001good evening and thank you for being here I apologize for the late start I do want to assure you your time is very valuable to us and I know it's very valuable to you today is Tuesday September 26 2023. and we have most of our board actually all of our board members that are attending or attending in person member Gallo our vice chair is not able to be with us this evening in her absence our immediate past Vice chair member bird will be serving as acting Vice chair for this evening I also want to remind the public that the board members will not be engaging in outside Electronics or digital communication during the meeting so that we can focus on the meeting itself and give our full attention to the matters before us to my
002fellow board members to District staff and to anyone who may be speaking into one of the microphones please make sure your microphone is turned on and speak directly into it so our YouTube and orange TV viewers can hear you clearly again thanks for participating we will begin our meeting with a moment of silence and then I invite you to join us in the Pledge of Allegiance foreign all right well I'm I'm wondering did you know that ocps employees employ ocps employees about 1200 custodians who collaborate with us on our 210 schools to keep our work sites clean the efforts of these men and women many of whom are immigrants or children of immigrants are essential to offering a positive atmosphere for Learning and working it's a spare it's Hispanic Heritage Month and I want to
003recognize that many of our custodians are proud members of the Hispanic Community as are members of our board and throughout our Administration Hispanic I also would be pleased to recognize 37 of these amazing custodians who have taken the initiative to continue their learning with additional training each of them has earned their Florida school plant management association certificate the training program was established for public school custodians by the Florida Department of Education in 1959 and it's been administered by the plant management association since 1994. this year the program returned to ocps after an eight-year Hiatus thanks to custodial Services director Carlos mufas I hope I got that close mafus better okay thank you because Castillo as well as Labor Relations director Leanne Blackmore and ocospa oespa let's go with oespa as I as I always say
004president Ron Pollard is Ron with us today I don't see him oh wait oh you're hiding okay sorry he's behind the podium there are custodians put their hearts into their work and routinely go beyond the Call of Duty to keep our campuses in top shape from the pandemic through many recent hurricanes in just a minute I'm going to invite Carlos to the podium but I also want to just tell a personal story my kids all went to Olympia High School and there was one particular custodian that they knew and loved and he looked out for them and they still talk about him to this day and I just want to say thank you thank you for being so important we you know we know our kids make a difference in the lives of our students
005and I think we sometimes forget how many people work in ocps that change lives and leave lasting positive Impressions on our kids so with that let me invite Carlos to the podium for so he can share more information about his staff's outstanding accomplishments foreign service first of all I want to thank a couple of people in this room they were part of this effort to make this happen means Liam Blackmore I don't know if she's here today director of Labor relation she was a big big part of of on this airport Mr Ronald polar I met with Ronald like my first week in this position and we both agree since day one that we want to bring this training back to the custodians so Roland thank you for your supporting thanks for allowing us to
006be here today this is big for the gustodian fsbma is a it's a seven week certification process so most of our staff they work during the day they have personal commitment I'm nervous so they have to move that on the side to travel all the way to jump to Maurice complex take the seven week class three hours per day so it's a big commitment so I want to thank them for this not just for the fspma for but for all what you do every single day for the student of ocps all the effort that you put to achieve the facilities mission and vision which at the end of the day is to keep the school clean or have a clean environment it's big for ocps it's big for the Department big for everybody but at
007the end of the day every single day we work hard to have the school clean for our students so thanks to everybody I'm proud of you some of you I know them for the last 10 years you start as a temp now some of you are Mastery to either crew leader I'm proud of you but you should be proud of yourself you should be proud of who are you doing every single day because I know it is it's not easy I started this industry as a housekeeper so I'm very happy I'm proud of yourself so thanks for your commitment and to be here all right congratulations guys foreign guys come forward will you bring your team up I know the board would like to be able to shake each one of your hands and just
008say hello and then if we could get a picture we would love that Carlos I'm nervous too oh I said I'm nervous too oh thank you make them foreign experience of course yeah hey but they can't see it that's okay it's not about it yeah all right okay hey guys wait before you all walk away before you all walk away before you all walk away before you all leave I wish I could whistle hey don't go anywhere and we rarely get this opportunity come on back up we really have this opportunity when you're right here but a couple board members want to want to say something so I want to call on them but I honestly words cannot describe how proud I am of each one of you and I know the entire board is
009I mean for you to go the extra mile and get this certification this education when you don't have to and when we didn't pay you any extra extra pay for doing it shows the kind of people you are and it's just it's so cool so with that remember Salamanca wanted to say a few words thank you chair I just wanted to congratulate you all my parents work with Studio workers for I mean all basically 18 years of my life and UCF they were custodial workers and usually work two or three jobs on making NZ but they took care of me and this is a job I'm so grateful for because they went in and they did they were so proud of doing a great job every time they would come home and I was proud
010to be their kid and know that they were doing really good stuff and it matters to our principals it matters to our students everything you do it makes a huge difference and you know it's a it's it's a job I really care deeply about earlier this year for a strategic plan we had kind of one of our metrics was around kind of where we wanted to be operational more efficient and we this board supported kind of now focusing on more square feet per dollar and we really wanted to have great folks like you that care about our students at our schools so thank you for everything you do and know that you know your kids are proud every day of you and it might not be here they might not be telling you yet it
011took a while for me to tell my parents but it's it's really important and we're very grateful so thank you one one more minute member bird and then I promise you can sit down or go home or celebrate with your family or whatever you want to do I think it's on or two more or three is this is the microphone on okay I can't say it any better the member Salamanca but I too have so much respect for you in the work you do my grandfather was a school custodian actually and it worked out well for me because you know I wanted to be a teacher since I was a little girl so when they would throw out this was back in the day when everything was on paper you know forms we had forms
012for everything so when they would throw out stuff he'd bring it home to me and I could play school with it so that was what I liked about it but he loved his job too and I have so much respect for what you do and in fact when I became a teacher my first job my first teaching job the one piece of advice that I was given the first piece of advice was make sure you are really good friends with the custodian and so I never forgot that and I always would I always made good friends with the people that were taking care of the school because you really help to make everyone else's job better and easier and your the work you do is so and vitally important to the work that everyone else
