriot High School this last week so I do uh
017care about how the schools are run my wife forl has been a substitute teacher for several years at multiple schools within the prince room County system for Prince William County I was on the 2030 committee that was chaired by now supervisor Frank priny I was on the housing board for almost nine years with three years as chair as a term limited chairmanship on that Committee in the brinville I'm sorry in the brain Brar Community Association our homeowners community that serves 6,000 homes and over 10,000 people I was on the board for 11 years and share of that for nine years uh helping move it away from the developer board onto the residence board some of my background I grew up in Southern Virginia I went to Prince Edward County High School and so I've been
018around education my whole life I grew up on the Hampton Sydney college campus as you can see from the resume y'all have I worked as a technical management consultant mainly uh supporting the FAA I've trained engineer but I have a lifelong learning uh attitude I have two master's degrees with an NBA from the University of Maryland at College Park and I keep looking for certificates for specific topics of learning such as the project management professional certificate a PMP certificate I'm a strong proponent of process for that reason process allows tracking of progress and also doing things the same way time and time again so that feelings or attitudes don't creep in when you need to treat everyone the same way each time I see tonight's agenda involves several processes that's a good thing one multi-tiered
019systems of student support that discusses processes for that Activity one actually changing is the School Board calendar I see yall moved up the beginning of that review process to this meeting uh as an aside I'm in favor of starting after Labor Day but I understand there's pluses and minuses to both of those decisions I'm opposing a big proponent of budget especially balance budgets uh setting balanced budgets managing toward those balanced budgets using the funds efficiently and effectively in support of the students and their learning I do understand this is an interim position for Mr Gil Trum however I will do my best to represent the brinville district and support the school board I will keep Mr chairman informed of relevant details and information to help him be best prepared when he returns and takes over
020his position if you have any questions now or later please do not hesitate to contact me thank you thank you and our last applicant is Tara and tadlock miss tadlock you also have five minutes thank you good evening my name is Tara tadlock I would like to tell you a little about myself and my background I come from a very Community involved family of six children my mother was a constant volunteer from coaching to sitting on the board of the Community College trade school my father drove us from event to event my brothers and I were involved in various Sports and community activities two of my brothers became Eagle Scouts and both still Co coach High School athletics in addition to their full-time jobs three of us served as volunteer firefighters three of us also
021served in the military when I was 17 I graduated high school and went into the army I reported to West Point the United States Military Academy the following year after several invaluable years of attending college classes while also learning to be a leader of soldiers I graduated with a Bachelor of Science due to an injury I was discharged from the Army and moved here to Virginia for a job very quickly I was back to serving the Department of Defense and the Army as a contractor a few years later I became a civilian employee with the Department of the army this past may I accepted a promotion position with the United States Census Bureau when I was in high school and I had a week or a few weeks off of summer training while a Cadet
022at the Academy I worked a summer job most Cadets I knew relaxed with family went on vacations backp pass backpacked across Europe or other such activities I worked a summer job starting in high school I was a camp councelor of a park and recation summer and winter camp programs I worked my way up to be being the assistant director assisting to run and plan the entire program I've always loved to be involved with my community and the youth in it from teaching children to play various Sports engaging with others helping them learn to read and tutoring in math and English I've always been one to give back to our youth I hope that I can continue to do so in helping other people grow to be successful contributors of society who may give back to
023their communities down the road while I'm new to Prince William County I hope to be helpful in keeping our community a great place to live my husband and I bought our house here in April moving from Fairfax County we love our new house and our new community our neighbors are friendly the children play outside and there are great amenities offered when we were looking for a new house to move to one of the things that my husband looked for was children playing outside since we were looking in the winter you would think you would not see too much of that but it was a huge consideration for us and allowing our son to grow up the top of my list was the schools that were in the area Prince Williams schools are wonderful and boast
024fantastic graduation rates I hope to assist our board in continuing the Fantastic strides our community makes and preparing our youth for life since moving here I became involved quickly in the community and I volunteered to chair board on our homeowners association I would like to note that while applicants had the opportunity to have people speak on their behalf I have not asked anyone to do so I would rather my application sit before you and to be judged how you perceive me I am trustworthy honorable and since I was 17 years old I have dedicated my life to helping my community my country and those around me finally I would like to thank my husband and our son for encouraging me in my drive to serve our community I hope that you all find me worthy
025of continuing to serve my community in a higher capacity during Mr tram's deployment thank you thank you then we're moving right along here to the uh citizens who want to speak on behalf uh we want to speak about the temporary replacement um it looks like that we have 20 people that signed up in advance and two people that signed up at the door I'll remind everyone that you can come to the podium and and and also uh and also you know if you choose to shorten your speech and say that you agree with someone else that is you are welcome to do that as well um everyone that signed up will have a chance to speak for a maximum of three minutes I will call the names and ask you take a seat in the
026front row um so our next group of speakers and sorry we have new microphones here so if you can't hear me someone just throw something at me and we'll be good uh don't do that actually I'm just kidding um so our first Speaker after the after the applicants is delegate Bob Marshall from the 13th District here in Prince William County and then an nuzo Robert Watson Steve Bender aiff Carney Deborah Weber rile o Casey and Don scoggan we'll start from there if all of you could come up to the front here so we get going delegate Marshall you can go and take the podium you'll be first so you don't have to get too comfortable and again as a reminder all the all citizens now that the candidates had five minutes and all citizens will
027have three minutes to to address the board and delegate Marshall you are up sir thank you very much Mr chairman I would first note that as a community we are very fortunate to have such individuals with the backgrounds and talents that they have whether or not they were endorsed or chosen by uh Mr tranum Commander Trum to to be on this board so we are we are very fortunate in that let me just give you a little bit of um background the military is treated with some Difference by the Constitution and elected officials of the Commonwealth of Virginia for example while the Constitution forbids me or any state senator from directly holding a federal job we make an exception for members of the uniform services you can be a commander you can be a private
028and you can serve in public office we allow spouses of military individuals who are assigned to Virginia but were not residents of Virginia to receive uh instate tuition we don't do that to anybody else the president of IBM could move here for a year uh his spouse or her spouse would have to pay you know full Freight uh Senator colan and myself a number of years ago uh passed a statute allowing a member I think it was of the Hy Market Town Council who was with the defense department was deployed to take his oath of office in absentia so we defer to the military and I think it's a a good tradition the purpose of this is to allow members of the military to be able to effectively efficiently and completely serve both their community
029and their country and part of that I would suggest to you is the ability if you are deployed to be able to pick someone to stand in your stead to represent the people because the voters of the brenfield district gave their gave their judgment to Mr trenum to represent them now I represented the brinville district or what was then the brinville district for 20 years and then I was uh moved over a little bit but the fact that they have done that they've placed their judgment in him to make a substituted judgment for them I would suggest should weigh very heavily on your decision to in this circumstance limit the choice to individuals that Mr trenham has chosen to not do so would be interpreted by some as an attempt to Commander the Democratic process
030to overcome an election without uh the uh necessity of in fact conducting an election and again I want to compliment all the individuals who came up here both those who were picked by Mr trenham to substitute for him and those who are not your contributions your talents are recognized and appreciated and I hope that in some capacity you serve but again I would urge this board to be consistent with the voters of the district who chose Mr Trent him knowing that he was a commander and might be called away to honor his wish and to honor their wishes and pick an individual who in Mr tram's judgment best reflects uh the common good that was uh that was supported by the voters of the brinville district thank you very much thank you delegate Marshall our
031next speaker our next speaker is an nuzo an good evening thank you for pronouncing my name correctly I appreciate that my name is my name is Ann nozo I live in the independence community of Manasses I am here to comment on the guil trenum interim appointment to the school board my children attend Prince William County schools my children are neither Democrats nor Republicans they are students in their respective Prince William County schools they are taught courtesy and respect the six pillars of character which are trustworthiness fairness citizenship responsibility respect and caring our children look to the adults in their lives to demonstrate these values and ideas Deals they look to their parents their teachers their school administrators and to you the school board where their fact or fiction the belief exists that the issue of
032temporary filling Gil trenham seat while he serves his country has become political or partisan my children are not Democrats or Republicans you have a responsibility to make the right decision by supporting one of Mr tren's recommendations as a brentville area resident I have voted for Mr trenum and I support Mr trenum in all areas related to Schoolboard activities I support the candidates that Mr trenum provided to the school board to serve in his absence my children only care that their best interests are served not a candidates political affiliation I don't know Mr Park but I worked with Mr bran as a member of the Piney Branch advisory counil of the member of the Devin road now Chris Young boundary committee I know him to be a competent leader and effective Communicator organized and someone who
033cares very deeply about the Prince William County schools I'm confident that Mr bran would serve the best interest of the brunville area and my children on the school board and I support Mr bran please remember our children the students of Prince County are watching to ensure they receive a worldclass education to see if you the school board follow all of the ideas and values Prince County has taught them thank you thank you an our next speaker is Robert Watson Mr Watson thank you Mr chairman my name is Bob Watson and I live in the cold district and my contact information is on file with the clerk I'm here tonight as a retired military officer to ask you and everyone on the board to honor the wishes of Commander Gil trenum by selecting one of his
034nominees to serve as his proxy on the school board while he's deployed to do otherwise is essentially muting his voice and the voice of his constituents in the brinville district and I know that all of you are better than that in government and in Private Industry across the Commonwealth and our country citizens soldiers Airmen Sailors and Marines are called to serve their country and they do so willingly laws are in place to ensure their position in government or private sector or guaranteed upon their return and by not selecting one of Commander tren's nominees you are de facto removing him from the board and while he's gone this is a disservice not only to him but it disenfranchises the members of the brentville district District who elected him Mr chairman and other members of the board
035when you ran your uh uh as candidates last year many of you said that you would put students and Families First so I ask you and everyone else on the board to please do that now honor that pledge honor commander commander trenham service to our nation and honor and respect the residents of brentville by seating one of his nominees on the school board until he returns turns thank you thank you our next speaker is Steve Bender Mr [Applause] Bender name is Steve Bender my address is on file with the clerk chairman at large Sawyers and members of the school board tonight you've heard from four applicants who are seeking to be appointed as the temporary substitute to Commander trenum during his deployment with the United States Navy when Commander trenum announced Ed his orders he
036did not that night request a temporary substitute to be appointed and to date he has yet to do so there's a very real question as to whether this hearing or an appointment by this board is even legal yes we have an informal opinion from a deputy attorney general but we also have an opinion from the lawyers at the division of legislative Services the lawyers that write the laws before the general assembly introduces them they say the opposite Commander tranum didn't surrender his seat it's not like when the other board members have left in the past years where there's a vacancy There's No Vacancy he asked that this board consider one two three candidates and he asked that you consider those three and then whichever of those three you felt you could work best with to
037select that person to stand in his stad when well he's overseas instead we went to a senator who doesn't represent the brinville district we sought an opinion that was to the liking of those that sought it and whatever may have been the real motivation the perception and sometimes perception is just as important as reality is that it was a strong armed tactic to put in someone who's more aligned with the beliefs and the voting practices of those that sought the opinion someone who and this is the perception would follow the chairman blindly apparently not doing that can get you in some hot water of the four candidates you heard tonight two have worked with me on the budget committee for the Gainesville rville District Mr bran Mr Park are both experts in the budget and
038they will be a huge asset to this board as we get into budget season in the coming months so I encourage you to choose one of those two candidates whichever one you feel you can work best with they're both friends I really can't pick between them if I had the vote I have I won't say who it is take whoever you like best that's the message that Commander trenham had for you before he deployed and that's the message that the citizens and the voters of brentville have for this board tonight thank you thank you our next speaker is odf Carney Mr Carney thank you Mr chairman uh H Mr chairman and respected members of the school board my name is Alf Carney and my address is on file um I also want to address the
039issue regarding filling the seat that is being vacated by Mr trenum due to his deployment my personal political philosophies are different uh from that of Mr trenum and I have not agreed with several items that he has voted for in the past having said that I'm not speaking here as a parent of two kids who attend prum County Schools or as a teacher who works in the county I'm speaking as a veteran who has been deployed in my view a person's service to his or her country supersedes any political affiliation Mr trenum is making a great sacrifice for our nation by serving in Africa his recommendation to fill his seat should be taken very seriously not only has Mr trenham served our country in the armed forces but he has served our country well as
040the Schoolboard member from brinville he has run for this position and been voted into office by the people of brinville time and time again with wide margins of Victory the people of brentville trusted him to vote for their best interest and thus he is the best he is in in the best position to pick a temporary replacement for his seat on the board brinville is predominantly a republican District I realize Schoolboard members technically do not get elected based on party affiliations nevertheless they do generally have a strong political ties Mr trenum represents what majority of Voters in brinville want and so do his recommended choices it's important especially in this political climate that we show respect to one another and that we respect the will of the people who voted or elected officials into office
041thank you so much thank you our next speaker is Deborah Weber Deborah Weber Deborah good evening ladies and gentlemen I had signed up for another agenda item so I'd like to yield my time with that our next speaker is Riley oey miss oey good evening board members Dr welt my name is riyo Casey and tonight I am speaking as an individual for three years I've been a member of the Gainesville brentville budget committee and have had the opportunity to work with the two candidates recommended by Mr trenum as his temporary replacement Mr bran and Mr Park would be excellent representatives for their District actually anyone Mr trenham recommends would be a good representative because he takes his role as a Schoolboard member very seriously and would not take finding a replacement lightly I'm disappointed in
042how this situation has been handled this is not the Prince William County schools I love and I'm proud to be a part of it is not what our school division is about we are about children not politics and party lines even though the attorney general has rendered his opin opion this board must honor Mr tram's position and respect his decision please vote for one of his recom recommendations do what's right vote your conscience thank you thank [Applause] you our next speaker is Don Scoggin and but before he gets you can come up to the podium Mr Scoggin but before we get going here I'm going to Rattle off the next uh next group of speakers here to come take a seat up front um we've got let make sure I get start right place Bill
043Petra Brad brl Steve Walters Rohan roboam Luke Underwood Nate salsman Nick pistilli Carson talson those are the next speakers and we have a few more after that as well Mr Scoggin Don Scoggins Scoggin okay what I like to say is that I my name is Don scogin and my address is on record I agree with all the uh previous speakers and reference to uh Gil tren's recommendation so I will not repeat the same thing but I will say this when you do make your um decision just think of the fact that in case one of you all had to go away temporarily so I think it's very important to be fair it's not like Mr trenham has um given up his seat it's just a temporary uh interim appointment so I would recommend that you
044honor his choice to represent him and just try to take the politics out of it and also consider what you would want done in case you were in the same position thank you very much thank you our next speaker is Bill Petra Bill good evening Mr chairman board members um parents my name is Bill petre I live in Woodbridge um I uh Echo many of the comments that um Mr tram's uh folks that have come and spoke on his behalf said um admittedly I don't have a lot of experience with the your board because uh we send my son to a parochial school uh here in Prince William we uh we are taxpayers and we do have a lot of friends that um their children attend the schools and we're very concerned about many of
045things that are going on um we send our son to that parochial school because of some of the agenda items for tonight that are going to be talked about um we try to follow what goes on with the board because we're interested and one of the things that we've noticed is the board has become very politicized in the last year or so um and that's unfortunate because the children suffer when when politics get involved with education um nobody wins now Mr trenum as has noted earlier has been voted in several times by his constituents so whoever you pick to replace him for that year while he's serving his country is going to be corresponding with him on a regular basis and you certainly don't want to be picking somebody that is at odds with him
046um over this decision um I I would like to to reiterate what the uh gentleman said earlier what if it was your seat and your constituents that had voted you in several times I'm sure you'd want to represent them the best you can and have that per that um recommendation uh picked uh I have nothing negative to say about the other folks that that put their name in the Hat that's wonderful that they want to serve the community um but once again I think that Mr tram's uh recommendation should be honored by this board uh the other thing I would like to note and not having any experience with the board is that it started an hour late uh I understand you have technical problems but um I was really trying hard to get over
047here by 7 o'clock because I was concerned I was going to miss my spot for some reason and uh many of the parents here have said that this happens on a regular basis starting late um so I would encourage you to try to be more punctual um so these folks aren't going to be here tonight thank you very much thank you our next speaker is B Brad brel Brad good evening Mr chairman and board members thank you for the opportunity to speak tonight my name is Brad bruml I'm a veteran I live in brinville District these last 12 years my wife and I have seven kids five of whom have graduated from brentville high school I got one there now one in noville elementary we're invested in the community we love it here wouldn't want
048to be anywhere else we know Gil trenum um and he has the finger on the pulse of his community and we back him 100% we wish him well and safe return on his deployment lot of my folks I work with in Fairfax County ask me why I send my kids to a place called cowpie high when there's so many other Metropolitan choices in Nova answer is simple people are down to earth genuine hardworking Gil trenum reflects those values I trust him I don't have to be here because I know he's got my back it burns me up I got to be here tonight to defend him in abencia please respect his wishes and respect the wishes of the people of the brunville district thank you thank you our next speaker is Steve Walters Mr Walters
049hi uh my name is Steve Walters my uh address is on file I appreciate the opportunity to uh speak to the board tonight um I want to Echo uh a comment made by the previous speaker it's disappointing that we have to be here addressing this issue there are tough choices sometimes that you have to make in life this isn't one of them there are hard decisions that you have to face sometimes in life this isn't one of them I noticed a trend in the speakers up here before I came up they seem pretty United in uh in their defense of Gil trenum I want to honor his service to our country commander trenum and his family in their sacrifice as he's going to be away uh over this next year I think it's pretty clear
050what needs to be done I think it's very clear what the right thing to do is I'm retired United States Air Force officer I spent time in the Air Force Reserves and I I can tell you that as uh I I've seen many reservist come back from deployments have been gone only to see employers take advantage of their uh time away put them into uh meaningless positions in their companies hoping they will leave knowing they will instead of protecting their jobs as the law requires you're better than this I know you are this is an easy decision and I know that one of the two people that Mr trenum requested fill his shoes are the ones that you're going to pick you can do the right thing thank you thank you our next speaker is
051Rohan roboam hi good evening it's Roan roboam I know but I do appreciate your attention tonight so good evening members of the school board the matter before us pertaining to Mr trenam seat is so serious I feel compelled to speak tonight as an active duty Air Force officer I am concerned about how this board is treating a fellow military member the mere fact that a decision about Mr trenham seat is still unresolved saddens my heart in absence of clear guidance rules or regulations it appears the members of this board may not stand shoulder-to-shoulder with Gil and nominate one of his candidates even after the Attorney General weighed in a decision to support Mr trenum selects was not made and the saga continues with these precedings tonight from where I stand it is either because a
052lack of board Unity disrespect to military service or political agendas I cannot understand why anyone would look outside of Mr Gill's selections or actively solicit candidates who have different perspectives he chose individuals that he personally knows to represent him while he is gone individuals he knows that he can work with while he is deployed if anyone supports another candidate we as a community must ask ourselves why is this board that fractured or is it in a large military Community you do not value military service or is it further political agendas so important that you want to change the composition of this board in my opinion if Mr tren's candidates are as good as any of the other candidates or even if they're slightly less qualified why not stand with Mr trenum and choose his nominees
053I want you to know I see this as dishonoring military service I have written letters to every Virginia delegate who represents areas of of Prince William County School Board and I'm asking them to provide legislation to protect offices of military reservice elected in County positions I hope you realize the Statewide precedent that you are setting here and what you are saying to the large military community in this school system I encourage you to support Gil trenum here and abroad thank you thank you our next speaker is Luke Underwood Luke Mr chairman a large uh fellow board members my name is Luke Underwood I live in the brentville district and right around the corner from cpai high glad to be part of a community that is representative of where I grew up I grew up on
054a farm in Iowa and my parents raised me with common sense common sense says if we have a representative here who has a couple people that he's chosen for you guys to to vet out of his choices he had three one withdrew probably because of the pressure of the partisanship that is coming from the board even though this is not supposed to be a partisan board then common sense says choose from those two candidates or three candidates of previously stated I cannot understand how this has taken so long to get this taken care of at the um at the town hall meeting that he had I suggested that it be done by Skype in this day and age when we can talk to somebody in Japan like they're standing next to me why can we