013in this District does and we appreciate you so much and I'm so thankful that you are so committed to your work like the chair said that you went and got the certification it just goes to show like she said what amazing people you are and how much you care about your schools and the students and the work that we do here at ocps thank you for that all right I said one more bit a couple more superintendent Mr pomerani that's all right superintendent yeah and then member gold wants to say something I wanted to also congratulate you and thank you for what you do each and every day to support our schools and Orange County Public Schools thank you remember gold follow that yeah well I have always wished I was bilingual I wish I
014had an ear for it I've had a best friend who's tried to teach me for 20 years to speak Spanish and failed so I think it's on her but you all are I don't want to call you silent Heroes because you're not silent but you are there your omnipresent in the schools all the time we could not have an assembly a sports game a performance a operator classrooms have the cafeteria reopened the next day nothing nothing would happen without the care and love and support that you give our students our staff your colleagues nothing and when a custodian is not present in the school or or we do not have enough coverage it is very apparent so that is when you know it goes It goes more recognized but you all do such amazing work
015I can at the drop of a hat bring a tour into a school and be confident they are going to see the best plant the best show at any moment in time and I want to thank you for that thank you for your work thank you for your dedication thank you and finally I promise I'll let you go after this but none of us will ever forget covid and the life-saving vital role that you pay played for education in the face of covet so when you said silent Heroes you all are definitely Our Heroes thank you go enjoy your evening with your family and make sure you tell your family members if they're not here and you have any kids or grandkids that we're all very proud of you all right Dr Vasquez do we
016have any newly appointed administrators Madam chair we have one new appointment this evening I am so proud to announce that authorine opal leibard is going to be the new principal at Dr Phillips Elementary School good evening thank you school board members superintendent Vasquez and staff for this opportunity to serve at Dr Phillips Elementary School I want to say thank you to all of the people along the way who have helped to make this journey a success for me I started out as a middle school student at Glenridge Middle School matriculated to Winter Park High School graduated UCF and was determined to come back to ocps to give back to the people that made my life such a huge success so I want to say a huge thank you to Dr Jones and Mindy Smith as
017leaders in the north Learning Community they really helped shape me into who I am as a leader to Mrs Fred Bowie principal at Pinewood Elementary these last two years have been outstanding and I am so grateful for the opportunities that you allowed afforded me to spread my wings and Lead at Pinewood to The Pinewood staff who are watching I love you all and I will miss you but I cannot wait to serve at Dr Phillips Elementary and finally to my Village to my husband Julian levard to my sister Niche McLean who is a proud teacher who has followed in the footsteps of the family I am so honored to be a part of your family to my children Jonathan June sarari Livi thank you for being wonderful children and I to the Dr Phillips family
018I cannot wait to start this journey with you thank you everyone and I hope everyone has a fantastic evening thank you all right we have a comment or two from Member Gould remember well I'm sorry I didn't get to greet you prior to the meeting we had a meeting that ran over before this but your community in Dr Phillips is very excited and you have a wonderful treasure there of very supportive families businesses rotaries that are here tonight that are really part of of the fabric of that school and I can't wait for you to get out into the community and meet everyone so I'm so thrilled that you are on board and really getting started so thank you very much thank you member Gould I also want to congratulate you this is this is
019really exciting but if I understood right you have four kids whoa okay okay I'm a mama for kids okay but I did not teach and then rise up through the education field the way you did and I can't imagine how you did it so I'm I'm just I'm in awe of you and I'm excited for you and what a great learning opportunity this is gonna and role model you are for your kids and to your husband God bless you we love the fact that you're sharing your wife with us and we know it's a sacrifice but it's we certainly are grateful and I hope that it still pays back to the family I know it will anyway congratulations I'm really excited and you're not far away so I'll be dropping in to see you thank
020you all right moving on the next part of our meeting is still fairly new and that is to hear comments from some of our district associations including CTA oespa and ocasa and the superintendent advisory council at this time I'd like to call on Mia Perez in tirano Leo and help me out when you come up and de Ares Sims from the superintendent's advisory Council all right come on up to the mic and from they're from Apopka High School you're competitive or anything I'll get you back before the evening is done so the first obligation that you have is to correct the pronunciation of your name my name is pronounced thank you so again hello good evening my name is interiano and today I'm joined with my fellow council members dearest Sims and Janelle Francis and
021today we're going to be digging on the topic that we brought up at the superintendents advisory council meeting that we had last week the biggest issue that we faced last week was trying to understand how we can help our students feel more connected to our school because we had a 30 of students I think in ocps that felt connected to their school and that's a true issue that we want to help conquer I think that the biggest issue is that students that don't they don't feel connected because they don't participate in a lot of things that they feel like so if they don't have a place at Apopka high school we offer many clubs Sports academics that students can be a part of and we also encourage if you do not have if you do
022not feel that you have a space or a club that's for you to start your own club because there is more than enough students there that will join your club and you know you can have your own space and also earn some leadership skills there running a club the next big thing is to use social media as this tool for success for our students I am a yearbook editor so I understand so we always try to send students out from our yearbook staff to take pictures with our cameras so that we abide by the school and States cell phone policy and then later on are your book advisor will share those pictures on her social media for a yearbook the yearbook social media and students just light up when they see themselves on there they
023see their name attached to the school's name and they really see that we see them and they are not invisible because we like to see every student at popca participate in something and what else is there but we like to have the students show their faces there and if not on our yearbook side then on other schools Instagrams like all Beta Club or our women's empowerment Club Instagram to have our students shown there as well because it also enlists a sort of school pride in them which will help them feel more connected to our schools but now I want to pass the mic on over to my fellow member darison good evening everyone my name is dear Sims and my topic will basically be how can we get more students to participate so just bear
024with me and I'll give you some information so I noticed that like my peer was saying Mia we don't have a lot of participation but what I did look at is one day we had our principal Mr Hines participate with us and the crowd went wild and not only it was not only social media but people were saying in person like hey this is really good this is really fun and when we were in the meeting the first thing my peers and I came up with was let's have a day where we just have Administration where the kids really interact with admin because I noticed that it was an opportunity for us to bind and it could open eyes for kids you know to want to join other clubs and everything like that so another
025thing we thought about was Club brush which we have like all of our clubs out it's pretty much like how we do for Darter opening before like school starts we have all the kids come out with their parents and everything like that and they come and they see what you know what interests them but it would be a little bit different it would be without the parents it would just be the students and it would be you know their peers at school and they would go to each table and see what they would like and everything like that so that would be a way to interact with them as well also on Fridays we have BFF which is blue fun Friday so SDA they have that for us so we thought about you know maybe
026expanding that just a little bit more as well and we thought about having a field day you know uppercut upperclassmen versus lower classmate you know they spread out either way or whatnot and we just you know collabed together as a you know as a group and that would maybe like open their eyes to you know to wanted to join or like maybe it was saying create their own and everything like that so those are just some ways you know to expand our fun love and community service within our school to make sure that everyone feels welcome and loved so thank you thank you okay Vice chair thank you well done first of all and I absolutely first of all superintendent thank you for having your Advisory Group come and speak to us and the superintendent
027and I had a conversation about this week actually how valuable it is to to hear from the students I also have student advisory groups at my high schools and I've met with two of them so far this year and it is the most valuable information that I get better than I'm not kidding like more valuable than when I meet with anyone is the information I get from when I sit down with students and because really when you think about it the business of what we do here is for those students and so how do we really know what the effect of these of these decisions are what we're doing if we don't listen to them and hear from their own voices what they're seeing and what they're not and listening to you all speak about
028the issue of kids feeling connected is very impactful and it makes me very emotional actually because I think that this issue right here is probably our number one issue facing all that we do in this district and for educating children because when children do not feel connected they're not going to learn when they're not feeling good about who they are or where they're at they're not going to learn and so many of our children as you said are feeling that way or feel like they're invisible when you said invisible it just made my heart hurt because I just I would want all of us to and all of us probably remember what that's like when we were adolescents especially if you were ones that felt invisible when you were in school like your presence really
029didn't matter if you imagine feeling that like that every day or imagine if you felt like that at work every day that's a horrible way to have to live and so if if we can do something about that I think your ideas are brilliant I love the idea of empowering them to create the clubs if there's not a club you're interested in what are you interested well create it and one of my advisory groups that's what they do at their school they have clubs for everything because the principal said hey go ahead go for it if you can find your advisor create it and they have like a club for like foodie like a foodie Club where they try different foods because you know there was some kids that were really interested in that you
030know I mean like I love that just whatever we can do to make kids feel connected I think is probably the most important thing we can do and I think that what you all are brainstorming here these ideas are so powerful and I'm so thankful for you and way to represent Apopka I love it and thank you by the way thank you Mr Heintz they have the most phenomenal principle by the way Mr Heights really does get out there and he really connects with the kids and they love him they really do and it's evident right I mean isn't he great so it really it is helpful to have a principle that is so connected like that with the students so I'm appreciative of you our community is so thank you for that and thank
031you girls you did a great job thank you and member for rant and the member Salamanca number five I just wanted I don't think I could say much more than what member bird just said but it was super proud of the three of you for coming it is not easy always to you know speak in front of a crowd and you did a fantastic job I love the way that you researched really thought of different ways that you could bring unity in your schools and just get kids to feel like they're part of it and I think a lot of times the youth growing up have this idea of jumping into high school and it would be like High School Musical and all it's just going to be fun and amazing and there's dancing and
032singing and it's fun all day and so to try to I mean obviously it's not like that I mean sadly we start to realize it's not but to bring in those clubs and things like that or different ways that you're you know just brainstorming I love it love that you have this the student representing and definitely something I may look into doing because I think this is a great idea I think hearing from you all you're very wise and have a lot going for you so thank you again and I don't know if these are your parents are they so great job you all did a great job fantastic you should be proud of yourselves remember Salamanca thank you chair I want to add to that something I remember bird said about how important of
033a role students play right we're all here for your education and for you to feel like you belong and you're engaged in your learning so it's so great to see you here engaged in the process of your own education of your own self-advocacy because it goes a long way to get leaders like us to to hear you to see you to understand your perspective and you should be proud of of you stepping up to be a representative for other students and your parents should be very proud because you have leaders in the making here today when I ran for office I'm I'm not a teacher and I'm not a parent at I ran I campaigned I was run by students such as yourselves and a lot of the messaging was and some of my folks
034were here actually my campaign manager and Mike I my team is actually back there so you can see him but it was it was controversial there was a lot of folks that said you know who needs a student representative up there you know we need parents and teachers which I think we have a lot of them up here but it was something we fought far and a lot of the folks in my campaign felt that having someone who had been a student for 12 years in the district would be a valuable voice up here and every day that I'm up here I try to be that valuable voice I try to remind folks of what that student experience is like and I'm not perfect none of us are but I hope that you can see
035that there there is a path to your continued leadership that your voice matters that the more engaged you get with elections with campaigns with issues and advocacy the more that it impacts the rest of of those that you're representing and I encourage you to keep doing it matters it makes a huge difference and it was thanks to folks like you that I get to hold the C that I hold today as well as parents and teachers and community members that felt that this was a valuable voice to have and that's why it's so helpful to have Dr Vasquez have a seat at the table for students to give us feedback as well so thank you for that thank you thank you member Salamanca wow I think everybody said almost everything I just kind of just
036to wrap it up and summarize I am so thrilled that you're taking on this initiative as member Salamanca said I'm I'm thrilled that you are taking the role on that you are just by being The Advisory Group for us it's it's terribly important but feeling connected as as member bird said is so vital and one of the things I loved was the idea of encouraging kids to create their own club my middle son did that when he was in high school he loved fishing and so he created a fishing club and they actually got Guy Harvey to send them all t-shirts yeah and they yeah and they went out on charter boats several times got very very sick but anyway that's another matter they learned to take Dramamine and that's for seasickness but that was
037a great experience for him but I think for a lot of kids that's probably intimidating too so I'm excited that you're reaching out and encouraging them to do that and you know it's it is really important to education but it's also an education in life and the sooner that kids learn how to advocate for themselves like you do and how to make those connections is everything in life honestly as an adult having connections opens doors all kinds of doors and your doors are going to be wide open because of your incredible personalities and your parents leadership and yes you have a wonderful principle but most of all we're just very proud of y'all so thank you and good luck and if there's anything that we can do to help support you we're here for you
038all right good night you guys yes and yeah we'll get a picture of the girls and then maybe with their parents and the principals good job you guys are rock stars it's not like this happy smile Perfect all right parents and principal blame your child all right we good okay thank you thank you all are you happy with your selection where did you come up with this stuff are you happy with your selection okay next I'd like to call on well I would call on Clinton McCracken president of CTA and I believe Clinton are you going to introduce your guest thank you sir yes it's Mr Floyd okay all right thank you so we'll try to only take 10 minutes okay that's what I heard no good evening members of the board and Dr Vasquez