055not do Skype he wanted us us to have somebody that we can go to and talk to people that he trusted the reason why I suggest that you choose from the two candidates that are remaining from his choices is that we as brentville District have selected guil trenum three times nobody runs against him because he speaks for us we do not have to worry what he's doing here we do not have to necessarily show up here although I would love to I can't because I have to get up at 5:00 in the morning I will be up at 5:00 in the morning to go to my job again tomorrow but I think he speaks for us so we do not have to question his judgment his judgment says choose from these two candidates the ones
056that he suggested that you could work best but that is all I have to say thank you thank you our next speaker is Nate salsman Mr salsman good evening chairman members of the school board when I was a campaign manager in Prince William County one year ago I was proud to work for a candidate whose goals were and still are to reduce class sizes raise teacher pay distribute funds evenly throughout the county and fight for equal rights regardless of sexual orientation tonight's meeting includes an action item that allows for every candidate who has applied for the temporarily vacant brentville seat to speak sadly that is just for show we already know about the back room deal that's been struck by certain members of this school board thank you sadly Diane Ralston and the rest of
057the school and a few other members of this school board have struck a secret deal that already secured the seat for one of the candidates here the consequence of this secret meeting with some of the school board members is that two proud members of our own Community were pushed to withdraw their names after facing intimidation and threats these school board members did not bother to wait for a public hearing they did not bother to meet with the each candidate individually and they did not bother to talk to their constituents the school board members who met in secret instead proceed in will instead proceed to put on their show tonight to make a mockery of the democratic prog process this board should be ashamed I'm sure the candidate you've already selected Shan bran will do a
058fine job to represent br Ville to the best of his ability while Mr trenum is away but certain members of this board should be held accountable for their actions for making this deal before the public hearing but also for the intimidation of the two candidates that were from the Democratic party with serious issues facing our County such as overcrowded schools coupling with population growth underpaid teachers and outdated supplies I can only imagine the kind of deals that are made about whose children are truly provided a worldclass education and whose children live in a district where backro deals and intimidation are the way of doing business I'm here tonight to expose those backro deals that exclude us from the process we will continue to organize we will continue to keep the community informed we will make
059this rigged system right for the parents for the teachers and for the children of Prince County thank you very much for your time thank you well we can we can allow we can allow I I do allow some positive and this is through board meeting after board meeting we do allow some positive clapping many board meetings allow no clapping and no booing but we will not we will not of anything we will not do that at all regardless and that that's going to carry over to the public meeting as well and we carry on to Future citizen time so thank you our next speaker is Nick piscatelli Nick Nick all right and Carson talson Carson hello I'm Carson Townson and my address is on file uh hello Miss Ralston I'm a student in this County
060and I'm here on behalf of all of the youth in the back and we want to know why we've heard rumors about the vacant seat and that you pushed out a candidate and she's not here tonight we've heard you intimidated people and had background deals back room deals for regarding the school board seat and as a student in this County I speak for all of my students and we simply won't stand for this anymore thank you our next I sure I should have caught up the next speakers um we have uh is it Leo Rivero Kevin Vargas orizo haer ban Justin Daws and then our two signups at the door Cindy stack house and Bill card you will be our you will be our speakers our first speaker is is it lejo Rivero apologize for
061I'm pronouncing that incorrectly Rivero thank you okay they here all right going to next speaker Kevin Vargas Kevin speaker next speaker is arizo hazan I'm sorry I I know there's no way I got that right and I apologize hello good evening um it's orzo Hai Gan thank you you're wel I knew it um my name is Oro gban um as a previous Prince William County student I find it pretty ridiculous that a position created to serve the people of our county is being corrupted and I'm here to show that we are here we are aware and we would like this um issue addressed um this position is created to serve the people so it should be decided by the people I don't believe we should appoint somebody that can appoint their replacement um I just
062don't think that's how public office should work um So yeah thank you thank you our uh last signed up speaker ahead of time Justin Daws Mr dos good evening my name is Justin Daws my address on file um excuse me tonight I'm just here to address this candidate and the seat filling and I just like to know why there are back room deal is being made and there are actually two candidates that aren't here tonight because four of the five of you actually had a back room deal and pushed her out of the office so we've heard and that's why we're here in the back to take a stand and we're not going to stand for it anymore so we're just letting you know we're here and we're actually watching you guys thank you have
063a nice night our next speaker is the two signups at the door uh Cindy Stackhouse and then Bill card you'll be our last speaker Cindy might be moving up quicker Mr card Cindy okay with that uh Mr Bill card you will be our final speaker how easy was that pronunciation uh I'm B my name is Bill cart I'm actually a resident of pomac District uh I want you to re to to know that the constitution guarantees us a representative or republican form of government and and it guarantees it all the way down to the ground and and so when the people here have spoken this evening about the uh particular persuasion and the political uh kind of ideology that persists in brinville is evidenced in election after election after election uh you should take that
064to into account somebody else used the word that to uh to not honor Commander tren's wishes would be the disenfranchisement of that PO population and and that's that's certainly true the uh our government calls for there to be a national natural tension in it and it and it's set up that way in U in many ways and the uh and while I think that some people may see this as an opportunity to ease the path uh the Bible refers to us as ironing iron sharpening iron and I can guarantee you that you would all be better for having an active aggressive uh Schoolboard member that Gil trenum approves of and I'm speaking as a retired milit milary officer I also think that this would be a ruthless and opportunistic uh you know action were we
065not to honor uh Gil tren's wishes uh I'd like to speak directly to my school board member and I ask you sir uh to honor Commander trenham service and his wishes and select between Mr bran and Mr Parker thank you very much thank you Mr chairman yes sir somehow my name can't didn't get on was on the wrong list I signed up when I came in at 620 what your name sir Wilson I'm sorry Chuck Wilson let me just find you here sir I see you're you're on the citizens comment time with no objection from the board Mr Wilson I this is standard procedure this happens once in a while with no objection from the board Mr Wilson will grant you the right to speak with no objection Mr Wilson you have three minutes thank
066you very much I'm sorry for this surprise my name is Chuck Wilson I'm the reason I'm here today because I'm a 27-year Air Force veteran retired senior officer and I lead the Veterans of Foreign Wars here in Northern Virginia headquartered out in aawan we have 5 188 veterans and 142 auxiliary members and their active duty retired and honorably discharged charged and I live here not far away from hle Road the issue of the military deployment of us naval Reserve Commander Gil trenum came up at our monthly General membership meeting last evening it was quite interesting to hear the discussion of all of the veterans the words that were used that you heard today by the previous speakers were also used last evening in our veterans hall Commander trenum represents the bradville magisterial district in Prince
067William County and Commander trenum has been ordered to active duty to serve our nation I'm not here for partisan Reasons I'm here because we're generally concerned about the treatment of a patriot who has been called to serve his country what came out of the lengthy discussions by our fellow veterans and I'm very happy to see we have so many here is that a nonpartisan election for the school board that nonpartisan election can form a conclusion therefore that school board should act in a nonpartisan fashion to honor Commander tram's order to active duty respect Commander tram's recommendation for temporary replacement and be respectful of the riches of Commander tram's constituents I believe the school board and good faith follow the good tradition of appointing someone that Commander trenum feels that would look after his constituents many
068of whom are veterans who elected him and I thank you for your time thank you sir with there being no other citizens who have signed up to speak on this matter I hereby declare this public hearing closed we'll take a literally two second 3 second pause here to get organized on the electronical side for the meeting and we'll get moving I would like to call this Prince William County school board meeting to order we will start uh with the excuse me we will first start uh with Miss Diane ralson of the neapco district would like to begin this evening Schoolboard meeting with a moment of silence thank you next we'll go to the Pledge of Allegiance do we have any students Boy Scouts Girl Scouts Cub Scouts anyone that students of Prince William County schools
069there's got to be somebody here that can come up and help lead us in the pledge yeah all right and then everyone stand please rise for the Pledge of Allegiance and then afterwards please give us your name your school and your grade please I pledge of allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible liberty and justice for all your name your grade and where you go to school um I'm Frankie Bates and I'm in seventh grade and I go to Marell Middle School [Applause] all right we are moving on to item 14.01 uh we have the approval of the public meeting agenda and a motion is an order Mr chairman Miss Williams I move that the Prince County School Board
070approve the public meeting agenda as recommended thank you Miss Williams do have a second Mr chairman Miss Ralston I second thank you discussion on the public meeting agenda those in favor of the agenda please signify yes by raising your right hand thank you the motion is seven yes unanimous motion passed moving on to the adoption of the consent agenda motion is an order Mr chairman Miss Williams I move that the Prince William County school board approved the public meeting consent agenda as recommended thank you do we have a second Mr chairman Miss sat I'll second that motion thank you discussion um I'm going to I'm Sorry Miss s i just jump in real fast um I only have one thing the adjustment item 15.2 adjustment in the Schoolboard meetings calendar what just want to briefly
071explain that um in December the two we we uh do our meetings on the first and SEC first and third Wednesdays of the month in December with the holiday break coming up they were literally as late as they possibly could be they were on the 7th and the 21st which buted up pretty good um into the uh into the the the winter break and so I asked the board if they would be willing uh we asked the board if they' be willing to move the last two meetings in December up a week each which which essentially moves a third meeting into November um so because there's five Wednesdays in November so it'll be a third meeting into November and then we'll have one meeting in December um which which will be on now on December
07214th so we were going to have a three-week gap at the end of November now that three-week break because of the extra Wednesday will now be at the end of December so we just moved it from November assuming this passes it just moves from November to December uh that was the reason for that because of personal schedules and travel schedules being on the 21st of December uh there was a chance that we could run into some issues there so that's why that was moved up so I just want to explain that Miss white thank you Mr chairman I'm trying to get use these microphones I'll be really quick because of time um item number 15.14 is the propos proposed resoning of the Utterback um proposal and this is in the Gainesville District this is directly
073across the street from Mountain View Elementary School if you've been on light a road you know that um there's not much space there for development um I believe it's um 230 single family units have been proposed my understanding is neighboring um homeowner associations are not in approval um I'm hearing a lot of Citizen feedback and our letter indicates the school division is not in support of any rezoning that increases student capacity schools already in excess of or at or in excess of 100% capacity um as all of you know Battlefield High School is an excessive capacity and I am not in supportive uh in support of this um rezoning appeal and uh thank you for the time on that thank you Miss s any further discussion on the consent agenda those in favor of the
074consent agenda please signify yes by raising your right hand thank you the vote is seven yes unanimous motion passed thank you and we are now moving on to Citizens comment time I want to give everybody kind of a brief description of what's going on we have a lot a lot of speakers today uh current policy with the Prince William County School Board that that well predates uh my existence here um is that we will do 30 minutes of citizens time and everybody else can can the rest of the speakers will move to the end of the meeting so everyone does have a chance to talk um it it's it's kind of under under my control we've made exceptions in the past so what I'm going to do is I'm going to try to get through
075the first 20 speakers everybody gets three up up to three minutes to speak just like in the previous meeting as well so we have quite a few speakers to get through so we're going to go through the first 20 anybody who is is is is after that will likely be pushed towards the end of the meeting uh per policy um Mr chairman point of order Mr Deutch uh it's been the practice of this board for the entire time that we have been meeting uh that we've allowed everyone to speak um people came here expecting that to be the case as there was no previous announcement why are we changing things at the last minute for the people who came here I'm not changing anything the fact of the matter is that citizens time is under
076the purview of the chairman and there's been situations where I've allowed it to go longer and other situations where we've stuck to a more strict time and being that there are you know 62 speakers signed up and this is a business meeting in which we have other things to get to as well citizens who want to speak will have the right to speak and I'm just following current policy well we actually haven't adjusted it um other times we've had a consistent practice for the entire time that this board has existed um and we've brought this topic up we owe the people here the chance to speak their mind Mr Deutch I'm going to your point your point of order is noted uh we're going to stick with current policy and and leave leave it up
077to the chairman to to get everyone to uh to move as efficiently as possible because we do we do have other business as well so no one is being denied their rights we're following current policy with that um we have uh 62 speakers signed up 50 ahead of time and 12 at the door everyone uh see we will see you'll have 3 minutes to speak and I will keep the time the lights on the monitor will indicate your progress the yellow light will signify that you should sum up your position red indicates your time is up and you should stop please use proper decorum and manners while at the podium if you do not do so you'll be asked to step aside please give your name and address for the record or you can say
078that your address is on file if that is as well I'll remind everybody that we will follow proper deorum we have traditionally allowed mild Applause when people agree and if you want to stand and because you agree with somebody speaking that is fine as well we will not allow and I will not allow negative uh shout negative attitudes negative yelling booing hissing any of those types of things and we do have to this is a business meeting and we do have to make sure this is run properly so I want to announce that ahead of time and repeat what we said earlier Mr chairman I move that we overrule a decision of the chair in order to allow the people who came here to be able to speak Mr chairman Mr chairman second that for
079discussion hold on we have we have we have a motion to overrule a decision of The Chair by Mr deuts do we have a second Mr chairman I'll second that for discussion okay miss the motion this this is a very simple process it to to overrule decision the chair takes two3 majority of a vote those who agree with the decision of the chair to to basically do what I said which is have the first 20 speakers speak and everyone push to the end please raise your hand to to Mr chairman point of order per Roberts Ru is it's actually a majority vote I don't have my book in front of me you're you're absolutely right I'm sorry it it is a majority vote for the uh to overall the decision of the chair Mr deuts
080is making a motion to have everybody speak ume up front and and I'm and and he's basically he's not basically he's saying he wants everyone to speak up front and instead of pushing anybody to the back yeah absolutely we we can have discussion on that Miss Williams was I'm sorry you're right M these buttons are killing me Mr Deutsch I just believe that we've brought this issue up uh to change policy on how we've conducted CI and comment time at the last minute would be surprising to the citizens who came to speak and we deserve uh we should let the people here speak Miss Williams um I'm a little confused because we're not changing any policy that I'm aware of Mr deut and um we've done this before in the past it it's not always
081been allowing every citizen to speak during citizen comment time upfront we've split the time before I feel as long as we hear everyone because everyone has the right to speak at our meetings that that's sufficient I'm not sure where we're doing anything different um than we've done be on a regular basis I'm a little confused oh thank you Miss Williams Miss sat white thank you Mr chairman um in the we usually have let the people who signed up in advance speak at the beginning of the meeting and we do have 50 people who took the time to sign up in advance um prior to 12:00 noon on Wednesday and if we could at least have them speak at the front end of the meeting I'd appreciate it and then we could have everybody who signed
082up at the door to speak at the end and I think that would be fair because we have followed that many many many times that is a precedent in our meetings thank you Mr chairman thank you Miss s Miss Jesse um that's not my recollection uh the chair has uh use his prerogative in many instances uh he has said I will if I recall it was and there new people on this board it was first 30 minutes and uh then sometimes he would uh change that but the persons who signed up at the door are always the first speakers and he assigned a timeline otherwise we will not get to any of the other items on the agenda I think it makes a difference However if those people if we were voting on an issue
083tonight and people were not allowed to speak prior to the vote and I think that's where the exception has to be made I think we have to 50 people speaking at the beginning we're going to be here probably until midnight anyway uh but 50 people speaking prior to the the meeting um is something that we really we can't interrupt board members please we need to to look at I I think um trying to work as many people in as possible um maybe over a period of time would be sufficient but I think uh we're not voting on this particular issue this many of these the issues that are here I don't see any vote being taken tonight on any of those issues so I think everyone does have a right to be heard and I
084agree with that thank you Miss Jesse Miss Rolston thank you Mr chairman I think that because we were an hour late these people could have gone home and they didn't so I I support them being a everyone to be able to say what they have to [Applause] say any further discussion Mr W you're smiling at me okay all right those in favor of the decision of the chair to hear the first 20 speakers uh please raise your right hand there we go I'm sorry I'm sorry Miss Jesse now 20 yes I'm saying the the decision of the chair let me thank you let me clarify the decision of the chair was to hear the first 20 speakers right Mr deuts wants to hear all the speakers ahead of time so the decision of the chair
085is to hear the first 20 do you agree with the decision of the chair to hear the first 20 speakers and move everybody else to the end per policy or do you want do you want everyone to speak first so raising your right hand you're agreeing with the chair as is per standard Robert ruls of order that it's written that way in in decision of the chair and so you're basically raising your right hand if you agree to hear the first 20 speakers and then everybody else push to the end for clarification okay those in favor of the decision of the chair please signify yes by raising your right hand those not in favor those abstaining with that we will move forward with our first speakers the decision parliamentary decision is that the vote the
086vote fails I think three to three to one and so therefore we will move forward with our first 20 speakers I'm going to call the first 10 here uh our first speaker is hasher Akil uh delegate Bob Marshall and everyone please come to the front Riley oey Danica Rome Steve Bender Robert Watson Brian Pace Don Shaw Shawn fiser and Mario Roso as a reminder everyone will get three minutes to speak and proper deorum is requested at all times our first Speaker Hashi Akil hash thank you um hello my name is hashir ail and I currently attend Ripon Middle School in the e8th grade um I will like to talk about my experiences with the science faere at different levels today now before I start talking I would like to thank my principal Miss Stone and
087my school for encouraging me and providing me with a world class education now it all started around a year ago in September when my school asked me to do a project for the school science faere I had no idea what I was going to do but after a couple of days of thinking I realized I wanted to build upon a project that I had done before and so in that project I had used nanop particles to detect salt in rice patties this year I wanted to get at the core problem and actually use the Nano particles to allow rice to go in saltwater so I started off with just a regular planting tray I threw some sea waterer dirt rice seeds and Nano particles in there and then I put it in my backyard fast
088forward 2 weeks I saw that my rice plants were growing in saltwater which has never happened before so I realized I could make a difference on a lot of the world and help a lot of people who are need for food so I did a lot of different tests and it took a while but most of my tests were successful and I would like to thank Ripon once again because without all the stuff that they taught me I would not have been able to understand a lot of the things that were going on so Along Came the school science faere and luckily I was able to move forward past that and I was at the regional science fa so I was super excited to present my ideas to people around the county and show what
089I had done was important and I realized that you can't just submit the same project over and over again to these science speres because although they say differently you have to actually have something different and you have to be more organized in your projects so after some luckily I was able to win first place in that one I decided I wanted to go bigger so I went for the Google science fair which is an international competition and I went for the broadcom science fair which is a national competition so luckily I was recognized by Google as one of the top 100 scientists in the world and I was recognized by broadcom as one of the top so my message to everyone so my message to everyone is it doesn't matter how old you are where
090you're from you can get out there and you can change the world in your own way our next speaker wonderful our next speaker is delegate Bob Marshall delegate Marshall thank you Mr chairman Mr chairman the proposed addition of gender gender identity or sexual orientation of Prince William school board's policies is without State Authority furthermore Prince William county is not not required to comply with Federal guidance letters from doe lastly the changes are lacking in precision and if implemented could result in an exodus of students from The Prince Williams schools three sources for these changes include a May 2nd letter from about 40 US senators to education secretary King which recognizes that the language of Title 9 of the education of Act of 1972 only prohibits discrimination based on sex gender orientation gender identity sexual orientation
091have been applied to to title 99's implementation by Doe by Court decisions and the administration the actual law has not been changed strangely these Senators want to give up their lawmaking power to invest it in unelected officials moreover the good guidance letter of May 13 violates the federal administrative process act a good guidance letter can only give examples of how agencies May comply with existing federal law Andor regulations it cannot add requirements to current law which this letter does the good guidance letter includes new terms never before adopted by Congress or the administration moreover it prohibits the use of any objective standards such as medical diagnosis or treatment to verify an individual's claim of gender which apparently can change from day to day in August Texas federal judge Reed o Conor issued an injunction against
092implementing the guidance letter because title n's text quote is not ambiguous quote judge OK Conor said the law quote specifically permits educational institutions to provide separate toilets locker rooms and showers based on sex provided that the separate facilities are com are comparable the Prince William law has no definition of gender identity or sexual orientation but any definition that would exclude reference to biology or physiological male female differences is an attempt to rationalize an ideological decision moreover when a boy thinks he's a girl or vice versa there's some recognition of a fixed meaning to the terms male and female denying reality is not something that we should encourage our students to do persons who experience gender confusion will not benefit from this policy moreover this policy is not a Legal Shield for such person it looks
093like a club to punish or evict people from the Public Square who respect the vision of the founders the the Virginia attorney general I would just ask what problem is this supposed to fix how many instances of discrimination have been uh have been recorded would citizens would students have to find a sign a compliance statement as is done in Fairfax County will sexual attitude restructuring education take place the Virginia attorney general Mark Herring issued an opinion at variance with six attorney generals of of of Virginia every one of them concluded that the only Authority in Virginia to change what a protected class is is with the general assembly local governments have no authority to do that at all I urge you to reject this then Mr chairman I would just ask that uh these documents
094which I have uh for you which is the compilation of decisions of the uh attorney General the letter from uh to sec to secretary King the opinion uh of guidance opinion from the secretary the Attorney General of Texas and the 19-page letter from attorney general Mark Herring in which he was asked to identify any federal laws or state laws that require this which he couldn't be made part of the public record and distributed to your colleagues thank you can hand him to the clerk delegate Marshall thank you thank you our next speaker is Riley oey Miss [Applause] oey I'm back good evening board members and Dr Waltz my name is Riley oey and my address is on file we have a new school year and with that we have a fresh start and a new