039it is my honor to introduce Mr Ulysses Floyd to share our Union comments today this past summer was Mr Floyd's 50th year attending the Nea National Convention is a legend not only here in Orange County but across our country he was the first African-American president of CTA and a long time FEA and Nea director he was part of the first Statewide teacher walkout in the United States here in Florida in 1968 and was the CTA president in 1974 when we achieved the right to collectively bargain in Florida I feel honored every time Ulysses is with us in our CTA meetings and I'm thankful for the guidance and the encouragement that he gives me I'm so grateful for all that he has done and stood for over the years for teachers and for racial and social
040justice members of the board Mr Ulysses Floyd you make me want to cry chair person Jacob Dr Vasquez and members of the iron a school board crying already is an honor and a pleasure to be here to speak to you on behalf of the Orange County classroom Teachers Association my name is Ulysses Floyd that's all for 32 years in the Orange County School System I know most of you but the other one this older one I talk in an elementary school for 32 years and in 1974 I was president of the Orange County classroom Teachers Association at the present time I'm still working with the Orange County classroom teachers and I'm a member of the CTA board as an a non-voting member and as I feel very good about that sounds kind of classroom Teachers
041Association is constantly fighting for better conditions and wages for our teachers which is what thing we would take down members whenever we can whenever needed thank you we would like to help our schools grow stronger and I still have more benefits and those CTA is also working hard with having a political and collaborative relationship with the board ayune has been challenged in the Years with several changes but I'm here to share that this Union has teachers and help help teachers and help students in in some of the work they've been doing if someone with you is an experienced knowing that thoughtful and achieve a note how valuable it is and I encourage all of the teachers to join in order to have some of the best teachers in the world not only the world but
042in the universe the school day for our teachers is not over when the bell rings they also work for many hours at home this is a profession that these people are committed to indicate they need to understand and support these teachers thank you for allowing me to address you if you have any questions I'm glad to try to answer them thank you sir I don't have any questions I just am in awe of you I am so grateful for all of your service to our students throughout the years and as a teacher and also in your role on behalf of CTA I would love it if you would come up and let us remember Felder wants to say something but we I think we'd all love to shake your hand and hopefully we have not
043there you are Frank I would love to get a picture if that's okay with you and Clinton could we do that yes ma'am all right let's hear from Member Felder and then we'll call it a colleague come on over and we'll hear from Member Felder thank you so much Mr Floyd and thank you chair Jacobs I grew up with Mr Floyd and Mrs Floyd in their home I was a little girl with their little daughter caring for we're all now grown but he and his wife were Educators along with my mother and Mr Floyd as long as I can remember has always been an advocate and very outspoken for teachers and that which he believed was right and righteous and even as I began made a decision to run for school board I was able
044to put size in his yard and he was encouraging me because at the absence of my mom and my dad so I'm so grateful that he still has the energy and he's still very much abreast of what we do Mr Floyd what you have done and what you're doing now will long be remembered because you are truly you are truly an advocate for education and for children and as a young girl not an adult growing up in your home in the community that I still live in I want to let you know that I love you and I appreciate what you have done and what you're still doing thank you so much foreign thank you so much for for bringing Mr Floyd really appreciate it what an honor it is for the entire board thank
045you all right next I'd like to call on Nate hey from okasa well that's hard to follow oh I know I do not envy one iota good evening Orange County School Board and superintendent Dr Vasquez I'm Nate hay the principal at Lake Silver and the president of ocaso currently ocasa stands at 316 members and focuses on advocating for our school administrators across the district our goal this year is to reach 400 members and we are well on our way first I want to thank the board and superintendent Dr Vasquez for expanding the nominations for principal of the year and assistant principal of the year with the new Cadre structure more administrators are nominated than ever before and it was nice to see so many recognized for their vital work that they do I want to
046send a big congratulations to the following principals for being named finalists for principal of the Year Becky Watson principal at East River High School Melanie Simmons principal Rock Lake Elementary Lindsey smestad principal Sadler Elementary and I also want to recognize our assistant principals our finalists for assistant principal of the Year Adrian Anderson assistant principal Pine lock Elementary Cherise hurdle assistant principal Rolling Hills Elementary and Bridget Rusk assistant principal Windermere high school so congratulations to them it is an honor to serve in such a large district and these amazing leaders will represent our district well recently I surveyed our membership to ask about the positive things happening at our schools because we have so many amazing schools and so many awesome things happening across the district and I want to share a couple of them tonight
047principal Swain at Avalon Elementary is proud of everyone at her school from embracing the sustainability initiatives this year they're part of the USDA cafeteria composting and food recovery pilot program and so far they have composted 1786 pounds of food waste that would have otherwise gone to a landfill at Camelot Elementary principal Gordon shared that their students do a daily affirmation that ends with I am loved and when you see the smile on their students face it'll melt your heart principal Walker at Chain of Lakes Middle School is doing things the Osprey way they have a structured system for beginning class each and every day they have an osprey store for an incentive program and they also their band director was nominated for a Statewide Tom Bishop award so that's pretty exciting for Chain of Lakes
048medal Dr Osborne at Hamlin Elementary had over 300 grandparents at their Grandparent Day celebration and you got it right they had Bingo going on so they had a lot of grandparents there it was awesome principal Brenda at Sunrise Elementary said their fifth grade stem Club is working with the Department of Defense and UCF to provide the students with challenges they currently have an Edible Garden that is being used for science lessons and an outdoor learning space where students can read with their reading buddies principal Stevens at Bonneville is focused on building a positive School culture where they have increased their clubs before and after school and created a positivity store where students cash in their Bulldog bucks for cool prizes and then principal Pelletier at Riverside Elementary is excited that her school was selected for
049the Disney musical in schools Residency program for this year so that's really exciting for their school as well so there's so many amazing things happening across our district and this is just a snapshot I want to give a big shout out to all the principals and assistant principals for the job that they do it's not easy and it continues to get more challenging as the years go on but we want to thank the board and Dr Vasquez for your support as we work together to create the best learning opportunities for students of Orange County Public Schools foreign thank you Nate it's wonderful to hear such good news and a very exciting next we're going to we have a number of proclamations we always have a large number oh I'm sorry Mr Pollard there you are
050hiding behind the podium thank you that's why you're here so much I so did you went out the look yeah I promise to be quick no you don't need to be quick but giving honor to you all Dr Vazquez Jacobs all of the school board members it's really been this is really a Nostalgia time for me first of all did he leave Ulysses Floyd really served as kind of a mentor to me and this Union work when I went to my first convention by myself with nobody that I knew you know I knew a couple of faces they said Ulysses and Ruby Strickland said come here you sit with us and they kind of guided me around for a while this guy been to 50 years oh my God if I can at 94 if
051I could walk around and still do what he do then y'all had Apopka high school kids Lord and Mr Hines I served as the custodian that was my AP and so I'm so always proud you know home girl you know how I'm about Apopka then you have those custodians there I worked so hard we worked together call us my food and Leanne Blackmore and our teams work together to bring this back you know I want to say this you know I feel to be give your life to a job to a company and feel like you value that you're respected that you can work toward promotion you're given your life nobody takes a job and I always say this to be at the beginning their whole life and a lot of these people spending 25
052and 30 years we know it's kind of I'm so thankful to y'all for recognizing them the custodians like I say of which I was one and I also took that same training what God it seemed like a long time ago about 10 years ago so I'm proud of those custodians I'm proud of Apopka high school I'm proud of all of your support staff every classified worker that you have just imagine for one second if one group didn't come to work yeah one group those custodians you imagine in schools you imagine this place so thank you for recognizing them thank you for giving me a chance to say something about them and that's all I needed I'll hide back behind Napoleon over here wow thank you so much Ron you give us a lot to think
053about because you do give so much of your life to a job and it's I know public education is a hard place to work for a lot of reasons but one thing it has that most jobs don't is the reward of knowing that you are having a profound impact on the on the present and the future on the lives of every child that walks through these doors so that doesn't make up for the fact that we all have to put food on the table and pay rent and we understand those needs but it is an awesome awesome opportunity so thank you all right we are now going to move on to proclamations October we're coming up on October which is a heavy month for proclamations I think we have a total of nine but we're
054going to start with a proclamation we have not recognized before you know a lot of our problem some of our proclamations are really student-centered eccentric or child-centric one thing we have not recognized in the past is National Childhood Cancer Awareness Month and I'm I'm I'm kind of ashamed that I haven't haven't thought of this I have a friend whose child died of Childhood Cancer and I know I don't know if any of you all have ever walked alongside of a friend that's gone through that but it's it's just it's horrible and I also and you all probably don't know this but Kelly who works for me she also lost one of her children to cancer and so that's how it came to my attention that we have overlooked this all the time that I've been
055here so I would like to call and I want to thank Scott howett we just recently started talking about this thank you for this Proclamation getting it on the agenda doing such a great job with it thank you and your team but I wanted to ask Kelly if she would do the honor of presenting the proclamation on behalf of the board she's tougher than me I don't know about that thank you madam chair many people do not know that cancer is the number one killer of disease by our children sorry this is hard nor do they know that September is Childhood Cancer Awareness Month go gold our schools exist to serve children and many of our families at ocps have been touched by Childhood Cancer including mine it's said to be rare but yet I
056personally know of one other affected in this room and numerous others in our schools right now as a whole we are very behind adult cancers in research and cure rates in part because only four percent of the National Cancer institute's budget is dedicated to Childhood cancers and that's for all types of Childhood Cancer combined the overall lack of research funding results in kids like mine having dosed down toxic adult chemotherapies which are many decades old as their only treatment option in my case as with many the chemo killed my son not cancer more awareness and private funding is needed to help further the fight against these horrible diseases and develop new Innovative treatments to preserve the futures of our precious children excuse me I think the board from the bottom of my heart for deciding
057to issue a proclamation and to you chair Jacob's forgiving me the opportunity to share the proclamation and on Earth my sweet Nolan and on behalf of his brothers Spencer and Carson as well as all children who have or will suffer foreign National Childhood Cancer Awareness Month September 2023 whereas Childhood Cancer is rare but it is also the leading disease-related cause of death past infancy in Children and adolescents and whereas National Childhood Cancer Awareness Month was first introduced in a presidential Proclamation by President George H.W bush in 1990 and was officially recognized on September 26 2019. and whereas a cancer diagnosis can take a tremendous toll on a child's family friends and community and whereas the National Cancer Institute has developed a National Cancer plan to speed up the development of effective Cancer Treatments including those
058of children and whereas children with cancer may be fighting for their lives in hospitals when they should be learning in school and playing outside and whereas every September advocacy organizations Healthcare institutions patients and families raise awareness of Childhood Cancer and whereas ocps honors the courage of the thousands of children who are fighting cancer every day and the loved ones who support them now therefore the school board of Orange County Florida does hereby Proclaim September 2023 as National Childhood Cancer Awareness Month in Orange County Public Schools thank you thank you so yellow is the color for National Childhood Cancer I didn't have any yellow and Kelly lent me her bracelet so from Nolan and so next year I will ask everybody to wear yellow but today we wear pink because we are proclaiming October Kelly thank
059you very much we are proclaiming October 2023 as Breast Cancer Awareness Month in Orange County Public Schools we are also proclaiming October 2023 as cyber security Awareness Month in Orange County Public Schools we're proclaiming October 2023 as lgbtq awareness and History Month we are proclaiming October 2023 as National bullying month I want to pause for just a second I'm not sure about other board members I did receive several emails from parents who are concerned that we did not recognize the impact that bullying has on all children and so for those who did write to me I'm sorry if I haven't responded but I will be responding but we are recognizing National bullying prevention month for all students and we are proclaiming October 2023 as National principals month in Orange County Public Schools we're proclaiming October
0601st through the 14th 2023 as disability history and awareness month I'm sorry awareness weeks in Orange County Public Schools and I'm going to ask Wendy Ivory executive leader and member of the superintendent's cabinet over exceptional student education to come forward and introduce the student who will be reading the proclamation good evening chair Jacobs members of the board and superintendent Vasquez in honor of disability awareness month the ESC Department wanted to highlight the unique circumstances that many of our students with disabilities face every day and the resources that our district provides to help our students access the curriculum you may have heard of one of our very own remarkable students at Lake Nona High School who uses a very unique way to attend school it gives me great pleasure to introduce Shannon Hayes Shannon attends Lake
061Nona High School classes via a robot called Vigo Shannon has a medical condition and cannot physically attend classes therefore the robot allows her to still attend school without putting her health in danger the robot attends classes and gives Shannon access to classmates and teachers without ever having to leave the safety of her home she's even made a few friends in the process as she's able to interact and communicate through the robot Shannon is an amazing gifted and dedicated student who excels in rigorous courses she takes pride in being able to attend her classes through her robot as opposed to using a virtual meeting platform Shannon hopes to pursue a career in the technology field she has overcome so many obstacles in her life and is a role model and inspiration to others she raises the