095beginning as president of the Prince William Education Association I have high expectations for the collaboration between pwea and Prince William County schools I would like to give a heartfelt thank you to the superintendent the deputy superintendent and their staff for listening to all stakeholders and reducing the amount of required grades from 18 to 9 this very simple action is not only good for teachers but very good for our kids this will guarantee our teachers will have more time to teach and our students will have more meaningful assessments I look forward to working with this board so we can make public education better for our kids it is absolutely amazing what can happen when we come together we work together and we keep one thing in mind our children matter if I had one wish for
096this school year it would be that every decision we make is in the best interest of our children and that those decisions result in actions that make a different difference in their lives no matter where they live who their families are or where they come from I am committed to working hard building trust and holding myself and others accountable it takes each and every one of us working together because our children do matter and they must come first thank you thank you miss oey our next speaker is Danica Rome Danica my name is Jan Kon I was born and raised right here in Prince William County I'm a parent I'm a journalist and I'm a transgender woman it can be hard to understand what it's like to be transgender especially if you don't know a
097transgender person when you're transgender gender dysphoria is persistent and consistent your deepest most internal sense of self conflicts with your body and the only way to treat it is to embrace your authentic self to live as your true gender not the sex you were assigned at Birth gender dysphoria is something that's here today is not something that's here today gone tomorrow it never goes away as a school board you have the authority to pass this policy because of article 8 section 7 of the Virginia Constitution authorizes you to supervise the schools also the argument that the policy violates the Dylan rule failed in the general assembly HP 385 failed in the general laws committee and it failed in the Fairfax County Circuit Court see these packets for the legal minutia but I want to focus
098my speech on the merits of this policy as parents we all want to keep our kids safe and respect their privacy that also means we need to understand each other and understand it's not a political agenda to protect everyone who uses the restroom regardless of gender identity it's just the right thing to do please understand transgender girls are girls and their students at Prince William County schools transgender boys are boys and they also students at Prince William County schools this policy helps to ensure all students have the same opportunities to do well in school and to graduate schools are required to provide a safe learning environment free from physical and verbal harassment so schools have policies and practices in place to prevent harassment physical intimidation inappropriate touching or invasion of privacy of another student schools
099supervise these spaces appropriately and take action when students violate these policies however a transgender student's mere presence does does not violate such policies they simply being in the restroom does not make another student unsafe a school's responsibility to keep all students safe is not comprised of policies allowing transgender students to use restrooms consistent with their gender identity or by the presence of transgender students in those restrooms mandating transgender kids use a unisex restroom stigmatizes them it is to say we don't believe you or your doctor you're a liar in a threat in reality LGBT people are routinely the victims of vicious assaults to close up at the George Hampton Middle School renaming just a couple weeks ago there was a banner there and it said everyone matters everyone matters updating this policy to protect lgbtq
100students and faculty codifies that sentiment into law it removes ambiguity you cannot and we will not discriminate against anyone in Prince William County schools thank you also and last thing this policy has been done in Arlington Alexandria Fairfax ARB Mar Charlottesville Richmond Rono Nori and Virginia Beach please protect everyone P this policy thank you our next speaker is Steve Bender Mr Bender you did say me right I couldn't hear you before before you start the clock of me can the board direct Miss McGowan to find that kid a patent attorney because if he's growing rice and salt water he needs one okay I'm still Steve Bender my address is still on file with the clerk chairman of large Sawyer members of the board Dr Waltz earlier this evening I touched on one of the many
101examples that highlight what has become an extremely dysfunctional board even before the newly elected members took office in January there was a request in December for individual employee contracts to which the attorney said no and the result was he was gone by the second meeting then there's the whole issue over the frazo naming whether it was Wilson or Hampton and then the renaming of Godwin all the argument about how much that was going to cost exactly there were the threats from that side of the bench to staff at Godwin that they need to be careful about what they say then there's the budget and the threats to cut individual school districts based on how their Board of County Supervisors voted there's a 9 minutes on the athletic fields which probably had its roote in a
102dispute between two baseball organizations the piano at colan High School the 600,000 for the Kelly Center staff levels the capacity of 13th high school that was kept small based on an East versus West posturing the board pulled to withhold Dr Bishop's contract without due process a vote that was reversed once the attorney became involved the issue of Commander tram's temporary substitute appointment and then there was that issue at the last meeting the policy 137 that was on the agenda for the third time for a first reading Mr chairman asked that that be passed that the rules be suspended that motion was ruled out of order Mr Deutsch raised the question of whether or not that should be a point of order he wasn't even allowed to make the point of order both of those are
103violations of Robert's Rules at no point during that time was the attorney who has a copy right there in front of her of Robert's Rules consulted a move to suspend the rules and pass is an incidental motion that must be decided immediately there's no debating or amending it and it requires a two-thirds vote chair does not have the option to not allow it when Mr deuts made his appeal of the ruling of the chair that's also an in incidental motion and can't be amended it only requires a majority vote and he can interrupt any speaker at any time to make it now on that last one there's no question of a perception or anything else the rules were just ignored and run rough shot over that's why Commander trenum is one of his last acts
104before leaving asked that tonight there be an issue on the agenda to appoint a parliamentarian Miss mcgallen make it official she's been consulted in the past but it needs to be official so I'd urge you tonight to honor his last request before he deployed and to protect all of you as board members by appointing a parliamentarian that's referred to because Mr chairman I know I'm running over you actually had the right to speak first on that motion earlier and last as the chair whose opinion was being appealed correct thank you our next speaker is Robert Watson Mr Watson I thank you Mr chairman and members of the board and Dr Waltz my name is Bob Watson and I live in the Kohl's District my contact information is on file with the clerk I'm here tonight
105to ask you to delay any updates to policy 60 until the courts have had a chance to rule on the N numerous lawsuits before them right now throughout the country that are related to transgender issues changing policy 60 to specifically call out transgender students will require numerous new guidelines to implement the policy and the guidelines will have to address more than just the use of Lo locker rooms and bathrooms my friends it goes much further like addressing sleeping Arrangements on overnight field trips and overnight athletic events for example guidelines will have to address how a transitioning female student with female genitals will be permitted to sleep in a motel room and potentially in the same bed with a male student yes folks folks this is the path we're on but right now there's no hurry
106to try to address all this right now the publication schools in transition which was endorsed by the ACLU the National Education Association and gender Spectrum suggests the following policy and I and I quote any student who feels uncomfortable sharing facilities with a transgender student should be allowed to use another more private facility like the bathroom in the nurse's office but a transgender student should never be forced to use alternative facilities to make other students comfortable members of the board there's no hurry to try to address this kind of stuff right now transitioning students are entitled to respect and privacy just like any other student who is facing difficult personal circumstances I am proud of the Prince William County school system which has been addressing the needs of transgender students throughout the professionalism of our staff
107and faculty so there is no pressing need right now to get out in front of the Courts and Implement policies and guidelines that will do more to highlight transgender students than afford them the Privacy they need right now we need to focus on classroom overcrowding and the needs of our special education students of which there are hundreds and hundreds in our school district yet nothing has been done in these areas it's just a string of broken campaign promises a measured and deliberate approach to the transgender issue will in the long run Deliver us the best results for everyone concerned so I'm asking the board tonight to wait for the courts we can address this issue in due time with the input and full disclosure to students parents and teachers thank you our next speaker is
108Brian Pace Mr Pace thank you for this opportunity to speak uh in preparing my remarks I researched some of the largest employeers in Prince William County to see if they had sexual orientation and gender identity included in their official written non-discrimination statements almost all did Walmart Canta Northern Virginia Community College novc Wegman's Target George Mason University Comcast Comcast y'all are behind Comcast this is obvious I shouldn't need to be here right now in 2016 we should treat our employees and our students with respect and based on the content of their character not based on their race color religion national origin sex pregnancy child birth related condition age marital status veteran status disability or yes their sexual orientation or gender identity basic stuff people we haven't delivered on that last part not officially we which means
109we really have it we have the opportunity right here right now to protect and support our most vulnerable populations because isn't that what non-discrimination policies are designed to do I've been there I remember how terrified I was of being outed of being attacked of losing what I perceived at the time as everything of losing my job I'm here to make it better for the next Generations in the pay forward a note about people who have been trying to scare you I've seen them before not metaphorically they're in the room these are actual people I saw them when they told me my relationship and now all 50 state marriage by definition could not last I saw them when they said that this was just a phase and I could change my orientation if I tried hard
110enough I saw when they told me that I was a crime against nature I saw them when they called me intrinsically disordered I saw them when they called me a word that is on my people pie of paper that I will not mention cuz there are kids here these people have been here before and they are here for the same reason they were here before do not believe that it is about some people using a bathroom this is just the latest in the proxy war and now that they've lost the fight to stop me from being legally married bless their hearts they need something to keep them going please do not be fooled and move confidently forward to support all students and all staff staff in creating safe communities where all can achieve thank you
111thank you our next speaker is Don Shaw Mr Shaw thank you Mr chairman members of the board my name is Da Shaw and Miss Urban has my contact information on file we hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal those words written 240 years ago embody theic American ideal the brave souls who signed the Declaration of Independence set a goal for all of us to strive toward we've come a long way since then from the Civil Rights Acts to the Voting Rights Act to the Constitutional Amendments as that expanded individual rights and protections as well as countless other efforts undertaken at the local state and federal levels we have as a nation continued along the path toward making our Union a little more perfect through the years but we're not there
112yet there are still members of our society who are marginalized or Worse finding themselves in situations with the potential for danger just because of who they are that's where you come in you see article 8 of The Constitution of Virginia requires a highquality free public elementary and secondary education for all children of of school age throughout the Commonwealth and as you know section seven of that article requires school board Wards to perform supervision over school divisions I grew up in the 1970s and ' 80s and witnessed the ugliness and bullying my brother received because he's gay 25 years later my oldest child also gay also received undeserved harassment because of who he is when a society fails to protect all within its purview it is incumbent upon our leaders to enact policies that protect those
113adversely affected this week is National Suicide Prevention Week the rate of attempted suicides is four times higher for LGBT students than that of their straight peers each time an LGBT student is physically or verbally harassed or abused the likelihood of that person committing self-harming actions increases 2.5 times um on average these are more than just numbers these are real people there are brothers and sisters Sons and Daughters cousins nephews and nieces students in Prince William County it's time to stand up and be counted I'm asking you to tell us your community that you will not tolerate harassment of any kind and you will expand to the LGBT community of the Prince William County School System the protections already enjoyed by others for some time now if that statement saves even one life it will have
114been worth it which side of History are you on thank you thank you our next speaker is Shan fiser Fisher if you could indulge me for just a second before you start my time the student who had the best chemistry project I'm trying to see you I have I have old eyes I was oh he left oh I was one of his judges best project we were all taking notes from his research so thank you for allowing me to speak today I don't think that I can add too much more to what Danica Brian and Don just added but I will state this from the universal Declarations of Human Rights Article 26 part two education shall be directed to the full development of the human personality and to the strengthening of respect for human rights
115and fundamental freedoms that's what we're asking we're asking that every individual student every individual educator be recognized as a human being the fact that they identify as lgbtqia that we have to bring sexual orientation and gender identity on the record is a state of sadness for me this is a human right everyone should be allowed to live and be educated to have a world-class education as a human in Prince William County somebody mentioned that now is not the time to review this policy and update it I say that's incorrect this is the perfect time to do so because while we do have many Educators Administration and students who do support those human beings who may be different from them I have heard personally Educators and administrators hurl epitet that I do not want to repeat
116here to students that allows other students to think that it is right it is up to us as adults to learn from our students as well as to teach them which way to go revising policy 60 is very important for that path to continue thank you thank you our next speaker is Mario already know so but Mario before you come to the podium but before you get going I'm going to call up the next uh 10 speakers if we have seats there um the next 10 speakers is Chris McClure David Aon David douly J Caleb Dalton Josh hler Pastor David shrock Hubert louder kobby Garmin Walter kubitz and Deborah Weber good evening members of the school board Mr chairman my name is Mario Roso I am an alumni of the class of 2009 from Garfield
117High School and I am here to speak on behalf of policy 60 and the revisions of adding sexual orientation and general identity to the policy I come here speaking out of my experiences from G Garfield High School and I can only say that I was so lucky to have gone to a high school that was so rich in diversity where I met people from all kinds of religions parts of the world it was such such an incredible experience of course that being said there are still people out there who weren't as positive and didn't respect people for their differences I know that this new this new policy or regulations have some people confused some people think it's a bathroom issue some people think it's a whatever it is all I can say is that there
118are kids in our schools right now who are suffering from bullying on the basis of their sexual orientation or gender identity and this school board has the ability to take one stall step towards working towards eliminating that type of bullying our school board can stand behind these kids and tell them that we value you for your diversity and Prince wien County one of the most diverse counties I believe in the country we can say that every single student regardless of what makes them unique are protected and by T moving forward with this policy I know that we can continue to lead and teach our students to Value diversity and to value our community I know that things are changing quickly and for a lot of us it's a little confusing but I know that people
119in my generation people my age we're moving forward for us the issue of sexual orientation and general identity it's no longer an issue it's something that we past and I know this school board can go on ahead and move forward with that knowing that the momentum is with them the future is good for people of different sexual orientations and gender identities and I know the school board will be take the big step towards realizing that goal thank you thank you our next speaker is Chris McClure Chris thank you good evening chairman Sawyer Dr Waltz and members of the board my name is Chris McClure uh my addresses and file a little more into the microphone please thank you thank you um I'm a licensed professional counselor here in Prince William County and uh live here
120as well my son started Battlefield high school last week which was very exciting um I worked as a college counselor for 17 years and as a K12 school counselor for three years so I've worked at the intersection of education and mental health for most of my career I've also worked with transgender students for the past 10 years and I've seen firsthand how fear and anxiety interferes with their ability to get a quality education as a therapist I know that for anyone living in fear and anxiety affects our capacity to learn and erodes memory retention the effects of that harm are long lasting and compounding those of you who are Educators know that if you don't build a solid foundation in reading or math skills for example everything you try and teach a student later suffers
121from the weak Foundation at the University I frequently dealt with students struggling with math because they learned in first or second grade that they were not good at math that label stuck with them for years and interfered with their ability to learn math for years until they unlearned that false belief about themselves so much of Life success depends on building a healthy sense of self the confidence to pursue your goals and the interpersonal skills to work with diverse groups of people on your job and in your community that Foundation is also being built in K12 classrooms some of the students I work with from eight counties actually uh feel so unsafe from bullying and harassment that they frequently choose to avoid the situation by not speaking up in class not participating or even being absent
122a lot that doesn't help their education either as we all know too well this isn't just a matter of educational success for some students it's a matter of life and death suicide rates as we already heard for lgbtq students are alarming when I first applied for my job first job as an elementary school counselor back in 1997 I put a quote at the top of my resume an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure at this point in my career I'm afraid I do more work trying to help people undo the negative beliefs that they learned about themselves in childhood fixing the damage in their foundations let's increase the prevention side of that equation and give all students an environment where they feel safe to learn where they can grow up feeling good
123about themselves not ashamed please add sexual orientation and gender identity to our non-discrimination policy in Prince William County thank you our next speaker is David Aponte David good evening and thank you to the school board for allowing me the time to speak tonight my name is David Aon and I am the chair of glissen Nova an organization dedicated to making schools safer and more affirming for all students regardless of sexual orientation and gender identity and expression I'm also a proud 2010 graduate of Battlefield High School I spent all of my grade school years in Prince William County schools and so much of who I am is because of the education that I received here it's also here where I discovered a passion for activism and an awareness of the struggles faced by the lgbtq community
124as time went by these struggles became more and more noticeable to me and I knew something needed to be done though I did not and do not identify as a member of the LGBT community I could not bear to see my fellow students made fun of and bullied simply for how they identified or who they were attracted to those injustices led me to create the gay straight Alliance at Battlefield a group that I'm proud is still thriving today in fact these groups exist throughout the county and do great work I've been honored to work with amazing student leaders from this County for a decade now it is in that spirit that I voice my support for adding sexual orientation and gender identity to pwcs non-discrimination INE equality policy so many students have recognized that this
125change has had to happen for years in 2009 this change was actually proposed by students as a revision to the code of behavior but was denied if students know and have known that their peers are being discriminated against for being lgbtq it is time something is done to stop it this policy won't solve it all but it is a massive step in the right direction school districts across the country have been implementing these policies for years with resounding success I know the public has many fears but I can assure you that they are unfounded and instead parents and students report a higher quality of education and higher feelings of safety in their schools following the enactment of policies similar to this one we know that these policies work but so many forget why they are
126necessary in the first first place people often ask why adding this language is needed when non-discrimination policies exist already well listen most recent National School climate survey tells us why specifically in Virginia nearly seven in 10 students experienced harassment based on their sexual orientation while over four and 10 students experience harassment based on the way they express their gender sadly only 50 or 59% of these students never reported this to a staff member the fact that only 5% of students in Virginia attended a school that has a non-discrimination policy including sexual orientation and gender identity and expression is a major reason for this as of right now the lgbtq students of Prince William are part of the 95% of Virginia students that are not specifically protected the board now has a chance to change that
127the research is clear and I am happy to support this policy and all of the lgbtq youth that will benefit from it thank you to the board for this proposed change and I look forward to working with you thank you our next speaker is David douly David my name is David douly my address is on file I'm part of koh's District good evening honored Prince Wayne County school board members and fellow County residents again my name is David douly I'm a father of two wonderful children raised in the county school systems for 15 years and both graduated from CD Hilton High School I've been here since 2000 in call Virginia my second home after honorably serving 13 years of active duty service in the United States Army however while serving in the Army I was
128a father who lived in constant fear of losing my job and livelihood to keep a roof over the head my kids' heads because I was gay under the don't ask don't tell policy in fact when I joined in 1992 I had to lie about my orientation in order to join the Army moreover I had to keep the truth for my own children I couldn't tell them who I cared for and who was important to me because I was afraid they would tell the wrong person and I would be out of a job even when my children were old enough to understand there was still the threat of them getting in a fight to defend their gay dad against other students or adults thankfully the don't assel policy doesn't exist anymore and my brothers and sisters
129who choose to serve can now serve openly without the fear of being fired for being gay I left the Army in 2005 and joined the Computer Sciences Corporation then caci Incorporated and now BAE Systems Incorporated all three companies have protections for sexual orientation and gender identity our federal government has the same protections teachers and other employees of princee County Schools should not have to live with the same fear I had while serving in the Army LGBT students and their straight friends and allies should not have to live in fear of who they and their friends are family members and friends that love us often stand up for us against hate and should not have to live in fear of reprisal bullying loss of employment for standing up for LGBT loved ones shouldn't we do our
130part not to live in fear of losing our jobs or going to school because of our sexual orientation or gender identity the world hasn't fallen because of the protections provided by my current or previous employers or the federal government my orientation has no bearing on whether or not I can do the job I was hired to do or the school classes I choose to attend please join me in welcoming a long awaited opportunity for equality I urge the Prince William County Board of Supervisors to Proclaim June 2016 as LGBT pride month following the footsteps of our neighbors and honorable government governor of Virginia however all I receive was silence please do not be silent please do not let fear guide your actions of decisions please add your support for sexual orientation and gender identity as
131a protected class thank you thank you our next speaker is Jay Caleb Dalton thank you Mr chair my name is Caleb Dalton my address is on file with the clerk I'm a resident of Prince William County from the aawan district a father a voter and a civil rights attorney I'm speaking on my own behalf as a Prince William County resident agenda item 17.01 the addition of categories to the non-discrimination policy including recent so-called guidance from the Federal Department of Education should be voted down for several reasons first and primarily the implementation of this revision is practically impossible and it opens the school district and this board to Legal liability let me explain under legal references 17.02 adds quote and guidance of the United States Department of Education in quote after Title 9 as you know