062bar exceedingly High through her true dedication to her academic career we did try to get Shannon here today but she was unable to make it however we do have a pre-recorded video of her reading the proclamation for disability history awareness via her Vigo robot so we'd like to go to the video now thank you thank you all right in our innovation in 2008 the third legislature designated the first two weeks of October as disability was straight and awareness week in public schools share for 12. and or the instructional goals of disability history and Miranda Street include recommendous of all students and whereas the Spectrum Mission results in better treatment of individuals like Social Security and suspending especially in youth in schools and was encouraging individuals with disabilities to increase their self-esteem resulting in more than
063taking thrive in their abilities obtaining early plus secondary education and transverse and contributing for their community and whereas it's a strict reaffirms its commitment to report inclusion of and equal opportunities for all individuals with disabilities and as observing the civilian history and awareness needs allows us to appreciate the accomplishments of our students with the students and their parents teachers and staff in Orange County Public Schools now their third the square bird of Orange County Florida and starts here by Brooklyn October 1 through 14 2013 as disability in history and Awareness Week informed Council Public Schools okay thank you thank you member for aunt I would like to speak just real quickly before we move on I do have a one issue with one of the proclamations and would like to just share a something that
064I've already written up today Orange County Public Schools will Proclaim October AS lgbtq Plus awareness and History Month while many May wonder why this community group is being recognized for yet another full month this Proclamation is under the guise of bullying while the previous proclamation in June was to celebrate Pride I have two main concerns with this Proclamation the first is with the Plus we as a board must Define the boundaries of the plus from a simple research it is evident that the plus is all-encompassing and is open for anyone who sees their sexuality differently than the societal Norms or anyone who would like to come under the lgbtq plus umbrella according to my research there are more than 50 different flags represented in the plus including leather Pride puppy pride and their allies the
065BDSM Community BDSM stands for bondage and discipline domination and submission status statism and masochism other flags represented by the plus is polyamori which is having multiple sexual partners at one time and many other sexual ideologies and perversions this Proclamation for many parents and community members is a push to normalize sexual promiscuity and sexual ideations at a young age if this is lgbtq plus awareness and history month what exactly are we bringing awareness to how will ocps bring this awareness and share the history of lgbtq plus will teachers now have the open door to bring this topic up in class will students be given an opportunity to discuss this with classmates during class time when I ask these questions at a separate meeting I was told this Proclamation is merely to help with anti-bullying this leads
066me to my second concern if this is merely about anti-bullying does this board not recognize there are many children and Community groups who are bullied in our schools not just students who identify as lgbtq plus If This Were a proclamation simply to bring awareness to bullying across all of our campuses and for all of our students I would have been more than happy to support it such as the one that we are proclaiming for October but rather than being inclusive of all of our students and families in this very large District this board is chosen to be exclusive and recognize a group he sees their sexuality different than the societal norms each school year we have a proclamation for our veterans giving them one day we have a proclamation for our teachers giving them one
067week but a group who is United based on who they are sexually or not sexually attracted to is given two entire months in Orange County Public Schools while I understand and recognize that each of our students staff and families have great purpose and worth I cannot stand with this Proclamation which recognizes a group solely based on their sexual orientation if this board chooses to continue with this Proclamation which has an open-ended plus encompassing any and all sexual ideations you are clearly pushing an agenda on our children our staff and our families if this board chooses to continue with this Proclamation you are making it abundantly clear that you are more focused on being politically correct than protecting our children who are the most impressionable and easily influenced I'm asking my colleagues today to remove the
068lgbtq plus Proclamation and continue with the proclamation focused on anti-bullying for all students it is time we bring unity and stop spotlighting one single community group thank you all right I would ask moving forward I usually start the meetings right after the proclamations that we that we refrain from Audible clapping cheering booing hissing I I'm I'm almost speechless I'm sure that given as much stuff as is out on the internet anybody can probably find anything as far-reaching as you did but I will tell you first of all I'm a Republican and so in terms of being politically whatever it was you said I happen to believe that people have a right to make their own decisions about their sexuality I also believe that being a gay or lesbian or transgender is not a decision anyway
069it's something you're born with any more than I decided to be heterosexual I just didn't ever wake up and make that decision we do this because there is no other group that is treated and has been treated as badly and continues to be treated as badly with the exception of I would have to acknowledge our African-American Community which we also celebrate and recognize and the rate of suicide is clearly an Evidence of society's lack of acceptance of our students and we want them to have one safe place one place they can come one place that they can be accepted and feel normal and feel welcome and if we get it right feel loved and if that's the sin we're guilty of I'm willing to wear it with a badge of honor member Kester Dental thank
070you madam chair and thank you for those affirming words the lgbtq plus awareness and History Month Proclamation I support it's about every student's basic right to learn some folks may say they want to get back to basics which I agree with that if you mean basic human dignity basic right to an education and everyone's basic needs to feel safe and secure everyone has a right to learn our democracy depends upon it and when students are harassed and belittled for whatever their differences may be because some believe that there's that's their righteous cause then they are denying those fundamental aspects of humanity and it happens to go against everything I was taught in Sunday School we welcome everyone to our Public Schools in a city where 49 people were murdered and 50 others injured and having
071to live with that tragic memory every day because one individual had so much hate for the lgbtq community that he took it out on these individuals it's important that we take a stand in support of our lgbtq friends and family members this Proclamation is actually less about lgbtq individuals and more about our expectations for the behavior of everyone else in showing respect hopefully with the district making this statement we can prevent the hate from taking hold and prevent a tragedy in the future every student deserves to be safe and it is our responsibility as a board to make sure that they are thank you madam chair thank you member Castro Donald member Salamanca oh boy I have no idea where the misinformation of what the plus stands for is coming from it seems to be
072the latest attack an effort to bully a community which is not a surprise the plus is meant to hold space for parts of gender and identity that we do not understand yet or we cannot Define it is not meant to be this long list of things that people are projecting onto it that is a reflection of the person projecting that into the plus not a reflection on what the plus stands for so I want to make that clear that whatever you're seeing in the plus is reflective of you not on our community and whatever information you're getting that defines this plus as what you want it to be is reflective of your lack of awareness and understanding and willingness to spend time with this community who is doing nothing wrong to you I believe in