132Title 9 is binding on the school district under federal law but guidance from the Department of Education is not federal law the reason it's impossible to follow both Title 9 and the guidance from the Department of Education is because they're contradictory as a federal judge in Texas recently ruled Title 9 is not ambiguous and yet the guidance recently issued by the Department of Education contradicts the language of Title 9 and addressing and mandating that the school administrators within Prince William County attempt to implement both Title 9 and the guidance as you'll see under the legal references of the Department of Education is practically impossible for them to do this guidance also violates federal law as has been mentioned violates the administrative procedures act and it also risks the constitutional right to bodily privacy of other
133students you've heard today that fears are unfounded yet I represent a mother a mother who is the the adopted mother of six students three of whom were sexually abused as children now those those girls they don't care what sexual orientation anyone is but they have been impacted by a policy exactly like you're being asked to implement today they've been told that they have to use not just restroom but locker rooms and showers with an individual who they don't care who his who his sexual orientation is what it is but who has male genitalia what they were used and what they were assaulted with and they see that as an instrument of assault regardless of that person's sexual orientation or gender identity this is not a an easy issue I understand for the for the county
134to deal with but it's one that has multiple sides and it's something that you will have to address there are issues with privacy There's issues with those who have suffered sexual assault and who fear for their safety and who will be ret traumatized by exposure to a member of the opposite biological sex in the restrooms the bottom line at this point is that courts are addressing this issue Nationwide it's unwise for this body to to implement sexual orientation and gender identity protections when the courts are currently addressing that issue thank you for your time thank you thank you our next speaker is Josh hetchler Josh good evening my name is Josh hler I'm an attorney with the family Foundation of Virginia and my information is with the clerk um I'd like to uh speak to
135the non-discrimination policy tonight and I'd like to keep my lawyer hat on um and i' uh some of my remarks will Echo those of Mr Dalton but I think think they're worth repeating um and I want to leave you with three main points uh the the first is that Prince William County schools are not legally required to add the categories of sexual orientation and gender to its policy um in fact no Virginia court or any applicable federal court has ruled that sexual orientation and gender identity must be a special protected class under state or federal law uh additionally the US Department of education's dear colleague letter that has been referenced has no force of Law and it is not binding on any court or this board um and additionally since the Department of Education and
136Department of Justice's guidance letter has not gone through proper regulatory channels it should be given no deference to by any Authority including this board numerous federal courts including the United States Supreme Court have recently halted any attempts to in Force policies like the one proposed this evening including the major case out of gler County Virginia in just this past week the Virginia Supreme Court heard or arguments on a Case pertaining to this type of policy and it has not yet weighed in is one of several cases across the country and in Virginia to be still in the court system and finally on this point Title 9 specifically permits separation in certain settings on account of student sex so all of that to say that Prince William county is not legally required to add these categories
137um the second point is that Prince William county is is actually legally prohibited from enacting a a school policy elevating the actions or characteristics of sexual orientation and gender identity to a protected status Virginia's Dylan rule requires that local non-discrimination laws not be more stringent than the state law state n non-discrimination law does not include sexual orientation or gender identity as this proposed policy attempts to do making its adoption a clear violation of the law adding the proposed language presumably requires all Prince Williams schools to permit boys into girls bathrooms changing areas showers overnight uh bedroom facilities for field trips and on to every Girls Athletic team and vice versa permitting these practices most assuredly violates the countless uh countless students constitutional right to privacy as well as many students uh right to religious liberty
138um and finally I would just say it would actually violate Title Nine itself for the reasons that Mr Dalton said for these reasons we respectfully ask you uh to reject these amendments thank you thank you our next speaker is Pastor David shrock pastor shro thank you for the opportunity to uh address the board tonight uh to I'm a pastor in uh aagan Bible Church a father and a citizen here in the county um there have been many reasons for concern many fears that have been expressed from both sides of this issue here tonight uh I'm tempted to to list off a number of questions that lead to that same uh sour of fear as well but the Bible tells me that love perfect love drives out fear indeed that is what we strive for in
139our church and I know that is what you want in the schools as well people to love and to respect one another I think Christians have failed often to show that love have often pointed fingers at those who are different who come from different places different backgrounds and all the rest but I think compassion which the Gospel of Jesus Christ instructs us to share as well is not found by denying the realities that are found in the world around us that there is a biological sex that is given to every single child that is born in the nursery every single child that is born in the hospital it is not compassionate therefore to put forth a policy that will try to legislate something on shaky legal grounds to be able to bring about help for
140those desperately in need and the good news that can be found is seeking after the truth good news is found in showing and teaching respect and care and listening and learning from one another the very things that are valued in the Prince William County school districts need the good news is not found through the law it is found through relationships it is found through personal relationships and getting to know one another I pray that the Christians in the schools would lead the way in that without denying the truth that they are found in the word of God indeed Jesus Christ came to die for Sinners he came to die for sexual Sinners of whom I am foremost and need his forgiveness and indeed that is the true solution that a policy cannot put in place
141thank you for your time thank you our next speaker is Hubert louder Hubert Hubert louder next speaker is Colby Garmin Colby just want to say first that um like many of the citizens that have gathered here tonight we are not in favor of bullying any students of any students being bullied for any reason regardless of what's expressed in policy I appreciate appreciate the opportunity to address you this evening and your service to the communities of Prince William County and the support of our children I'm a father of two Triangle Elementary students and I've been actively a part of my community there in Triangle and I'm here this evening to share with you my perspective about the policy change under consideration and I ask that each of you to make the best effort possible to approach
142the subject in a thoughtful manner that puts the emphasis on problem solving that meets the actual needs of our entire school system from the youngest kindergarteners to the seniors in high school so thoughtful consideration is the request here's what I would consider a thoughtless action of change first it would be thoughtless to make a quick decision for a political win the decisions that you make will have far-reaching consequences and they deserve the Dignity of careful thought rather than cheap political action for points students who experience gender dysphoria need thoughtful support not political points parents who are concerned about their young children being instructed about sexual topics at an inappropriate age deserve thoughtful support not political points there may be loud voices on the fringes of these issues but my experience with citizens of this County
143tells me that the vast majority recognize together that these are complex issues that need thoughtful solutions from our government officials which brings me the second thing I believe would represent a thoughtless change a decision to change the wording without a description of the implement ation for the citizens to consider the truth is that many of us are not clear what the implications would be of the change that is being debated without spelling out some of the implications and telling us what practical changes would be the result of a new policy or what current problems would really necessitate a change the citizens of this County are left vulnerable to speculation and unnecessary political attention there are elements of our culture and society that will seek to make citizens on both sides of this issue look ugly
144or foolish we are not for that the truth is our school system does not need unnecessary attention that will distract from the primary purpose of educating our next Generation in the core disciplines and subjects if the board believes there is a real impressing problem in this area I would like to know how do they intend for that particular problem to be solved please do not change the wording without considering the actual needs and effects since Prince William County schools do not currently discriminate against transgender or lesbian and gay students the burden of proof that necessitates a change in this manner has yet to be demonstrated since it cannot be spelled out how the privacy of our children will be protected the burden of proof for the necessity of this change has yet to be demonstrated
145since other Counties have paused the process of their changes due to upcoming court cases in Virginia and other states the burden of proof for the necessity of this change has yet to be demonstrated and lastly since the decision itself puts unnecessary attention on students in our County that would benefit it's a the burden of proof is yet to be shown thank you our next speaker is Walter kubitz Walter Walter okay our next speaker is Deborah Weber Deborah good evening my name is Debbie Weber and my family lives in Manasses and we are Prince William County taxpayers Mr chairman are you revising policy 060 because you fear losing Federal funding for Prince William County schools if our County Schools don't allow boys to enter girls restrooms or play on girls sports teams will the schools be
146punished financially for not complying with a policy from the Obama Administration the Federal Department of Education I trust that you don't wish to hurt the feelings of a child who thinks he or she is of a different sex however you end up hurting the feelings of the girls and boys and violating their privacy when they are forced to share bathrooms with the child who was choosing his or her gender in July you posted to Facebook I worked hard to win an election in Virginia's second largest county and I as I typically am was rewarded for my hard work I am proud to serve my community as chairman of Prince William County schools please focus on serving this County students parents teachers staff members and taxpayers keep it simple help the students learn and let the
147teachers teach thank you thank you with that we're through our first 20 speakers and we will use the um citizens time at the end of the meeting as well um we are moving on to item 17.01 which is a title one schools presentation uh that Miss rson has on the agenda Mr chairman Miss Miss uh Jesse I'm sorry um I would like to look at tabling a couple of actions we have so many citizens who are waiting to be heard and if those citizens are here I would like to table uh the title one presentation which is 1701 the multi-tier support tier support 1901 and advanced placement 2102 those are all instructional items and we really need the time to delve into those so I would like the board to consider uh tabling those for
148the next meeting okay the since the agenda is passed by the board we can do so without objection on those items is there any objection to tabling those items or any Mr do do you have a question does m Rolston have any objections and some of them are her items right that's what I'm asking I mean ultimately if anyone objection can hold them up regardless of whose items they are cuz they're now owned by the board because they were passed on the on the agenda so does anybody have any objection to 1701 1901 or 2102 per Miss Jesse's request are you good with it or with no objection from the board we will uh table 1701 1901 and 2102 to a later meeting is that what you're requesting Miss Jesse yeah yes and this what
149uh Shan the meeting and give more opportunity for the citizens that have signed up to have an opportunity to speak okay thank you Miss Jesse all right we're moving on to item 17.02 uh revision of policy 060 non-discrimination and commitment to equity um and it's the first reading and those those items were available online I'll be very brief I know people may want to talk on this and we just heard from citizens but I just I normally don't write down my thoughts uh I usually kind of go off the cut tough but I'm going to I'm going to speak from some on 1702 we're on item 1702 um we my LBJ tie today went to the Lyndon Banes John's library in Austin Texas this and saw saw some of the things that he had to
150do during his time and thought it was good inspiration for today so um with that um thought i' just tell a little story and we'll move on this will take two minutes for me and then we'll go on uh to the next board member who'd like to speak about a month before the shootings in Orlando my 8-year-old daughter was eating cereal next to me before she went to school like normal mornings I was watching the news and her as her and her brother ate breakfast this day there happened to be a story uh on the news about members of the LGBT community I didn't even know she was paying attention but that's kind of how it works with kids right when you don't think they're paying attention they are she asked me what the L
151and LGBT stood for I explained and then I begin to explain the G and then she stopped me she then proceeded to explain to me the G the B and the T she not only knew what they stood for but she knew what they meant I have to admit I was kind of impressed but what impressed me most was the profound question she asked me next my smart beautiful innocent 8-year-old daughter looked me right in the eyes and said Daddy can I have some more Cocoa Pebbles it hit me like a ton of bricks kids aren't naturally biased they understand that everybody is different including them every time a class of people is added to to the non-discrimination policy the same arguments that we hear today about a traditional view on on sexual orientation and
152a traditional view on gender identity were also the same arguments we heard about a traditional view on nationality a traditional view on religion and a traditional view on race when they were added to the non-discrimination policy I hear a lot of concerns about protecting the majority well the whole concept the whole idea of a non-discrimination policy is to protect minority groups because the majority will always protect itself at what point do we say that a group of people isn't worth protecting does a religious group in princ County have to be large enough to qualify for religious protection since disability is a protected class do we need to have a certain number of people with a certain disability before it is protected of course not that's absurd every religion every race every disability regardless of their
153numbers needs protection the non-discrimination policy is is designed to protect our most vulnerable residents it needs regular updates and reviews you don't hear any arguing about the other classes in the non-discrimination policy anymore but they too were once filled a boardroom because of their controversial nature and this too shall pass I for one will never give in to the fear legal threats and bullying of those who oppose protecting our most vulnerable students and employees and that is I will that is why I will proudly support adding SE ual orientation and gender identity to our non-discrimination policy anyone else Mr DCH thank you Mr chairman um is now the time to ask questions of Staff in regards to what the implications of this policy would be I don't believe staff has a presentation available to ask
154questions but we can certainly we can certainly turn them was in and right Dr Waltz I don't want to speak for you is there a presentation or anyone prepared to answer those questions as of now no we we just wait direction from the board at this point Thank you then all right well I think one of the things that's very important to consider before moving forward on a policy change is what those implications are and I think we should have a very thorough uh briefing and understanding from staff uh from legal council about what it is that would be changing as a result of this policy um I want to spend a little bit of time and just talk about good policymaking uh one of the things that policy makers should do when going ahead
155and making good policies is to Think Through the unintended consequences of their actions um and really every action has unintended consequences and that's why good policym seeks to minimize those so as effectively as possible solving for the problems without creating new ones and that's what uh we should do as we think through really any uh item that we're uh talking about passing uh from a policy perspective here one of the ways that we do this is to make sure that we're solving for a particular issue uh so far we haven't really heard about what the particular issues are that we are trying to solve for here in this County uh we've heard about progress and the need to embrace progress in the new wave of change uh we've heard about other broad um broad statements
156about how we should we should improve things Etc uh but what we haven't heard are the specific things that we need to address here as a county to improve things and having that as a framework and a starting point gives us us the ability to figure out how do we create an appropriate um and tailored response that may address some of those concerns uh one of the things that has particularly concerned me is that as we've been on the board um honestly I've been impressed with the way that staff has handled uh these situations they' have Arisen um they've done it in a way that seeks to balance uh respect privacy safety and the many things that should be balanced uh when addressing this um and so first off I just want to thank staff
157for the way that they have handled things so far secondly we've also worked very hard and continue to work as a School Division to improve the way that we address bullying uh improve the way that we try to help students who are considering suicide who are considering self harm um and we I think that's an area where we are improving and uh where we should continue to improve as we try to help all students um but in looking at what we're doing here uh some may say we're just adding uh about 10 or 11 words to our our policy but those policy changes have implications and one of the things as a board is while we change the policies staff then write the regulations that come along with that so it's important for us to
158go ahead and to understand as we're talking um to the public we're discussing those issues these issues what are going to be the regulatory changes that are going to accompany um this policy change uh if there are no changes there is no need for the policy change if there are changes let's have an honest upfront dialogue about what those would be so as a community we can discuss those and understand things um I also am very concerned with the way that we are moving forward on this um honestly uh it's been clear from the way that it's been brought up we're moving forward in order to score political points uh while the legal situation is very much up in the air uh and what could be very risky uh is if we were to change
159things we would have regulation changes and then the legal situation changes again because so much is in the air and then we have to change things again um and that disruption um is something we should be very careful about uh and then just one one final thought um my last board comments uh at the last board meeting before we hit the summer uh I talked about the importance of trying to depoliticize the board as we get back to education improving education for all students you know overcrowding uh teacher compensation uh student performance how we address special ed students and help them out how we improve Career and Technical education options there are so many things that we could be doing as a board to improve things in this County that we could come together and
160do um but moving forward on this in really disruptive rushed manner is something um that's only going to cause a lot of trouble in the way that we're going about it and just one one final statement just in terms of the kind of trouble that we could be getting into um outside of legal trouble just the community trouble uh Fairfax we saw them last year move forward very quickly with this policy change um we saw them quickly start implementing regulations and then they realized that both the legal situation and the way it was impacting their Community was so disruptive they had to put those regulation um changes on hold so I think this is something we should be very careful about and something we should uh really wait for um finality on the legal side
161thank you thank you Mr deuts any further comments Miss satte thank you Mr chairman um just as the chairman did I also prepared um prepared comments um to stay on track tonight and usually I do speak off the cuff also um and you know my comments are going to copy some you've already heard tonight but as you can imagine we've received a large number of emails from people in our community concerning the proposed policy change the emails have been from people with opinions against the policy change and supporting it just like we heard here tonight I want us to keep in mind as we move forward that we are talking about children we are all concerned about our community and I know we all want the best for our children you've heard questions raised here
162tonight and I have more questions than I have answers for if as a board we were to pass a changes to policy 060 in two weeks what are the implications of passing the updated non-discrimination policy would the updated policy 060 result in the need for more policy and regulation updates in the division if so what are they what is the impact on our students with the change of policy 060 what is the impact of our honor staff with the change of policy 060 how will instruction or day-to-day operations be impacted in the division as a result of this Andor other related policy changes how will we accommodate the deeply held religious beliefs of many of our families and students as we make any proposed changes how will we accommodate the cultural beliefs and values of
163families in our Multicultural County how does the proposed policy change address the concerns of these groups will there be changes to terminology and paperwork used in the division what changes will need to be made what is the full scope of what we're looking at will professional development be needed to implement the change who would be in charge of writing and delivering that professional development how would we deliver it to our employees and how do we work that out in incorporating it with our existing professional development what physical changes of any might be needed to any of our facilities as a result of related policy changes we all have heard a lot of talk tonight about bathrooms in regard to policy change and we've received that in our emails also why because parents are strongly expressing
164that they want their children to have their privacy respected in bathrooms and locker rooms while in a position of undress or vulnerability how do we accommodate privacy for all of our students what does that look like under possible policy changes how might it be different from now what would be what would be the cost of those changes how do we prioritize our funding with an already full Capital Improvement plan what impact or change will this require for employee health insurance plans what is allowed covered under current law in regards to health insurance will there be an increased cost of the division to employees what about other employee benefits is our current policy working what are our current practices do we need to improve our current practices versus a policy change are we enacting all of
165these or as we are enacting all of these possible changes how are we going to continue to provide privacy to those students who do not want to draw more attention to themselves we don't know or have all the answers to these questions and these are some pretty serious questions why would we make a policy change which set sweeping division-wide impacts without first thinking it through and making a comprehensive plan for the division we have to consider what's in the best interest of each and every one of our 88,000 students and over 10,000 employees we're talking about almost 100,000 people and add their families to that number as well we cannot take that responsibility lightly or irresponsibly I highly suggest that we wait until the federal courts and probably the Supreme Court weigh in on the
166current cases with so much existing litigation even Fairfax County Public Schools as Mr deut just mentioned whose board rushed to pass of policy change last year are now at a in their implementation as they wait for the courts if we make a decision now and the courts later change rulings then we are taking all of our constituents on a legal and very emotional roller coaster and we owe all of you better than that this decision must be thoughtful well planned out and deliberate our students cannot be used as pawns to try and make political points we're talking about the lives of our students and I know I don't I know none of these none of these board members take that lightly I spent hours researching reading attorney general and Court opinions medical documentation opinions from
167multiple organizations and opinions from your constituents as I know other board members have too and there's still lots more to read I propos that this board ask the superintendent to form a task force of employees and community members after we have more guidance from the courts this taskforce can evaluate how we plan as a division the need and how we need to incorporate any updates into our policies and regulations in regard to what has been proposed for policy 060 they can formulate a plan for the school division on implementation they can take the time to evaluate what the full impact of those policy and regulation changes will be to the division and assess any costs associated with the changes the task force can also formulate a plan for how to begin to implement any proposed
168facility changes or updates after this process the school board can be presented with a proposal that encompasses a comprehensive approach instead of rushing to pass one isolated policy update I propose we pause and we look at this at its entirety and the resulting impact of that decision I don't want to put our constituents through the charged and antagonistic atmosphere that we saw in Fairfax we need to work as a board to make sure that we have the best interests of each one of our students as a priority we have to consider our staff and we have to consider what's in the best interest of the division thank you Mr chairman thank you Miss s Miss Williams thank you Mr chairman I'm not going to take up a lot of time talking about this because we