073Liberty and letting people live the lives that they want to live this is what America is about let people choose who they are stop imposing your moral beliefs on everyone else this Proclamation is about bullying the lgbtq plus youth are more than four times as likely to attempt suicide than their peers and it's because they are targeted in our schools in our community many times as we've seen here in Orlando a really terrible Massacre happened because of things that are shared online such as the one shared here today in the wrong hands this is incredibly dangerous and we need to not provide the space to share such information I encourage folks out there to continue electing people who believe in freedom and liberty in an inclusive Society because it has real repercussions when you put
074someone up here in the diocese that's these hateful speech I'm a student at the district I was in these classrooms for 12 years I was born and raised Catholic a Hispanic family it was one of the hardest things I ever had to do was to come out to my family for something of who I am it was my teachers and my peers who accepted me for who I was and told me I was not wrong or evil or that the plus stood for all these terrible things that was just projected onto it that I was not this monster I like to think that I live a very healthy life that I am representative of my community that I am loving that I am inclusive and that I don't wake up every day trying to hurt
075others and I would encourage folks to stay out of other people's business we are public education because we're here for everyone not just those who agree with you and your beliefs based on religion or values we're not here to impose values on anyone we're just here to say the safety of our students our priority and that's what this Proclamation is about you could read it is about bullying thank you thank you maricelamonka member for Rock I would like to say that you've confused my protecting of all children these are all beliefs and ideologies that each family can discuss every child has the right to be whoever they want to be whoever they have chosen to be every family has the right to raise their child in the way that they want to be every single
076one of our kids deserves to walk into school to have someone smile at them to treat them with respect and dignity and all I am asking is that we do not marginalize one group and Zone in on one single group that is based on sexuality I did not create this group this group is they wanted to be based specifically on sexuality and I feel it is extremely inappropriate for adults to know or to even be proclaiming sexuality on children I think it's inappropriate thank you all right just one final thought on a personal note that most of you all know I was mayor when pulse happened I was incredibly proud of this community and shocked quite frankly because there was so much support from our community and a group came to Orlando and asked if
077they could hang the great the Gay Pride flag from the County Administration Building and I call their County Administrator and told them I wanted it done I anticipated he would come up with all sorts of reasons why we couldn't probably be a hazard might hurt somebody might blow down I just was so conditioned to people being anti-anything lgbtq that I was writing for the pushback half the board was a republican so I thought well even if I get it hung up there's going to be so much pushback but I didn't get any pushback I was I was overwhelmed with relief that the answer was we will have it up before you wake up in the morning that was the reaction the reaction it should be but the reaction I never thought we were capable of
078and do you know how many emails that I got complaining about it two 1.3 million people and there were only two that wrote with something negative just and it wasn't even negative actually it was just that they thought it was divisive I was so proud of where we had come as a community and I and I thought you know sometimes you have to break somebody's heart to open up their mind is what I thought but two weeks later they talk about getting safely to school an Orange County Public School student it was two or three weeks later a student from Orange County Public Schools was walking home he was perceived to be gay I'm not sure if he was or not got beat up very badly on the way home because the students thought he
079was gay and at that moment I was honestly crushed because I thought we had come so far but I thought you know what if our children grow up the way my generation grew up friends that I had my close friends who were scared to death to tell their parents in high school and in college petrified to tell their parents if this next Generation grows up that way well shame on us for replicating this hatred and so with that in mind when I took office I brought forward the proclamation and I continue to be proud of it we are not no matter what you read on the internet no matter what you say to each other we are not teaching children how to be gay you couldn't teach them if you tried just not teachable I
080have I have a good friend who went into a conversion therapy at his church he went through this whole conversion because it was so uncomfortable being gay you didn't want to be gay anymore because Society doesn't accept you so that's what he went through and you know what he met another guy going through the conversion they're now married okay my point is both of them wanted to fit in they didn't want they didn't choose to be gay they didn't like the way people treated them but that's who they are that's how they were born and their dear friends of mine and they will always be dear friends of mine and whatever I can do to help the Next Generation not be so close-minded so hurtful without knowing it I'm going to do and we're not
081going to teach it and we're not opening the door for teaching it and guess what kids are allowed to talk about it anyway nobody shut down the freedom of speech of children to talk about the things they want to talk about whether they're at home or they're at school or they're walking to school so good luck trying to stifle that our kids our kids are way better than we are anyway let's move on we've got a couple more proclamations and I look forward to all the wonderful emails I'm going to get from the right side of the aisle which happens to be wrong member Salamanca I do want to just acknowledge the student and disability month and the incredible work the Art District thank you that's done I don't want it to get lost in
082the back and forth speaking of getting back to the basics public education is about providing education to everyone we had an amazing student up here show how we as a district are able to accommodate all types of learning and we are accepting and inclusive of this all this alongside with bullying and everything that comes for just being a student that is different and so I do want to say that was incredibly powerful and thank you Wendy for all the work that you're doing with our ESC students and to superintendent for prioritizing these areas in our district as this is something we can always do better in and we're always as a board very really careful about making sure we're doing the best we can for our families that need this so thank you to Wendy
083for bringing this incredible student to tell us about her story and to read the proclamation thank you member Salamanca member Felder thank you chair we can always depend on our little Santa Monica to bring us back I do want to say something about what happened what board chair Jacobs and I experienced yesterday in attending Magnolia School in Silver Pines when I looked at the young lady who we honored just now it was just incredible I just want to thank the Silver Pines principal Damaris and the Magnolia principal Mr Schuler I was I said that I was so Godly proud of Orange County Public Schools and what we were doing and the fact that we had a district Brevard County to bring over members of their school board and their District to come and to experience
084what we have here in ocps with students who have disabilities I'm you know I it's we have to do what we can to be inclusive of all of our students and give them all an opportunity to have a platform and I'm so grateful yesterday was just incredible and I know we can't just let everybody come to school without you know tags and stuff but I'm gonna tell you y'all need to go visit Magnolia you go visit Silver Pines and see what our students are doing in our Administration how they work so well with the children to make sure that everyone has an opportunity to life has an opportunity to make the best of the life that God has provided them with and board chair Jacobs and I we were just mesmerized oh wow and those
085are my schools so thank you board member Santa Monica bringing us back to remember that young lady and I've taught students to I had to use boxes and computers to communicate and so forth and they were some of my better students you know because they wanted to be there we were able to make that happen so I just want to thank this district for you know being a district that we don't shun people because of what we may not understand or be able to identify with who they are but they have a platform to be who they were born to be and we just tried to enhance and encourage that opportunity so yesterday was wonderful and in superintendent thank you for that or you know allowing you know the schools to be open in the