169will be discussing this again and that's really my point um this policy revision and change is undergoing no different process than any other policy revision and change that we have before come before us as a board and I would just like as we've been um so kindly reminded tonight and often that this is a policy that really truly directly relates to our children and our children having the right to a safe and healthy learning environment we never know all of the policy ramifications to their finite implementation which just never happened and I almost feel like this is a discussion that we could continue on forever and ever because no there are two sides to this issue and they're very far apart what I would ask us as adults to keep in mind is the kindergartener
170the sixth grader the ninth grader the 10th grader the 11th grader any of our students who directly deal with this and have to wake up every day and go to school and not feel protected so if we're not going to do this or we're going to fight about it I would love to hear someone anyone tell me another way that I can find to protect a class of students that is no more important or less important than any other class of student and allow even if it is one person to feel like they have a right to be in that building and be be the person that they are that's all it is for me this is not a bathroom policy it's not a locker room policy those things can always be dealt with and
171always be changed not to mention last time I checked every woman doesn't look like a woman every man doesn't look like a man or at least my own personal definition of that and who am I to tell them that because you don't have long hair because you don't look like this that you are not who you say you are when I go to the restroom almost always with other women unless I'm in a family bathroom I'm not checking out anyone else's because they I can't I mean there's doors and stalls we have those here for those concerned about restroom issues locker rooms also have private areas where kids can change why because already now it's 6th 7th 8th 9th anyone going through puberty ever it's pretty uncomfortable get naked in front of somebody else some
172people are born with the ability to do that I personally am not one of those people I was terrified the entire matter of fact I could probably change my clothes without anybody seeing anything I've mastered that skill nothing to do with my sexual identity or any of that by allowing someone to be who they are that does not mean that we are making someone else not be that's all it is we've been through this with color of skin we've been through this with sexual orientation we've been through this with all sorts of topics and ranges speakers have come up here tonight to say I am am um I hope that we can find a way to work together I'm always someone who asks people for comments because I like to learn the issue from both
173sides but pitting us ourselves against each other is not helping anyone if we aren't going to agree with this I would love to hear an alternative version that works just as well I I I'm just lost I I um to me if it's good enough for our federal government and everywhere else I'm not quite sure the difference that we're doing here in our school system and I don't know I I I would like to I don't know I I agree with our our board we have to further discuss how this will be implemented and what it will look like but that's no different than any other policy that we do so um that's all I have to say thank you Miss Williams Miss Jesse you know um every time I come to this boardroom I've
174done uh an extraordinary amount of research I always try to make sure that I'm fair to the presenter uh I really did not want to remove the items from the instructional items because we talk about so many things and we don't talk about instruction but I looked at every slide that you presented Miss Goss and Mr Mulgrew I don't know where you got all your slides I I was just trying to understand your slides but uh I know you put a great deal of work into those slides and Title One and um all these people uh on this one I found myself uh really uh in a quandry because uh I grew up in a society that had very strong views I grew up in a family that had very strong views about um what
175we don't want to use the word homosexuality uh I grew up in a very biased environment uh many of My Views have changed because of my two girls and they're not they're 30 year old but it's not a big deal to them and it's like Mom you know and so it's it's been you know I hate to use the word evolving but I've had to change my perspective the religiously there are all kinds of religious views that come into place here but discrimination of any kind is discrimination and so the the the the the the regulatory parts of it as I was speaking to Mr R I sent a note to Mrs sya it's really all the details that are coming into play people are jumping to conclusions but I do understand I am a
176mom and I understand a parent's um concern about having someone perhaps enter a bathroom or do these kinds of things um I have the ultimate faith in this superintendent and his staff to assure the safety of all students I I was in a school um earlier where some child was um not done something really terribly too but actually to see young children who touch people and they don't know it's inappropriate it comes back to the principal the principal takes care of these things she would not allow anything to happen to any person in that school I've been a principal and I know you can't take care of everything but just because it's hard because I think this is going to be difficult just because it's hard doesn't mean that it shouldn't be done yeah some
177things some things are hard and very difficult I don't like the way this was brought to the board I I just don't I don't I don't think it's all political but I do think that there has to be more communication it was like I was caught off guard like bam we're doing this I'm not sure if it would have helped if there had been prior uh discussion of some kind so that the agenda item could have been placed with us knowing that we would have what is this 50 60 100 people here and we have to take instruction off the agenda so that you have a right because you do have a right to speak and not remain in this building until 12:00 at night that's not the way it's supposed to work instruction should
178instruction should be first and we we should have anticipated that this was going to be such a vola issue that it was going to consume a lot of time and obviously a lot of Prior discussion about the implications of bringing this before this board in in in a manner that I don't um uh chairman Saia I don't disagree with your with the actual desire to do this because I support uh some type of measure to ensure the safety of all children it's just that here we are and the board is sort of grappling with it in public because it came on in such a fast and it's like bam and I don't assume that everything is done for politics I don't know what political gain this man is getting from all of this discussion that's
179going on tonight you know I think he's going to be beaten up by various people but um I think that whatever we do you know uh uh later on you'll see that I had which I don't know if I have it now the the pool came up again when I went to uh kogan and everybody was running to see the pool but it was never about the pool to me it was never about the pool it was about the swimmers the swimmers and I've been accused of saying because of African-American all those swimmers who came and talked to me were Caucasians I don't know a lot of black swimmers but I do I I I support any any group of of people whether they're white black blue or what religion that I considered to be
180down not given their rights and I just didn't think it was right that one sport required kids to get up 3:00 in the morning and another sport that cause concussions we get uniforms that give them today so for me it's about the rights of people thank you thank you Miss Jesse any further discussion Miss Roston I had promised my uh some constituents in neapco that we would finally finally get to hear about title one and a few other things and so I we waited all summer so we can can wait another two weeks I guess that my my feelings about this subject is not as difficult as maybe some of my colleagues when you live in an area where everybody has the freedom to be who they are it's just what it is there's nothing
181overly special about any of it it's just what it is so therefore my my conversation with you is going to be quick when you come from the bay area of California you've watched this show before you've watched how people have had to struggle and at some point in time everybody comes together we'll all come together and I'm and I like um Miss Jesse agree that the superintendent will come up with the right decision so if you I don't have a problem with people saying the things that they want and I have to give you credit because it's not an easy topic and it's so new to you here but again it's okay because the hearts and minds of all of us are with you no matter what thank you thank you m rson and Mr
182wil um I I'll be brief um I too am concerned about the process uh the short notice um with this whole thing uh you know and I have done research too like Miss Jesse I spent the last couple days and I went through all 50 of the largest districts in the United States and made an Excel spreadsheet and give it to Debbie it was so important I left it at work today but um and literally every one of these is very different interpretation okay so one District says yes we're going to have the policy and include the you know gender identity and we're going to include sexuality but then when you break down and say what does that mean in regards to bathrooms and showers and overnight stays every one has variations and so my
183concern is given the timeline of where we're at right now and the implementation of this and the variations that are out there I am not fully comfortable voting on this in two weeks if you look at any other District out there and I'm not saying again you can look a lot of people mention Fairfax and said that they paused this and stuff like that but if you look throughout the country and districts who have recently tried to implement this cuz many as you mentioned Miss Ralston California was obviously way ahead and other districts were uh ahead of this but if you look at all the other ones they're either paused or they had multiple town halls and forums to talk to their residents about this I have not had a chance to go out and
184knock on doors in pomac and talk to my residents about this I've been at back to school nights I've been dealing with parents talking to me about the website crashing not logging in the parent portal uh not having the right Wi-Fi in their buildings I don't have the chance right now to really engage my community and talk to them about what stay here do I think the policy the idea what's presented has Merit absolutely I believe in protecting our students from bullying I believe in protecting our employees from being discriminated and being fired because of their sexuality or gender preference but I want more definitive outlines of what that means for all the other areas as well I yield my time thank you Mr wook and with that we will move on to item 18.01
185legislative priorities Mr Iman good evening chairman sores Vice chairman Jesse members of the school board and Dr Waltz yes it is time once again to formalize our legislative priorities and what I will tell you is I will be as brief as possible tonight because we do have a work session that's coming up in two weeks so that we'll have plenty of time to have further discussion but let me at least introduce these formally to you and the community this evening in terms of what we have proposed for board action we'll start tonight with the six major legislative priorities and and uh if you're at the board table and if your monitors aren't working yes you can see up to my left your right on that side monitor if that helps a little bit and as
186you'll see uh first and foremost something that you've seen before but still continues to be probably our most important agenda item and that is for this uh full funding for the standards of quality including support Personnel our second one is continued uh State increases for annual teacher salary increases and reinstating full funding for the cost of competing which as you know directly impacts Prince William County Public Schools we also are seeking funding for class size reduction for both classroom facility ities and the teachers that would be needed we ask the state to eliminate the local match for Virginia pre the Virginia preschool initiative we're looking for new funding for technology infrastructure and increased bandwidth which Mr wil will help with some of those Wi-Fi issues and new for this year we are asking that the
187state allow School attendance officers to file legal motions and as I say again we'll have more opportunity to talk about all of these in detail in two weeks next I'll introduce our statements of support and opposition as in the past these statements are broken into the state's K12 budget uh subject areas and while I won't read each one that's on the screen to you they will be dis played there and posted to our website for your and The public's information they begin with conduct and discipline and I'll pause just a moment to give people a chance to at least scan that screen they do go on to finance purchasing and food service and let me make a point here that in the first item that you see on this slide we will have a modification
188to this statement at the work session after the presentation posting deadline to board dos for tonight's board meeting School Board member William Deutsch did ask that we add a phrase that asked for flexibility and how to spend funding eloc allocations and that phrase will be added to that first bulleted item when you see it at the work session continuing with Finance purchasing and Food Service items and they continue with instruction and standards of learning continuing with instruction and standards of learning then on to instructional technology and continued funding for our Prince William County Public Schools Virginia star initiative then on to retirement and insurance and next to Schoolboard governance and in that category also in the top bullet that you see there the bulleted item we will once again reference Mr Deutsch's request in terms
189of flexibility for the School Board around funding we go on to standards of quality and accreditation and finally with special services following tonight's presentation our next steps will include the September 21 there we go sorry about that work session and anticipated school board approval at the October 5th meeting as always will then publish our final product draft sample bills and share with our delegation and one final note since the posting of this presentation we do have a date for our annual legislative breakfast and that will be November 21 here at the Kelly Center at 7:30 in the morning and with that I thank you and I'll see you all at the work session in two weeks thank you Mr Iman thank than sir and we have agreed as a board to skip over item 1901
190so that brings us to 1902 the 2017 2018 annual school calendar good evening chairman Sawyer Schoolboard members and Dr Waltz tonight is a part of the ongoing process to determine the school calendar for the school year we will be presenting as promised the summary of the work and recommendations of the calendar committee as well as the input gathered this summer from the community stakeholders via an online survey at this time I would like to invite Dr Casada director of accountability to present to you the summaries from the calendar Committee in the summer calendar survey okay good evening chairman Sawyer Schoolboard members and Dr Waltz um we were doing this earlier this year typically we've done the calendar for the following year in December but based on feedback from the board the committee and the public
191at large we're trying to move things um earlier and it's our hope to move it even earlier um going forward so um this is to present the C our purpose tonight is to present the calendar for 1718 obviously we've just started 1617 so that calendar is in place just by way of reminder we have to have a calendar that starts with at least 180 days of instruction and a minimum of 990 instructional hours this calendar the calendar options you're going to see tonight were put um were developed based on past practice as well as the input um of our committee um like taking into account federal holidays um laws requirements everything like that so the board has received and the information that we're presenting is all posted on eboard two proposed calendar options one's a
192pre-labor day and one is a post Labor Day I'm going to try and go through both of those as quickly as I can um yes okay so first we had a committee that met twice in June to discuss the calendar which was then presented to the superintendent staff before coming here um you can see we included multiple stakeholders parents um principes teachers students employee Association Representatives representatives from departments like student learning and accountability human resources and an election board representative um and then at the end after the committee made our made the recommendations um we provided a public comment site I'll describe that a little bit later um I do want to call out we have students we get from the healthy community's healthy youth lead team and had a couple and one in particular
193a student from Woodbridge High School was extremely helpful to the discussion she was a gem okay just by way of background Prince William County does continue to qualify for a pre- Labor Day opening for 1718 school year even if we don't close once this year can you even imagine that no closings this year um so that option is on the table for us um so again two options would be presented for your consideration one would start August 28th of 2017 and the post Labor Day Option would start September 5th um just some outside context this is an evolving this is a theme an evolving um issue many Northern Virginia uh divisions have moved to or are moving to pre-labor dat um openings including Fairfax which has been directed to start on the 28th of August
194in 2017 the rest of their calendar has not yet been um developed um however Maryland schools which have traditionally been opening before Labor Day may be moving in the opposite direction the governor has directed a move but there's back and forth on that too so that's just some context and you're getting both options I will say the committee had a strong preference for Labor Day pre- Labor Day opening um driven I think perhaps mostly by the priority to end school as early as possible in June all right first I'm going to walk you through the pre-labor day option and then the post Labor Day Option you're going to get a visual presentation and then I'll summarize so our visual Learners will get it and we'll some don't try write write notes I promise you'll get
195a summary list that shows you the dates other than the start and end of the calendar and the length of some of the marking periods and a few wrinkles um much is quite the same okay so here's our Graphics of the first semester of a pre- Labor Day opening um you can see that school would start the Monday before Labor Day like we've done this year and last year um the calendar and Labor Day itself of course would be a holiday for everyone um the calendar would continue um with school days the rest of September and then in October the um Columbus Day um which is the 9th it would continue as our division wide professional learning day this was started in 20145 several other jurisdictions in this area use this model where it's a
196holiday for students but um a professional development or workday for staff so we get to November and that's where things get a little tricky um so the end of the first marking period always coincides with uh the weekend before election day given that 2017 is not a presidential election the practice has been to close schools for students but have it as a um parent conference day at the elementary level or a work dat in um middle and high school this topic comes up every year and is discussed and our election committee representative is there the committee felt this practice um should be continued this fall of course schools everything is closed on Election Day because it's a presidential election schools are clo there's no conferences anything because of the volume expected okay then um another
197tricky part to this particular November is that the Veterans Day holiday which is a um has been part of our calendar for um forever um is observed on Friday the 10th so that kind of creates what we call Swiss cheese in that month and then um Thanksgiving would um fall the the end of 22nd 23rd and 24th um continuing the practice for the past several years to give students the full day off before Thanksgiving this was um recommended by the board several years to not do a half day anymore that day then going into December um given that the Christmas and New Year's holidays um both fall on Mondays um past practice and the recommendation of the committee would be to have spring I'm sorry I'm jumping ahead winter break go from the 21st um
198of December through the 1st of January when you see yellow dates those are dates that schools are closed um the like orangish one mean everything is closed so the School Division would close on the 25th and 26th December and then on January 1st in observation of those federal holidays um the first SE semester would end at the end of January on the 26th with a work day on the 29th okay second semester is a little simpler um as I said the end of the semester would be at the end of January you'd have the President's Day holiday in February spring break would fall at the end of March and in the pre-labor Day Option it would include the Monday at the end of the break which um is the day after Easter the third marking
199period would end later than that um and there would be a teacher work day um on the 16th so a student holiday that day we'd have Memorial Day and then school would end on the 13th of June with two teacher work dayss at the end of the school year on the 14th and 15th okay wow that rain okay so the post Labor Day Option just to walk through real fast and then again you'll see the um differences side by side in a moment in this option school would start on the day after Labor Day so the 5ifth of um the 5th of September the first marking period and everything around that would be the same the only difference that you'd see on this first page is that winter break would be starting um a day
200later um that was the decision of the committee if you're were going to open after Labor Day to try and minimize the time in June that you'd be going by starting a week later so they were doing some tradeoffs okay so one of those trade-offs would be to start the winter break um on the 22nd as opposed to on the 21st spring break would be the same except the other trade-off that the committee recommended was to um have school be open on the Monday after spring break or the Monday after Easter again in the way to get school to not end a full week later as a result of the shortening of winter breaks and spring breaks and reducing the length of the school year by one day to 180 the pre-labor Day Option has
201181 which has been our practice this year um the post Labor Day Option presented by the committee would have school ending on June 15th um three work days would be at the end of that calendar because the school year would be shortened by one day yet the teacher contract would not be changing that's why you see a difference there okay now that your heads are probably spinning um here are some key dates as I promised that show you some side by side so that shows you the first day of school and where they differ shows you that professional learning day would be the same the dates in November are all the same no matter which calendar um you approve Thanksgiving break would be the same winter break there'd be the variations and you see that
202they would everything would have the 25th and 26th is holidays for everyone in January 1st those are federal holidays um the committee was recommending the one-day difference at winter break you see the rest of it is the same um spring break variations um as I mentioned and then the end of school would be different but by only by two days okay so again um just to summarize the big differences are the start and end of the school year um the length of the marking periods differ slightly the actual yet length of the school year would be different by one day so the post Labor Day Option you'd be starting at the minimum number of days you can have to start a calendar um both of them would have significantly more than the 990 instructional hours
203required um the beginning of the year dates are just shown for your um for your information for teachers um as mentioned as Mrs Goss mentioned we had a public comment site available in August to show uh the community and staff members the two options and ask for feedback um I can update what's shown on this slide to tell you that over 5,000 people provided at least some kind of feedback and the percentage actually recommending post Labor Day was up to about 67% what's interesting and important to note is that the comments from people on both sides of the pre- or post Labor Day um were very consistent people want longer breaks but they also want to end as early as possible so knowing that we have what I like to call a zero sum game
204with the calendar not all of those things can be accomplished so people want longer winter and spring breaks which the post Labor Day Option that was on the table didn't do but everyone wants to get out earlier in June which why wouldn't you right so um the preference um appears to be for post- Labor Day not necessarily the option that was presented so moving forward the committee strongly recommends the pre-labor Day Option um the committee members were surveyed and then discussed it at their uh second meeting and it was the strong recommendation um the committee continues to recommend moving the approval process earlier this is our first step to get from December to September we'd ideally like to do it in June so that folks have that full summer you know two summers um before
205the school year starts um the committee endorsed the current practices relative to election day um meaning in presidential election years everything is closed staff and students in non-presidential election years we can have parent conferences and teacher work days um and then issues raised by the um committee for consideration is the length of winter break folks ideally like the idea of two weeks but again the committee didn't want to do that tradeoff for having to be in school longer um timing of spring break continues to come up as an issue some folks are interested in making it a stable week as opposed to it being tied to the week before Easter but there's not been consensus on that and then um there's been discussion of an additional professional development or workday at the end of the
206first semester but again that hasn't garnered um consensus support or majority support from the committee at this point all right this is presented for your information tonight and we'll be back again on the 21st for your action thank you thank you any discussion I get I'm getting eyeballs M Miss Jesse Jess which which option required teachers to remain 3 days after students leave that was the post Labor Day option because that option in order to get school out early not too much later than the pre- Labor Day Option was to shorten the school year by a day that was the recommendation of you recommend the pre the committee recommends the pre-labor Day Option the post- Labor Day Option in order to minimize the impact of starting later included shortening the school year by a day
207which necessitates the three work days I just have one comment once the children leave you're holding people against their will and I don't know which principal can hold them in a building for 3 days so I am pleased to see that you've gone with the pre-labor Day Option thank you very much I have no other comment thank you Miss Jesse anyone else Mr Deutsch thank you Mr chairman um so just trying to figure some things out and I guess this is an issue that some people have raised uh the pre-labor Day Option uh has a starting school a week earlier than the post Labor Day Option roughly yes sir but it has us only ending School two days before and I guess people are just kind of wondering if we're starting early in order to
208get out early why aren't we getting out early so that's a great question and so the um pre-labor Day Option um includes um spring break and winter break that are longer than um the post Labor Day Option and um one more day in the school year which is consistent with the number of days we've had in the school year so we've had for the last two years 181 days in the school year so the pre-labor day option is what the committee started with and then basically to come up with a post- Labor Day Option that they felt they could endorse they made some trade-offs so that school wouldn't end that much later so they shaved off three days one day of winter break one day of spring break and one day of the school year
209okay um I guess and then another question you said that we have significantly more than the required number of hours on both schedules uh how many is that roughly per schedule so roughly per schedule it's roughly um about a 12 days worth of hours if you have 180 days but you um and 13 days worth of hours if you have 181 days in your starting point but you can't start below 180 so that's your um your Baseline um so even if you have a gazillion hours you have to start with 100 you have to approve a calendar with 180 days but um that's how many hours you would have okay uh last question um in reference to the elections uh we're going to have both parties are having a I believe it's June 12th primary
210next year um for the uh time out is 2017 2018 never mind any further discussion okay thank you thank you moving right along to superintendent's Time Dr Walt's time to test out your new microphone button over there thank you chairman Sawyers members of the board uh this being our first meeting I have the usual talking points to bring people up to speed and then uh we always have an opening of the school what is there to get excited about so if you're a new board member uh you'll get to experience that for the first time to all the teachers parents and students who said we needed more time for teaching and learning and less on mandated assessments I did hear you we are cutting the number of required assessments per marking period in half that
211means that instead of 18 assessments teachers may give as few as nine per marking period this waiver to current regulations is effective for the current school year while fully revising grading regulations are developed over the course of this year I congratulate everyone in our schools and educational support offices on the outstanding opening of a new school year the new Kyle Wilson Elementary School and Charles J kogan Senior High School both opened and received a lot of great media coverage the rededication of Hampton Middle School was a memorable event for everyone at every school I visited students and staff were very excited engaged in their learning our schools open uh smoothly and you would have almost thought that we had been open for weeks so uh congratulations for all the hard work and planning to make
212that happen as the year begins I am pleased to announce some of our more recent accomplishments and there are many the scholarship total for the class of 2016 was $38 million over 500 students in the class of 2016 received one or more scholarships congratulations to Melanie yielding fourth grade teacher at Ellis Elementary School who was named one of six Virginia finalists for the presidential award for excellence in Mathematics and Science teaching Parkside Middle School has been awarded the designation as a Cambridge professional development center it is the first and only school in the United States to have this designation this means that the school offers professional development and teaching and learning that meets rigorous International Cambridge standards teachers will earn the Cambridge professional development qualifications certificate actually from the University College London Institute of Education
213which was ranked number one for Education worldwide professional development opportunities at Parkside Middle School are open to any educator across our School Division in the annual best of Prince William Pole conducted by insidenova.com Ashlin Elementary School is voted the best elementary school and Ashlin teacher Carly Domingo was voted the best teacher Kathy schz who teaches language arts and gifted education at the noville school is Prince William County's 2016 Poet Laureate her selection was announced by the Prince William County Arts Council this is also an opportunity to invite everyone to attend the Annual Arts alive Festival on Saturday September 17th at the Hilton Performing Arts Center from 12 p.m. to 400 p.m. and the admission is free while The Archers of Reagan Middle School were not in Rio for the Olympics they were able to bring
214home the gold to Prince William County with a win at The Outdoor World Tournament the Reagan archers are world champions for the second year in a row for the second year we published a combined Elementary and Middle School guide and calendar the calendar includes the weekly menu for elementary and middle school students as a separate pullout page the menu and calendar are posted on the website throughout the calendar we have included artwork by our students and the cover of the guide was created by Isabelle Vanette who is an eighth grader at Bull Run Middle School this year and I think we have yes the artwork work uh is up where you can see it and in closing I will share with the school board and the community my annual top 10 reasons to be excited
215about the new school year are we ready number 10 clean and well-maintained Facilities our support staff cleaned and prepared over 10 million square feet of building space to prepare for our new year number nine new schools and other facilities opened on schedule and within budget including Wilson Elementary colan High School the independent Hill Maintenance building activity rooms at carydale Enterprise and Tyler Elementary and Ripon Middle School Edition and continuing the New Hampton Middle School complete with new logo and all kinds of exciting uh paintings and murals inside the building um an excellent opening there number eight new schools are underway and other improvements division wide pomac Shores Elementary School and the new independent Hill instructional facility are both under construction and then you can see our additions Belmont Henderson nebco and Lakeridge Middle School renewals
216at antita moli Mullen Westridge Lakeridge and son ERS middle schools number seven Technology support all schools are on inet with wireless access over this past year more than 7,000 new computers were installed with over 45,000 now on the pwcs network almost 700 interactive whiteboards were installed this past summer with almost 90% of the classrooms in our entire School Division now having access bring your own device is available division wide and new for this year pwcs Future Ready integrating technology into instruction and division bandwidth doubling from 1 to two gigabytes number six student learning more than 11,100 students attended summer school for remediation enrichment extended school year and High School academic programs number five more than 11 11,000 people attended our professional development courses and they numbered 1,100 in preparation for this new school year number
217four pwcs now has approximately 11,000 employees we welcomed over 800 new teachers to pwcs and almost 90,000 job applications were received this past year including over 43,000 for teacher applications we're down to the final three Support Services on the first day of school 20,500 breakfast and 54,2 15 lunches were served and I will tell you I sampled I'm trying to remember what I sampled it was something I had it was something I had never eaten before and it was delicious stay tuned 798 buses were on the road and traveled over 55,000 miles more than 60,000 students rode the bus to school number two celebrating success all 11 of our high schools are in the top 10% Nationwide in the Washington Post poll osbor Park Battlefield Patriot and Hilton High Schools were recognized for being among
218the best from over 21,000 High schools Nationwide each earning a silver medal continuing with our successes the 2015 ontime graduation rate from pwcs continues to improve and is now at 91.4% the percentage of our students earning advanced placement International Balor or Cambridge qualifying scores continues to far exceed the national average and in some cases the world average Parkside Middle School I mentioned is now a Cambridge International professional development site again first in the nation since 2005 2006 the number of students taking the SAT test has increased by 38% and the number of students taking the ACT has increased by 59% 20156 28% of high school students that's grades 9 through 12 were enrolled in at least one of those Advanced courses 26,1 145 is the number of college credit hours earned by pwcs students in
2192016 by earning scores of three or higher on AP exams 38,1 68,7 is the amount of scholarship money earned by the class of 2016 which is up7 million over 2015 during the past five years students have earned 179 m349 th30 in scholarships 21% of our students in 20156 were English Learners increasing number of English Learners have been identified for gifted Services we've had a 14% increase from the 20145 school year to this past school year over 25% of English Learners were identified to exit the n Services Program in 2015 2016 meaning they're competent in versatile in the English language number one we welcome over 88,000 students to the new school year up approximately a th000 students from last year we continue to be the second largest School Division in Virginia and are now the 35th
220largest School Division in America and there are approximately 16,000 School Division Visions so I'd like to thank everyone it obviously takes a team our teachers support staff administrators our dedicated School Board Civic groups community business partners elected officials parents Guardians and students have come together to help build our worldclass schools right here in Prince William County and we're looking forward to an excellent Dynamic school year thank you thank you next we got a few items here we can probably chip away at a few of these um pretty quick next is item Ron I second thank you discussion any no all right with that we take a vote those in favor of the motion please signify yes by raising your right hand and those not in favor okay the vote is six yes one no motion
221passed thank you uh moving on we decided to skip item 2102 is that correct make sure I'm look at the right item okay the next one is item 21.03 revision of policy 137 uh motion is an order Mr chairman Mr DCH um I think this uh motion is very important um I think that it we just need to make a motion first and then then we can have discussion Mr deut all right sounds good I'll just move that in order to make sure we have a full board um to vote on this item that we postpone this until the burville seat is well until two weeks from now or two meetings from now well the agenda is on on the with with it would have to be unanimous consent to pull an item off the
222agenda does anyone object to pulling item 21.03 off the agenda without objection so so moved we are now sorry I hit buttons now um item [Music] 04 to a later board meeting with no objection so moved item 2105 save schools advisory Council appointment Mr wil this is your item yeah Mr chairman I moved that the Prince William County school board approved the appointment of Kathy strip matter to represent the bomic district on the safe schools advisory Council for her two-year term thank you Mr wil is there a second Mr chairman Miss Jesse I second thank you discussion those in favor of the motion please signify yes by raising your right hand thank thank you vot is seven yes unanimous motion passed all right and now we're going to move on to the second segment of
223citizens time we got there uh I'm going to call up the first 10 speakers I realize that we'll probably have some some absentees but we'll move through I'm going to remind everybody uh at the time the same rules apply as previously you have three minutes to speak proper deorum at all times all that good stuff uh speakers here we y Andrea laferty Brad brl Mike and Teresa zachor U sorry zek Father Thomas vanderwood Angela Hull Scott and Sophia patchin Joanne Bennett Lisa Schuman and Elizabeth Del jodis and Pastor Michael Rogers those are the next 10 speakers I apologize for the butchering of any names that may have happened it is a frequent occurrence from my microphone so I apologize first speaker is Andrea laferty Miss laferty I am Andrea laferty president of the Traditional Values
224Coalition for the last year and a half I co-led the strong Community opposition to Fairfax County's misguided effort on gender identity I'm so glad I was number 21 got to wait here through the evening so you were successful Mr chairman in succeeding in eliminating the majority of the people who came to speak their moms who needed to get and dads needed to get home um I'm going to set aside a much of my testimony because um a lot of it's been said but I want to address a few things sounds like the board's made up their mind yep um you've chosen to disregard the Dylan rule which is the you know the rule of land here in Virginia that you don't have the authority to do this you've chosen to ignore the fact that there
225is no statute or case law for you to do this um I don't know if you've chosen to ignore the fact but um what will happen here is you are going to be changing your discrimination policy so that means that people who are truly troubled and need help people that suffer with suffer gender gender identity conflict are now going to be put in the same category as African-Americans other and other minorities that is what you have acquiesced to in your statements tonight um I want to point out that there uh the uh Manifesto for what you're about ready to do says that it's irrelevant whether a person's objection to a student's Identity or expression is based on a sincerely held religious belief you don't care about people's religious beliefs and how parents want their kids
226raised you don't care about the overnight trips where the manifesto says transgendered kids get to stay in the same room with their peers and in the manifesto it says not disclose the students transgendered status to their parents or to other students it also talks about um implementation um from leadership to bus drivers bring in external trainers or every professional working in schools should also normalize gender variant Behavior by talking in positive ways and infusing into the curricula and lesson delivery moms and dads listening in the audience and those of you on in television land understand this is not the end all of you here have decided how it's going to it's going to be implemented in Fairfax I could go on at nauseum about what's happening we've pushed them back in Fairfax they are you've
227heard what's happening there they've got to stop what they're doing for a moment but there there's stuff in the curriculum do are you aware of that of what's happening in the curriculum what kids are being taught and will be taught based on this there's a lot to think through not just about the bathrooms and the locker rooms there are many ramifications I would love to talk to some of you here so you understand what you're about to do what you've said is going to happen thank you please take some time and and meet with some some of us thank you thank you our next speaker is Brad bromal Brad and I'm sorry you said it right you said it the first time and I don't remember exactly how to pronounce it so it's all right
228District my address is on file Mr chairman our constitution provides a great template for checks and balances in government the policy changing question provides neither we're going to leave implementation in the hands of elected bureaucrats I can't tell if there's going to be any public debate on any of these policy implementations I'm very troubled and very concerned for my family for my neighbors for my kids and for my grandkids my fellow citizens in favor of the policy change have eloquently expressed their views however I would ask you to consider how many rights we currently withhold from juveniles today buying alcohol tobacco voting driving why because they are too young to handle the responsibility could potentially harm themselves or others okay this seems to be pretty consistent logically understood that young people are different than adults
229working for Comcast who are capable of making decisions that affect the rest of their lives and their livelihoods we should consider youth of the people involved sounds like you're ready to pull a pin on this hand grenade and walk away I find that very troubling it's going to be a nasty show I hope you reconsider thank you thank you our next joint speakers are Mike and Teresa zarak Mike and Teresa going once going twice father Thomas Vander father uh Mr chairman and uh superintendent and members of the board um name is Father Thomas Vander Woody um I don't think they got my address when I signed up so it's 13260 McCartney Court Bristo Virginia and just just briefly this this evening um just listen to everybody um it's um quite a quite a hand grenade
230quite a hot potato that is is being spoken about here about the possible change that you may make to the prism County Schools non-discrimination policy to include gender identity and sexual orientation um as a Catholic priest I am taught our church teaches to love God above all things our neighbor as ourselves we love each and every person um that person's been created by almighty God In His Image and likeness that said out of love then we we must always speak the truth the truth that sets free Mother Teresa just canonized this past Sunday quite quite an individual that taught us all how to live this okay in season out of season um our action spoke very loudly so as far as in this case we we're considering uh changing this language and the allowances that
231would be made um and there's been much discussion in the bathrooms and the locker rooms especially um I grew up with a family of seven boys a lot of Athletics a lot of guys um just a couple points that may might be uh worth bringing to Bear here first of all the the right to privacy especially of young ladies those of you are women you remember when you were younger I know it's instilled in us as far as the respect for a young lady um and their right to privacy um to allow any other male in a locker room bathroom girls um does it respect the girls some of you had daughters some of you women you remember this growing up were you what were you taught about if a man or if a boy
232came in your your bathroom or locker room same thing I think it's just we go back to the basics here um and what is truth likewise with our sons in their locker rooms the boys are we setting them up you know we know the problem with with pornography these days right guys are driven by their eyesight women are driven by emotions for the most part are we setting our boys up for future lawsuits for actually not respecting women so I just bring those few points to bear for all of you to consider as you um you know uh consider these decisions these weighty decisions as you mentioned that will affect close to 90,000 children in our County thank you all very much thank you our next speaker is Angela Hall [Applause] Angela good evening my
233name is Hall in my uh address is on record um my daughter is a senior this year and is so excited to be completing her final year of grade school and very happy to be a part of a graduating class which will not have to experience four years of PE but this issue of four years of PE is uh for our future graduates why this non-discrimination policy is so important all through our children's education we've sought to teach them respect for self respect for others even when their ideas or beliefs may be different from their own I believe that there's they've had that experience in their class class rooms and their and the goals of their teachers I want my children to Inner school and know and trust that they're protected well cared for their
234teachers seek to provide the best learning environment they can and teach them well what is true so they can be equipped with wisdom to make right decisions and fulfill the purpose for their lives that great responsibility is a shared partnership and it's a noble task of parents and teachers and it's hard and it takes great sacrifice and love and I'm thankful for the many personal sacrifices of our teachers my sister's an elementary school teacher but I would not want to see any of that trust and partnership broken because of misguided changes to a non-discrimination policy trust is a very fragile thing it's hard to gain and easy to lose as a mother I try to understand what my children need and how I can best nurture that need in their lives my heart goes out
235to the parents of children struggling with their gender identity so I try to be sensitive to understand what has happened to a child who feels this way I read their stories they're heart-wrenching there's much hurt and pain which needs to be process with professional counseling and parental involvement so we as parents and Educators need to be very careful not to do more harm than good in redefining this policy I can see how many changes to the policy will most likely create more problems than they solve most of these children do not want to be the center of attention policy changes with thrust them and others all other students into completely unchartered territory with exposure to very unwanted and potentially unsafe harmful experiences students become unprotected from the potential abuse by those who would take advantage
236of such policy changes M most people realize separation of the Sexes is a good privacy policy and has worked very well in our schools but be please be very very careful of those whose motivations is not the personal healing of a very hurting child but who have a broader social re-engineering agenda to promote in the medical profession one of their guidelines States first Do no harm I believe that's a great guideline for all of us as parents and teachers concerning policies science tells us there's only two genders male and female defined by The XX or XY chromosomic conception others would have us believe that there are up to 72 gender titles with the many forms of mental gender identity when I read about sex reassignment surgery I read that they are chemical and iCal imp
237impersonations of the opposite sex because no one can physically become the sex opposite of their genetics in fact the addition of the excess hormone levels in their blood greatly increase a person's risk for degenerative diseases cancers high blood pressure blood clots Strokes diabetes all diseases for which there are no simple cures this surgery requires the suppression of natural puberty which will inhibit growth and fertility of a physically healthy child when I want to help someone I try to convince them that there's something which they're not or accommodate or affirm false idea about themselves as inherent and fixed for life I helped them to see the reality and beauty of who they are and were created and designed by their designer to be and to work compassionately toward their well-being and holess I have great hope
238for the families of these children because 98% of the boys 88% of the girls who struggle with gender identity eventually accept their biological sex after naturally passing through puberty so to repeat please do no harm second be very careful not to create more problems any policy was meant to solve and third remember trust is very fragile and it's it's easy to break and hard to gain back thank you our next joint speakers are Scott and Sophia patchin Scott and Sophia Scott and Sophia next speaker Joanne Bennett Joanne Lisa Schuman Miss Schuman M Williams makes a good point if anybody else has anything this happens quite often if you have anything feel free to hand it to the clerk and they'll they'll pass it down as you talk as well so anything that it's not your
239fault I I allowed it to happen earlier so you did you just follow follow in orders that's it's my fault actually but anybody else that's it's perfect it's welcome but hand it to the clerk and she'll pass it down for us thank you your time will start hi my name is Lisa Schuman and I am hearing all of these different uh things and I I had to review what I wanted to say about 10 times because many people have said the same things um one of the things that I did was pass out to you a copy of the America Alliance defending freedom and they have a what they have as a proposal to equally cover the safety and the um protection of all students and this was proposed in North Carolina but I believe
240it's a very good example and it leads you to be able to see the different Court decisions that were Incorporated and thought out and how they came to that decision one of the things that was brought up is somebody asked how our federal funding would be um affected if we did not change our policies and if you look at page um seven of what I handed out to you it says in um underlined in the middle of the page as a practical m a public school will not lose Federal funding for non-compliance with Title 9 school boards often hear that their schools will lose Federal funding if they refuse to let a transgender student use a bathroom of his or her choice and if you skip down it says no school has ever lost funding
241in the 40 years since Title 9 was enacted additionally if the Department of Education threatens a school's funding that school is entitled to a hearing before an administrative law judge and review by federal court if a school fights and ultimately loses that school is still given 30 days to comply and keep their funding so we don't have any risk of losing funding if that is a fear of our school board as far as bullying goes I can tell you from firsthand of my own I have three children that have been into in the public system there's going to be bullying no matter what and it's always terrible and it doesn't matter it is regardless of race religion color it's never acceptable so of course we should work on bullying and of course it's a tragedy
242when it happens to any people I can tell you as I heard one person say that you know it's you know if you feel this way this is who you are I can tell you I have an extended family member who gave their child up to for adoption that child was raised by two lesbian people who raised their son and he wanted to be like his mommies and he took on the identity of a transgender and went through the school system for a number of years and then as he got to the time of adolescence changed his mind of his own valtion and now identifies as his anatomically a genetic Ally disposed original gender at Birth so when someone says it's not fluid I can tell you from personal experience that it can be I
243can tell you that one of his two mommies dissolved the relationships and went and married a man so these are things that do happen it is not completely black and white I can tell you that my I have a a very close family member in my immediate family who identifies as homosexual he would be very uncomfortable with an anatomically female person in the gender in in the bathroom or anywhere else thank you thank you our next speaker make sure I'm on the right thing here Elizabeth Del judies Elizabeth bless you bless you uh Pastor Michael Rogers Pastor Rogers okay then we have our next speakers we have Bill pet I'm going to call several names here Bill Petra Reverend Reverend meline Campbell Jennifer Cole Darien Somerville Justina Roberts Pam Cara tibs Lee Carter Giovanni null
244and Phillip Wilkins uh Bill Petra Woodbridge Mr chairman board members and parents my wife and I are perplexed about this whole issue of transgenderism in part because you have put parents in a position where they feel compelled to come to a public Arena and stand up for their children when you should be doing it for them we have come to Where Have We come as a nation when we are having Schoolboard votes on transgender policy this is most disturbing the most disturbing thing about this is there's no real basis to entertain the subject in my hand I'm holding up a few pages of a current document distributed by the World Health Organization it's called the ICD-10 classification of mental and behavior disorders it lists on page 168 under gender identity disorders gender identity disorder of
245childhood or what we call transgenderism once again this is the World Health Organization there's another report that I would like to bring to your attention which is just just released in the new Atlantis it's the authored it's authored by two famous professors of Psychiatry Dr Lawrence Mayer and Dr Paul McHugh of John Hopkins University School of Medicine it's 144 pages long the executive summary is only three pages and part part three of the executive summary covers gender identity bullet number one States the hypothesis that gender identity is an innate fixed property of human beings that is independent of biological sex that a person might be a man trapped in a woman's body or a woman trapped in a man's body is not supported by scientific evidence there's a whole lot more in this documents that
246is contrary to the policy changes you are considering I suggest you read it I am not trying to hurt anyone's feeling here but you are spring on unfamiliar territory with what many of would call flawed data this is political correctness G to Muk Fairfax county is going through this right now and it's a nightmare for the parents and the schools so where do this board draw the line on policy votes what if a group of students said they needed to be in a bathroom by themselves and without their individual bathrooms they would not feel discrim they would feel discriminated against would you start building individual bathrooms where would you draw the line a coworker of mine and his wife wife adopted two girls who were severely sexually abused when they were toddlers they are school
247age now and have a lot of issues to work through he was telling me how they would have a total emotional meltdown if they ever discovered someone of the opposite sex in their restroom have you thought about what kind of effect this would have on other students have you thought about how parents are going to have to explain to their children why a boy thinks a girl is now thinks he's a girl and now needs to be treated like one that's not a conversation parents want to have have with young children I would like to respectfully suggest that if parents do not feel their children can attend Prince William County without this policy change they should consider homeschooling their child I urge you to vote no on this policy change thank you for your time
248thank you our next speaker is Reverend mateline Camp Reverend Campbell okay flipping it over here Jennifer Cole is our next speaker Jennifer Daren Somerville Justina Roberts Pam allar Carla tibs should I come up I'm Pam oh Pam I'm sorry I skipped right I was moving too fast I apologize Pam I I got pass you are up Pam it's all right it's all right put my glass is on here okay I'm ready hi good evening um my name is Pam iser and um I'm up here standing for me um I want to let you know that I am African-American don't know if you recognize that I'm a female I have a mental illness I am gay I am a member of the Unitarian University vist church and of all of those only one is protected and
249that is the only one is not protected here in Prince William County School Systems currently and that is me being gay I just want to let you know that I was wrongly outed at high school by another student the experience of being shamed and exiled was devastating to my soul this was 1986 and I had no one to turn to there were no allies let alone living outloud LGBT Educators to whom I could turn to for support the day after everyone in the school knew I wasn't sure that the administration would allow me to remain being the marching band's Head drum major or the student body Student Government body president but I was blessed I was blessed because I was I managed to be allowed allowed to honor both my positions until my graduation I
250will never know who spoke up for me and what price they may have paid in doing so I can only be grateful and fight to ensure that nobody has to live through the fear the shame bullying that I experienced I may have survived that period of my life but my wounds Run Deep it gets better my wife Linda and I have been married for eight years we have two sons three grandchildren and families in both Texas and Scotland who love us without limit please ensure that the protections that weren't there for me and the person I called my guardian are put in place for all students in Educators here in Prince William County a child should be their authentic self in learning and an educator should feel that same way in teaching thank you so
251much for your time I just need to say some of the things I've heard up here have been disrespectful and hurtful but I will never give up this fight thank you thank you our next speaker is Carla tibs Carla greetings my name is Carla tibs and my addresses on record and um I want to thank you for honoring your word and hearing all of us out um but um I am very saddened by the way that the business is being conducted I'm very pleased and happy with all the residents I think that for the most part the residents have come and and even though they were disappointed they conducted themselves very well and the discussions have been very thoughtful and that's what we've asked you to do I I I kind of took a little
252offense Miss Williams that you insinuated that we would be less than that or that um we are trying to because we oppose um this opinion that we would not conduct ourselves in a decent order and I believe that we have had quite a few suggestions that are um very good ones as to how to move forward to continue conversations to operate with respect and love to have a dialogue that is not pushed by some other agenda that is being Tethered to this and for anyone to think that has been in office for a long time that there are not circumstances that motivate people of position and power that's not seen it's ridiculous of course there are and of course we know that Prince William County has been named uh nationally as one of the Battleground
253counties for the upcoming election and for us to be wedging such an important issue in between so many agenda items says you don't really are interested in hearing the totality of the voices that are out there I appreciate you Mr wils I appreciate the fact that you say I want to know what people are saying and what to think there's plenty of opportunity for us to grow together and to grow in understanding and to respect one another and to hear the points of views out in a loving and kind Manner and to come up with an intelligent solution anything beside that indicates to me that there's something else hidden and just because something is hidden does not mean it's not seen because it is being seen it's being seen by the Lord first of all
254and also by knowing eyes and understanding people and so I think that if you move forward you will give the appearance of something that you don't want and that is that you're not listening to your people and that you do have something else going on and that there is things to be hidden and seen so put that to rest and have open conversation and dialogue with respect for one another and for us who vote for you thank you our next speaker is Lee Carter Mr Carter thank you Mr chairman members of the board Dr Waltz members of the staff and those residents that are still here at a quarter to midnight my name is Lee Carter I'm I'm a candidate for the Virginia House of delegates my address is on file as you're all aware
255the business of running a school system is often one to compromise too often the cost of a program has to be weighed against the number of students that it will help or any potential Financial benefit that it can return to the school the issue that brings me before you today however is a much simpler matter of just doing what is right the proposed update to the non-discrimination policy should not be a costly measure it won't lead to bickering about which school should receive what funding it will simply ensure that our students and teachers are not discriminated against or harassed on the basis of their perceived or actual sexual orientation and gender identity nothing more nothing less so I'm here today to speak about the cost of inaction on this matter when a student feels unsafe
256in the classroom based on who they are that student is set up for failure it is more difficult to concentrate more difficult to learn and more difficult to perform in assignments and tests it can be demotivating and it can rob that student of future opportunities extending long after he or she graduates from our schools when a parent feels that their child feels unsafe that parent is UN unlikely to remain here they begin to look for other school systems other places to live and other places to work it can chase that family out of Prince William County robbing our community of valued members and our bus businesses of valuable employees when a business loses employees because their children feel unsafe they are less likely to expand into our area they begin to look for locations other
257than Prince William County robbing our residents of jobs an opportunity to make the best use of their talents here at home and last but not least when a teacher feels unsafe in the classroom they look to other school systems for employment or even worse leave the profession of teaching all together when that happen we rob all our students of the opportunity to learn and grow under the care and guidance of that dedicated professional members of the board I urge you to update not just policy 60 but policy 501 policy 512 and policy 738 to include the right of all employees and students to be free from discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity because it's time to stop robbing our students and teachers of their dignity and safety based on who they are and
258it's time to start treating them as whole people deserving of our respect thank you thank you the next speaker is giovana n giovana Phillip Wilkins Philip Mr chairman Dr Waltz and members of the board thank you for allowing me to speak tonight my name is Philip WI wiins and my contact information is on file with the clerk I'm here tonight tonight to State my opposition to the proposed changes to the school district's non-discrimination policy first let me State unequivocally that people who identify as homosexual or transsexual have the same inherent dignity as any other human being they should not be ostracized and they should be treated with respect they are precious children of God with that said I do not believe sexual orientation and gender identity should be included in the list of characteristics already
259in the school district's policy homosexuality and transexualism are perversions of human sexuality and contrary to human nature itself in no way should they be normalized in an official school policy and let us not forget that the percentage of our society who ident ifies as either homosexual or transsexual amounts to around 3% with transsexuals telling less than a half% why do you as a school board have such a desire to make a sweeping policy change for such a small number and let us not be naive as to the far-reaching consequences of this policy change the non-discrimination statement will read the division shall not discriminate in employment nor in the provision of Education ational programs services and activities on the basis of race color religion national origin sex gender identity sexual orientation so on and so forth
260if you haven't already decided to let males in the female's bathroom and that includes grown men then this statement certainly opens wide that door Mr sawers do you really want boys in the bathroom with your daughter how about grown men do you really think that is a good idea my young daughter will never go to a school in which males are allowed in the bathroom with her that is the height of foolishness I'm not even suggesting that it would be the incredibly small number of transsexuals who would perpetrate sexual crimes against girls and women as evidence by the sexual violations of women that have occurred in Target stores any male with perverted intentions would have many easy victims available to him and how about sports teams this opens the door to boys playing on girl
261sports teams do you really think that is fair to young girls and what about the many families in this school district far more than 3% who are religious is it fair to those parents to have to send their child to school in a district that openly Embraces Vice and sin how is it fair that their child's school will undermine the morals and virtues they are trying to instill in their children at home it's my sincere desire that you use reason and common sense in your Deion and not rely on emotion and or fear of a lawsuit doing the right thing often takes courage thank you thank you our next group of speakers are John McCardell Tim Heisler Harry Wiggins Philip carmichel Bashon puit Arthur dagman dagum dangum uh Benjamin perves Nancy Lon Cassidy Ketchum and
262ginger Jabs so our next speaker on the list is John McCardle John John McCardle live in Brunsville District so thank you for having me I'm a little bit confused um there was um there's a lot to talk about bullying that goes on against whether you're homosexual transgender whatnot I tend to follow the news and don't tend to see a lot of that going on is it and it wasn't discussed at all during your minimal public discussion so is it the sort of thing that is it a prevalent issue in the schools right now that it needs to be addressed with this specific group um again it wasn't touched one iot it in your very very very limited discussion now Miss Jess you indicated as a former principal principles know what go what goes on in
263the school it gets up to them everything I think that's what I heard you say a little bit ago um given that if it is such a prevalent issue as it being ignored by the schools is it an issue in the hiring of teachers and administrators that um right now they are being discriminated against and it's being ignored are the lawyers allowing that you know Mr Sawyers I just I've heard none of this and so I think it is all these issues are being ignored are the principles just totally and how is that going to change how will that change if this policy is put into place and is the bullying automatically going to go away I think bullying exists for different reasons not just for the issues we're talking about but for you know
264a lot of things um you know I can say I'm short and therefore I was bullied when I was in school growing up uh and some things you deal with some things you know you get over but again is it just going to go away because it's written to this policy and um so I I guess I don't get that and in the meantime by saying that okay well this is now automatically going to go away because of this new policy um what about again the Privacy rights of my children and I I said this to my twin daughters who 12 um we try to instill in our kids uh a sense of you know you know what we believe to be moral uh modesty in the way they dress the way they talk the
265way they treat others certainly and now you're saying we're going to expose you to this um and it doesn't matter what you believe in what you think because there is this other small group that again doesn't seem to be a big issue from what I'm hearing nobody's talking about how prevalent it is I don't read it about it you know um so I think you really need to address that you need to have this discussion and stop trying to rush through this for whatever the reason is whether it is political um you know I don't know what the reasons are but you need to slow this down and have discussions you know there's talk about lawsuits um Let Let It Go through the courts well today I don't know if you heard about this in
266a place called Virginia not our Commonwealth of Virginia but in Virginia Minnesota just today there is a law suit filed because there are 11 or 12 um families that are suing the school district because there was a situation in a locker room and again this could happen any time but this is real life here um among the allegations student X commented on girls bodies while in girls locker room including asking girl plain of f about her bra Siz and asked her to trade body parts with him danc loud music was sexually explicit lyrics while twerking grinding and lifting up his skirts to reveal his underwear thank you sir there are three or four things these needs to be slowed down and addressed and stop ignoring it thank you thank you our next speaker is Tim
267Heisler Tim Tim Heisler next speaker is Harry Wiggins Mr Wiggins my name is Harry Wiggins I live at 3525 wooders in Trail Lake Ridge Virginia 221 192 attending Awan District um I just uh gave Mr Urban a resolution that was passed unanimously by the Prince William County Democratic committee uh the resolution is in favor of adding sexual orientation and gender identity to the Prince William County schools non-discrimination policy um this is strictly a in my view a civil rights issue uh after the Civil War the uh the 15th amendment was passed that uh gave the vote to African-American men and most of you know that women's suffrage didn't happen till um but Virginia Virginia took care of that in the 1901 uh Constitutional Convention by imposing pole tax a um literacy test and six or
268seven other items that prevented African-Americans from voting and those those issues remained in effect in Virginia until 1971 until the 1971 uh uh Constitutional Convention and and new constitution if not now when and this needs to happen it needs to happen now as soon as possible of course there's going to be issues that need to be worked on as Mrs Williams said every policy that you promulgate is going to have things to be worked out by the administration you have a very competent Administration that can easily handle this so I'd urge you uh to move forward with this and a couple things I'd like to point out in this uh resolution every legitimate college and university in Virginia includes sexual orientation in their non-discrimination policy 113 of the top 120 colleges ranked by US News
269and and World Report include sexual orientation in their uh non-discrimination policy nearly every Fortune 500 company includes sexual orientation in their non-discrimination policy it's time for Prince William County to move into the 21st century with the rest of America and move forward with this thank you thank you our next speaker is Philip carmichel Phillip hopefully the timer doesn't disappear on me this time Mr carmichel you're up uh good evening thank you for uh hearing me out tonight uh my name is Philip carmichel my address is on file with the clerk like everybody else uh that address is in Bristo where it's been for 17 years which means I've seen a lot of change to Western Prince Lim County uh Bristo wasn't much more than a post office when I moved here and uh still not
270much more but uh I've seen a lot more change in Gainesville and uh and hey Market um I hear a lot of talk about um the policy and the policy and bullying in the policy and and I feel like we're relying on a policy when we should be relying on each other and uh every election cycle I hear talk of leadership and I'm this and I'm that and and it seems like all our elected representatives are the smartest people in the world and yet we can't do anything without a policy um in reality I think the the policy of this nature is one where the more you add the more you subtract in that by adding uh groups you're going to by definition exclude others so we'll be having the same conversation every year it'll
271just be a different group in reality the policy should just say that Prince Loom County does not discriminate period end of story so um I touched earlier on leadership um and the uh the letter that was referred to that was put out by the Department of Education and the Department of Justice I I read through it I started on all the references but there's a whole lot of of them I don't know if you've all read them all but I I didn't get through them all but I did notice a trend and that the majority of them refer to uh funding and it's like the third paragraph in the letter funding and just like any policy it's becomes a weapon at some point um that to beat on on the school districts to bring them
272to their will but the nature of the school district is it's us and it's all of us and we need to be better about um about ourselves and doing what's right for us not the unelected bureaucrats in Washington and I'm disappointed that so many people have left um we've heard a lot of Stories on both sides um of bullying when they were kids and and I think all of us have felt ostracized and uh put out at some point and and a policy doesn't help it's action it's leadership it's at the school level at the school district level um I have four children 29 years of experience between them in the prince room County schools and um some of them have been bullied and along the way and and my oldest is now at Patriot
273High School it's been her best educational experience and I credit the principal there a lot and um he's been phenomenal so uh thank you for your time thank you our next speaker is Bashan puit Bashon Arthur dag I'm gonna no I'm not even going to try because I'm I've already tried too many times and too many people try yeah thank you Arthur denum is my name my uh address is on file um I I've I've come to just voice my my objection to the change in the in the uh 060 as well um my reasons are I mean we've heard from the legal perspective from moral perspective from scientific perspective um I just have two points to reiterate a study that just came out from the Psychiatry of at St John's Hopkins you know they
274came out saying that there's no scientific evidence to support the idea that a man can be in a woman's body or vice versa and um so so basically what this statute is asking for in terms of the transgenderism is that we are asking people to believe something that is unscientific not scientifically based which is then a belief so we're we're forcing other people to participate in a belief that's not theirs um which which is almost like a religion so um you know that's that's not what our country is about you know where're that's not what faith is about really I mean we we try to convince others but not force them to our beliefs um this would seem to force people to believe that or or to treat this person as what they say they
275believe they are even though it's scientifically unfounded another uh my second point that I uh would like to address is that Miss Williams you had mentioned about an alternate alternative to this proposition um that would work well um much like everyone else I've heard um the objections you know the the the the problems that the transgendered and the LGBT community have had is um with the bullying um feeling unaccepted for who they are um I would just reiterate some of the other things that others have said that um they are humans and and and that's not a question if they're not being treated with human dignity with the Dignity of of everyone else then uh that you know that should be uh reprimanded but however um to to participate and and again to to um
276have my children be forced to acknowledge that what they are saying they are as true or to treat them in an un you know something that's not based in science not not really um you know that that's that's a whole another thing aside from the bullying so you know as people said before you can be bullied for being short you can be bullied for being skinny you can be bullied for being you know large whatever the case may be that should not happen um the speaker before me said no no discrimination at all and I I support that so thank you sir next speaker is Benjamin perves Benjamin Benjamin Nancy Lon Cassidy Ketchum Kum I'm sorry I'm sorry I I got going too fast your name I'm sorry Nancy Larson Nancy Larson Miss Larson the
277floor is yours thank you and I suppose you have my address on file um so I I'm I'm a parent of three Prince William County School children and I just have questions for the board I'm not taking a stand one way or the other but I do have questions um and a lot of those questions have already been asked um this evening um so you by having me go later you guys actually spared a lot of my questions um my first question is just what rights religious privacy rights and rights not to do you sacrifice by providing the new rights that logically arise or will be demanded from the language changes and in my mind I'm thinking of my daughter's right not to see a biological adult male in a state of address until she
278chooses to do so um she's um she went to school year early she will enter high school at age 13 with some of the boys who have been held back they may be 18 or 19 years old I do worry about her ending up in a shower potentially unaware that she's going to end up in a shower with an adult male while she's an underage 13-year-old and these are concerns and I know everybody says it's not about the bathroom it's not about the shower but for me this is a very um real concern um my next question is is it possible um that this policy change will result in an exchange of one group's rights and values for another um do all students identities and preferences matter including those who because of religious or moral
279beliefs would not want to be undressed with or sleep with or share um a bedroom with a member of the opposite by biological sex in a school activity um and then there's been some debate about how many of these questions need to be resolved before is it several is it none um but as I read um your policy LGBT students fail to receive equal access to school services and Facilities as they are it also requires a staff analysis of the proposed um addition or changes in terms of the following legal legal implications educational benefits impact of the administration on the School Division immediate and future changes in number and assignment of personnel and immediate and future budgetary impact so I think there are some questions that you must ask and answer and put together in
280a policy and I think most parents would like to see that summary or policy and would probably help um make your case for whichever way you decide this issue um I thank you for listening to my questions and concerns and I do believe that until you can answer these and many of the other questions raised tonight such language changes cannot consa or logically be made I urge the board to carefully assess the unresolved and concerning issues and only act with certainty Clarity in the best interest of all students and not just a few students thank you thank you and then Cassidy is our next speaker sorry got ahead of ourselves Cassidy um Mr chairman members of the school board before I address you as a local teacher I'd also like to address you as a
281psychology student and say that there is research out there that says that people aren't just born XX or XY they're actually born xxy but you guys can Google that later um I am proud to say that I support the LGB btq non-discrimination policy to the members of the school board you took an oath to serve the teachers parents and students of Prince William County by passing this policy you will all be voting to give our teachers the freedom to be who they truly are in public as the teacher in the community myself I cannot imagine being forced by law to hide my identity from my students or out of fear I am proud to call our community home because of our diversity our diversity in race ethnicity gender identity and sexual orientation by voting against
282this policy you would be robbing the children of learning about their own community and even worse you would be sending the message to all the children who identify with the lgbtq community that who they are is not acceptable in the eyes of their Community when we talk about end ing teenage bullying we can all agree that it is a priority however we cannot in the same breath argue against a policy that bullies our teachers and children into hiding their own identity it is important for children to have lgbtq allies when they are figuring out who they are as one of my favorite educational philosophers says any situation in which some individuals prevent others from engaging in the process of inor is one of violence whereas one in 10 heterosexual teens will attempt suicide two out
283of every three teen lgbtq students will attempt suicide not only are they at risk for suicide but lgbtq youth are at higher risk for experimenting with drugs lower academic grades risk of homelessness and a higher risk for STDs these risks are elevated by LGBT youth because of bullying that too often times occurs in our schools the current policy treats our LGBT students and teachers like Outsiders and only makes these members of our community more susceptible to bullying this treatment of homosexual youth being abnormal creates a school cultural for intolerance which quickly turns into hate that manifests into physical and emotional violence against LGBT youth our schools should provide an unbiased stance on sexual Ori orentation and allow adult role models to be who they are so they can protect children figuring out who they are
284I urge the school board members to act like leaders and The Advocates you were elected to be I urge you to respect your community members by allowing them to Pro be protected under the law and I urge you to stand up for social justice and equality for students and staff thank you our next speaker is ginger Jabs Ginger going on to the handwritten list which makes it worse for me here um Maria Georgina Maria I'm going to go I'm going to Rattle everybody off here as best I can Maria Georgina Lopez sorry I just saw that part he Heather Mosser David hish Frankie Bates Chris Bates Kathy Marshall Bill card he was here earlier Chu Chuck was here earlier so it's Kathy Marshall Bill card is it Autumn Birch Tim not getting that one at
285all Chris Moore and Paul mochic I think again the handwriting always gets me so we'll work our way through it here Maria you are our first Speaker good evening everyone H thank you for the opportunity to direct you H my name Maria Georgina and I would like to address everyone today tonight actually today new new Disney day in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ H and on behalf of the children that they are not here they oh don't understand ER what we are discussing even if we try to explain and the major implication of the decision that you are facing to make this this following week and also uh because of the community the International Community that is here that perhaps don't are not even aware of this discussion happening tonight and as we
286H hear the pled of the allegiance I reflect in what he said it says we are one nation under one God and my H proposal to you tonight in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ is that you honor that God that has allowed this nation to be a great nation because no matter what circumstances this nation is facing the greatest nation that the Lord has allowed is United State of America please don't allow this nation to walk Foreigner with a decision that will not only jeopardize children by the future of the this nation and the future of the families that are going to H be part of in the in the years to come please remember that our creator make us with a purpose to honor him and to serve him whether we recognize
287it or not we finally one day will be asked for this and I respectfully and kindly ask you that you make this decision thinking as what will you do it was your daughter your granddaughter your ER son or your grandson facing a situation that they are not ready to be ER responding properly will you hand them a weapon or will you hand them a car without knowing how to drive my ER question is to ask you that you don't implement this because it will harm more people and honor God and he will honor you God bless everyone thank you Maria next speaker is Heather Moser Heather Heather Moser David hish David Frankie Bates Frankie you can pull that microphone down young man [Applause] uh good morning ladies and gentlemen um I am I'm reading this
288on behalf of a Prince William County schools high school senior uh I am transgender I was born in a female body when I should have been born in a male body I was recently made aware of the Prince William County school board's wishes to help the lgbtq community as a member of this family I think that the school board should ask for our help when attempting to created a safe work and learning environment we should know what we need or would like to see happen to make it feel not just safe but also equal and included with the other students and faculty I personally have a few suggestions that can help make Prince William County schools a safer and healthier environment for everyone here are some of my ideas allow all students to play any
289sport play in any part of band Orchestra drama club and color guard and join any club that their school offers update an anti-discrimination and anti-bullying policy to include gender not sex because sex does not equal gender sexual preference gender identity these are just some ideas I greatly encourage the school board to discuss and consider to create a safe a safer and healthier environment for not just only the lgbtq community but for everyone I also encourage that those in charge ask the students their families and faculty who are part of this family to help give their suggestions on what they should like to see change if anything I respect that people do not like change but change is inevitable so why not change things for the better be the change you want to see in the
290world Gandhi if we stop defining each other by what we are not and start defining ourselves by what we are we can all be freeer Emma Watson thank you for your time thank you Frankie next speaker is Chris Bates Chris good morning I had some notes prepared earlier this evening but after all the discussion those notes kind of got blown all away [Music] um I do appreciate that you wish to include the transgender lgbtq Community as a protected class under your non-discriminatory policy I do agree with other speakers that careful consideration needs to be done before implementing this if only to avoid having to roll it back if the courts decide against it that being said we should not use religion of any type as the moral yard stick to measure our antibullying policies with
291Bullying happens to everybody I'm a white male I got it all through school I wouldn't have been protected by any policy in effect anywhere except for one that says no bullying period as someone else mentioned the more you add to these the more you subtract unfortunately in these cases it does appear to work that way now on an unrelated to that subject some actions by this board have been perceived as having a political vent this board is supposed to be nonpartisan there should be no Us Versus Them the board is to oversee the school systems what's best for our children and the staff and teachers that provide role models for them Commander trenum has been asked to sacrifice for his Nation we should honor that we should accept that by policy you have to open
292up your uh you have to open the proceedings to anyone who wants to step forward I ask that you accept more his recommendations have them have a little more weight thank you thank you thank you our next speaker just to make sure Chuck Wilson came in earlier and spoke on on the first hearing I want to make sure he's not here to speak again because I did have him crossed off because he said he was on the so we're on the right we're on the right page then Kathy Marshall is our next speaker Kathy Mr chairman members of the board Dr Waltz uh thank you for this opportunity to speak today um since there were so many people who had hoped to speak and because of the time and family obligations were not able to
293I would hope that you would have further public hearings to give them a chance uh to speak all of their names and addresses are on file so it would be not that difficult to get in contact with them and I kind of found out about this proposal through the grape vine so I went to the websites of the school board and the prince Willam County Schools looking for the policy I couldn't find it but you know maybe I just missed it but something this monumental P um should be really publicized like on the homepage I mean this affects every family um I don't know if you've notified every parent but I think every parent at least should be notified about this change our proposal every teacher every school administrator every staff member should be individually
294notified um this should be discussed at p meetings uh people need to weigh in um when you have a meeting one meeting and this many people show up it shows that there's a lot of interest um I'm not going to repeat a lot of well my my time is almost up anyway but let me just read really quickly um there um there are some societal forces who try to deny nature but everyone knows through observation scientific evidence genetics and common sense that there are only two Sexes male and female while there is never justification to be unkind to anyone neither should we pretend that there would be no harm from this policy change just as we must help anorexic students to see reality when they believe they are overweight and they are not we should
295help gender confused students see reality as well those of you who have children and grandchildren please ask yourself would you want them sharing bathrooms lockers showers and overnight accommodations with the opposite sex or even just discuss transgender issues in the classroom what does it have to do with getting a good education please don't discriminate against students who deserve privacy thank you thank you Kathy our next speaker is Bill card Mr card thank you Mr chairman board Mr superintendent um I found myself sitting out there in apologies to Rodney King you know thinking why can't you talk about education and you know M Jesse and Miss Ralston you deserve to be outraged that you didn't get to your points because we're taking up time with this and I suggest that you exercise some supervision of your
296chairman because if anybody thought that this wasn't going to be as what was termed earlier a hand grenade than they live under a rock this this is not something that this response should have been anticipated by any everybody and you should have given it a wide birth because the 88,000 students and the 10,000 people that work for the school system probably thought that you were doing the business to help enrich them tonight and that didn't happen so th this has no place in this board now or ever uh the study I handed out uh people other other people have alluded to and it's important uh that you understand actual science as regard to this uh my Christian faith is attacked all the Time by people that want to talk to me about science in this
297uh transgender issue you are on the wrong side of science it's been mentioned alluded to before an earlier person came up here and and as talked about gays experiencing four times normal suicide rate a postoperative transgender human being is 20 times more likely than the general population that commit suicide in Sweden which is much like your Bay Area Mrs Roston which is an absolute utter mess so this you've got to come off of this immediately and get to the business of dealing with 88,000 students 10,000 educational professionals and do and do right by them I please uh back off this silly policy and get to work thank you thank you our next speaker is Autumn Burch [Applause] Autumn hi I'm thank you just say what's on your heart don't worry about anybody just say what's
298on your mind um my I'm Autumn and last year my best friend was bullied for being gay and gender fluid behind my back they were kids that rode my bus and they were bullying her after I got off and I feel like it's important to to make it thank you for your time thank you our next speaker is Tim and Tim I'm sorry I'm not able frany I'm sorry I'm not able to read the handwriting I apologize I can't read my own handwriting so you I apologize for not getting it there Tim you're up thank you uh thank you Mr chairman in the board but before I get started uh is there any transgenders still here in the room that I could give a hug to please how about a hug [Applause] Aug you're too
299ugly um anyway that was my outside voice I didn't mean to do that okay any anyways the reason I that's the nicest thing somebody said to me today just so you know and I want just get everybody going here we got the people after midnight so let's wake up okay anyways the reason I wanted to give the person a hug and I and I by the way you gave a great speech in the very beginning is because I love everybody I'll start out by saying that I've never hated anybody in my whole life I never plan on I love everybody doesn't mean I agree but I I love everybody and that's because I'm a Christian I just want everybody to listen and I know it's getting late but if you could just open your mind
300your souls and your heart and listen to what's being said I here I changed my speech about 20 times listening because a lot of people had some good points one of the things I heard was and I heard it and I I really feel bad for the young lady that was here is about harassment protecting people education for all bullying and I sat there and listened to it I go wait a minute that's wrong for everybody period I don't care who they are they should live their life as long as sometimes those policies or um feelings aren't pushed to everybody else it doesn't happen and I I'm going to jump to something oh I was going to say no one no one I didn't hear anybody at all say anything about denying protection for everybody
301all are welcome you can be who you are however we have to watch out for everybody inclusive so one of the things I did is uh my son he's really my grandson he's seven years old morality starts at home everybody here I don't care where you're what side you're on morality the the values they all start at home the government should not be dictating how we raise our children we should be and I don't care what side of the what side of the aisle you're on it doesn't matter we cannot keep chipping away at our social freedoms like this social engineering should not happen so who's seen A Time to Kill Everybody seen that movie anybody will you remember that part where he said close your eyes and pretend now it's your daughter or your
302son I want everybody to put themselves in that position the and uh one more thing is I did read the policy it's like maybe 50 words four words changed I highly say please please please make sure you read that and and study it very well because there's a lot in there that needs to be looked at thank you thank you uh next speaker is Chris Moore Chris Chris Moore and final speaker listed is Paul again handwriting Paul mochic as I'm seeing Paul all right with that citizens comment time is to an end and we are on to board matters and arbitrarily I'm going to start to my left Miss Rolston thank you well we're back and we know we're back cuz it's Wednesday at 12:30 Thursday at 12:30 um and welcome back to everyone else
303let me just say a little bit about what what been going on um since we've last met but I would also but before I even do that can I ask uh Mr chairman if if the superintendent could um talk to the per whoever's in charge of the jrc to send a um um letters to Gil trenum while he's away did thank you okay all right um this year my first full year will be we did a back to school drive for back with backpacks and my nine elementary schools anywhere from 30 to 65 backpacks were placed in the elementary schools along with supplies uh and things that teachers say they need extra we um in our middle schools in my two middle schools they've got book bags I mean backpacks and other supplies and so
304did the school as a whole and our high school likewise it was the first time this kind of endeavor for us in the absco and we had a great time and I just want to thank some of the organizations some that I belong to and and some that uh just reached out and said yes they wanted to be a part of it the Lutheran Church of the Covenant Dell City Moose Lodge Dell City Masonic Lodge uh Dell City civic association Dr Harold Franks Belair Women's Club Woodbridge Rotary Club and hugs and so this was really really a great thing and uh I just really want to thank them very much I attended something very spectacular this summer and it was the summer school graduation it just seemed to me so good it was really really
305good and the people that were graduating were so excited about this and some were getting their GED and it just said to me that you know look what we do in Prince William County schools too often we hear everything wrong everything bad but this was this was good and it was sincere by those who were a participant so again I just really like to say thank you our my one school that is now Hampton Middle School was a great undertaking it may have been long and drawn out coming to that point of that evening but it was a beautiful and wonderful event and I thank up the very next day and I'm just going on the very next day I went back to the school to see how everybody was doing and there was a
306they were having an event and there was vendors and one of the vendors was one of the organizations it was the omegas and they were there signing up students just like they said they were going to do so I am very proud to have the organization working very hard in our schools uh I think this is about it but let us um welcome back all of our teachers and principals students and parents and just plain Community people who have an interest and they came out this evening and we need to respect the fact that um everybody is entitled to be who they want to be thank you thank you Miss Roston Miss Williams thank you Mr chairman in the interest of time I just like to say welcome back to all of our staff and
307students um we're off to a great start I think um and please uh bear with us with all the new changes as you can tell we have new board we have new website we have new teachers we have new lots of things um so if you run into an issue we'd always would like to know but um just a little patience as we start our year off and um hopefully we will all be able to log into our uh lovely School messenger and get on there and do what needs to be done um and for those of you I strangely enough has not been said um but a lot of people do view their our website on their phones so I don't know how many people know this but if you flip your phone this
308way it makes a tremendous difference in your viewing capabilities for viewing the website some of you may laugh but me as a parent I spend most of my time doing like this on this I don't get a chance to get home get the laptop before I'm looking up who did what when and what day i' even have high school student and what color day it is for where so um I just wanted to let people know that this seems silly and simple but it can make a world a difference to your life so um that's it until we meet again thank you m Williams and that does not work on landlines correct that's only it's only smartphones I just want to make sure I'm not not technologically that great miss Jesse a a great a
309number of things happen uh during the summer uh but I have to tell you that the three Schools kogan Wilson and Hampton I I was just so very impressed with facilities and all the work that you do I um I know how much work it is in fact I was at Anum today and they were doing work there so when I looked at those three schools I began to realize all the other renovation work that's been done uh when I came on this board uh I I guess the second year I started the uh unsung hero award and so they're not here but Mr Clan I used to always say you were the genius and you said I have a staff well tonight I'd like to recognize your staff and so for the unsung hero
310award I would like to recognize um Mr D Thompson John wendley David beavers and an associate superintendent that took on a task and I know was challenging because I was kind of a part of that Hampton committee and I had a a role in that committee um and so I would like to recommend Mr Bill bixley for an unsung hero award you were very receptive to all of us every time we called you I just appreciate I know what you do and I wanted to recognize I want to say something for Mrs Mitchell um but I didn't want to slight the other principls who also open schools but I know to her I sent a special card to her uh that she should receive but um I know what it's like to be a principal
311who didn't plan to also rename a school and she had all these people pulling at her um to the um kogan I think I have a slide do I have a slide for kogan or maybe oh swimmers well let's do swimmers for kogan there go there which one is it swimmers I just want to say something about kogan because you know I've stood up for the swimmers and I I just want to be very serious about this because I know I once said to you I don't apologize I really don't apologize because you know I watched the Olympics this year and I saw Michael Phelps Katy Lei Simone Manuel I think her name is and I know that Prince William County schools is going to have a gold medalist out of that pool for me
312it was never about the pool it was always about the kids and for Hampton I think I have a slide on Hampton um it's it's called I call it the money shot I think it Mike Wright who did this shot but um isn't that something and Mrs um yeah Mrs Roston who allowed me my role was supposed to be the U murals of course you know I dabble in a little bit of other stuff but um I just think this is the money shot that shows what we can do without adding a great deal of money for structural changes what we were able to do at that school with and and I know Ray Darlington also know uh the uh stas and Stacy as I call them Ridgeway what they did for that school and
313I know they're paid but they gave us a brand new school without really a lot of structural changes so I wanted to say to my right he shared this picture with me I consider this to be the money shot and um that's really all I have to say really I just hope that in the future we can get home before one so thank you thank you Miss Jesse Miss sat thank you Mr chairman I want to welcome everybody back to a new school year I've already been to one back to school night I'm looking forward to many more and um thank everybody for their patience as we get used to the new website I'm still getting used to it too and I still have to watch the instructional video that Dr Waltz told me I
314need to watch that's on the homepage and uh I have to do my homework um thank you to all of the parents all of the community members everybody and the students who showed up tonight to speak um for those who weren't able to speak we do invite you back to come back in two weeks to our next meeting and uh we will try to be more prompt um with our citizen comment time this time it's our first meeting back in the school year we haven't met for the most part all summer as a board and so there were some business we had to discuss so our our apologies for being late and um just uh looking forward to a great school year and working together with staff and Community to do what's right for our
315kids so thank you thank you Miss sat Mr Deutch thank you Mr chairman um I would like to Echo what I believe Diane Rolston said and really one of the highlights of the summer was uh the summer school graduation we had one of the most energetic principles we have to have in this school division uh leading uh being the keynote speaker it was almost like he was the MC and the entertainment and everything as he uh LED that pep rally it was pretty darn incredible and pretty exciting for students who face more challenges in life and what they've been able to overcome and move forward on uh we also we finished off last summer uh with a number of high school graduations really got to celebrate uh what we're all about there as well and
316then started off uh this year with the opening of a number of new schools uh two of them were in my district uh colan high school and uh Wilson Elementary and then we had uh Hampton uh Middle School renaming reducation and uh it was a uh just an exciting week with a lot of festivities uh as we really celebrate what we're all about um I'm very very excited both for what I'm seeing at kogan and uh Wilson with just kind of the uh the community uh Buy in as the community and the uh teachers and the ad ministrative team are working together uh to bring out uh really new exciting uh things in the coming year uh and so there's uh there's a lot um a lot of good things that that happened over the
317summer and that we uh we're excited about uh looking forward to uh especially next week hitting a lot of back to school nights and uh as we continue to uh just celebrate the beginning of uh the school year um that said you know when we ran we were really excited about working on improving education um here in the school Division and I think some of the the issues that um Miss Rolston and Miss Jesse brought up um for discussion at some point you know show some areas where we need to keep working and improving um and with the way things are going right now I'm very concerned that it's going to take a while to get to those and other issues that we need to do um we have as this issue continues and we
318have different regulations that roll out uh different um Poss POS lawsuits this is going to consume a lot of time as we move forward on this issue and uh really that's sad is there's a lot of things that we need to continue improving in the school division um on that note um I want to um thank Dr Waltz uh for his work on uh increasing how we use flex time and uh increasing uh improving um the the grading situation to provide more flexibility for our uh teachers and for students and I think the changes we can continue making in those directions will Contin continue to uh improve the School Division thank you so much thank you Mr Deutch Mr W yeah I'll be brief uh had a great time both my high school back to
319school nights uh Forest Park pomac of yeah what I don't know what that mean wake up uh but it's been a late night um I hope as a board we can reduce these meetings um uh the timeline uh I also hope that you know we're able to go back can tackle educational instructional issues um and uh I look forward to our next board meeting it's going to be a late night again and last but not least um you know it's always the moments for me that um that you're not expecting uh which are which kind of are meaningful and um the the one for me was you know we had the three key moments and as my first time as my go around as chairman I get to dedicate the schools and I get to
320give the official line and say the school's dedicated and the name of it and and that's that's kind of one of the cool Parts about being chairman I guess but um the one interesting thing was around all the controversy and all the the the um around renaming uh and turning the name to to George Hampton Middle School you know early on I remember saying to the teachers when when Miss Rolston and Miss Jesse and I went and met with the teachers there at the school um one of the things that I said to them that got a pretty big groan at the time was that you know that ultimately this will be a good thing and you may not see it now but you're going to see a fresh school you're their legacy the teachers
321are their legacy the people who work at that school are the legacy of that school and that it's actually going to shine a spotlight on on the school that otherwise wouldn't have been there and I meant what I said it wasn't a throwaway line I didn't expect for it to stick and I had to because like most of my words up here I didn't expect him to land anywhere um but uh but I had I had a couple teachers come up to me um at the at the Hampton reded a and say you know what it's like I didn't want to hear it when you said it when you came and met with us um but you were right this is a wonderful school it looks like a brand new school you know me and
322my friends they weren't speaking for everybody in the school of course they were just speaking for themselves and a couple friends so I'm not trying to say that everyone's you know now loves me or loves Miss Jesse or loves Miss ralon for the answers that we gave them several months ago but I will say that she she said you know we've got a great school and we feel refreshed we feel rejuvenated we feel like our school has gotten attention that it otherwise wouldn't have gotten and and and she was and she was happy happy to be a part of the Hampton family and to me and only speaking for me that kind of closed the book for me and I told her that when she when she spoke to me the first teacher that said
323it to me I told her that and I think I think it's a wonderful Legacy that we've left behind and we have three brand new schools in the school system that that will that will go on for much longer than any of us will ever be around and so everyone did a great job in those things so I really do appreciate uh everyone's effort and I do agree with everyone you know we went through a board training recently uh several board members have talked about the the the the efforts to shorten board meetings uh one of the things that we talked about is how items get on the agenda uh that certainly is is an open-ended deal at this point any board member can add something to the agenda uh it is their right to
324do so and therefore B you know they can get a little longer we certainly there are multiple ways to attack that and to to limit that as well well as was suggested during our board training so we can look at some of those types of items as well um so you know I think everybody wants to have B have have good efficient meetings and I'm all for uh open discussion to make that happen um but at the same time not limiting the rights of the members that set up here with me because we were all duly elected as well so it's a balance that we have to strike with that and no further business before this board this meeting is adjourned