086principles for doing so well and again thank you principal Schuler and principal Damaris we certainly and when the ivory you're a jewel for this district and we thank you so much for all that you do thank you thank you member Felder all right our next Proclamation is for October 3rd 2023 as this that's so bad when you can't say that word dyslexia Awareness Day in Orange County Public Schools we're proclaiming October 5th as World Teachers Day October 8th through the 14th as fire prevention week and I also want to recognize Clinton McCracken in the back for bringing forward the proclamation as well for lgbtq month when I was first elected and thank you for being here with us now all right we are going to move on for me did I mention the principles okay
087Dr Vazquez we are ready for a strategic Plan update thank you madam chair this evening we are going to hear from Greg Moody executive leader for school choice on a very important topic and that is truancy chronic absenteeism and not only what we have been experiencing but this is a trend that we are seeing all across the country and it is going to be something that we as a community will need to tackle together it's having a significant impact in our schools but more importantly we are seeing the impact it is having on our students and so I look forward to the conversation the board will have arounding this very important topic Mr Moody thank you good evening Madam chair our board member superintendent it's my pleasure to present our plan for truancy intervention this
088evening I'll briefly share background information research the current state of ocps truancy and attendance and plans for the 2023-24 school year first allow me to provide background information section 1003.21 Florida statute says that all children who are either six years of age or who are older than six of age but who have not attained the age of 16 must attend school regularly during the entire School term a student who attains the age of 16 during the school year is not subject to compulsory attendance beyond that date of which the student attains that age if he or she files a formal Declaration of intent to terminate School enrollment with the school district ocps has policy je student attendance that governs our actions related to attendance and truancy truant is defined as a student with five unexcused
089absences in a calendar month or 10 unexcused absences in a 90-day period Florida law defines habitual truant as a student who has 15 or more unexcused absences within 90 calendar days or without the knowledge or consent of the students parents or Guardians and who is subject to compulsory attendance a true incipitation means a petition filed by the superintendent of schools a legend that a student subject to compulsory School attendance has at least five unexcused absences within a calendar month or 10 unexcused absences within a 90 calendar day period or as more than 15 unexcused absences in the 90 calendar day period a truancy petition is filed and processed under statute 984.151 and chronic absenteeism is defined as any student who accumulates 21 or more absences or 10 or more of the Academic Year either excused
090or unexcused section 100 3.26 of Florida statute states that school board Shall Set policy regarding attendance and what constitutes excused and unexcused absences ocps defines a student as absent when he or she misses more than one half of the school day absence absences shall be excused for the following illness illness or death of a family member recognizing religious holiday medical appointments legal appointments participation in an approved activity or class of instruction held at another site pre-arranged absences of educational value with principal's approval headlights infestation catastrophic disasters that significantly impact the life of the student now let's take a closer look at Chronic absenteeism I'll share some findings of from research chronic absent rates increase as students progress through grade levels elementary middle and high school chronic absenteeism impacts a variety of student outcomes math and
091read and achievement retention and student discipline students have an increased risk of dropping out of school Research indicates chronic absenteeism is a better predictor of Dropout than lower grades or test scores one study found that only 17 percent of the children who were chronically absent in kindergarten and first grade achieved reading proficiency by the end of third grade research on Upper Elementary grades found that students who were chronically absent in fourth grade through sixth grade are less likely to graduate lower rates of attendance are associated with higher rates of grade retention disengagement and alienation in school in a survey of over 5 700 chronically absent students in grades 6 through 12 across eight states chronically absent students were asked to provide their number of absences during the previous year only 43 percent of those students
092recalled or reported absences that were consistent with chronic absenteeism the students were asked about their absences compared to the peers only 55 percent of the students perceived their absence rate to be the same or less than their peers let's talk about reasons for absences historically research reports reasons for absences they are health including short-term illness chronic illness medical dental and Mental Health appointments transportation including missing bus car problems or not wanting to walk in the rain personal stress includes depression sadness stressed upset family emergency preferred activity outside of school hung out with friends family stayed out too late and overslept or substance abuse and value of school I mean in perception that school is boring no reason to come to school believe that school will not help reach their future goals and perceptions that parents
093don't care if they're absent from school additionally adolescent children may experience a barrier to attendance if they are expected to take on adult responsibilities and contribute to the household some students may have to work care for younger siblings or care for our family members this barrier may be more prevalent and lower social economic households our versions are factors that may impact attendance because the student feels they are unsafe or do not belong research highlights mental health concerns such as fear anxiety and depression as contributors to absenteeism disengagement includes factors which influence a student's desire to attend school students who lack connections to school and or the people in school will most likely exhibit attendance issues Family School connectedness students are more likely to be absent when there is not a strong connection between family and
094school let's take a look at ocbs Chronic absenteeism for the 21-22 school year ocps reported a 20 27 percent rate for chronic absenteeism compared to the State of Florida at 21 percent these data are captured in survey 5 and shipped to the state doe during the summer that's why you'll see the most recent data is from 2021-22 school year we expect that the 22-23 school year data reports will be available from the state soon this graph shows our chronic absenteeism rate over time this chart captures the percentage of students with 21 or more absences from ocps from 2013 to 2022. you can tell from the graph that from 2013 to 2020 Orange County hovered between 10 to 13 percent in 2021 we increased to 19 percent in 2022 we increased to 27 percent ocps mirrored
095the Statewide increase of chronic absentee absenteeism rates post pandemic our average daily rate of attendance for 2021-22 was 89.6 percent and the average daily rate of attendance for the state was 91 percent this graph shows our chronic absenteeism rate by school type for the 2018-19 school year through 21-22 school year elementary schools the first set you'll see 2019 was 8 percent 2024 I mean 2022 was at 24 so 16 percentage Point gain K-8 and special schools were 7 to 16 percent middle schools you'll see a 13 percentage Point increase and high schools had an 18 percentage Point increase from 2018 to 2022 school year now let me share some steps that we have to enforce attendance if a student is marked apps in a connector orange call Ascent home at the end of the day
096notifying the parent of the absence when a student reaches five unexcused absences in a calendar month or 10 unexcused absences in 90-day calendar period or the 15 unexcused absences he or she will receive an attendance warning letter this letter is automatically dropped in the parent portal in Skyward the same letter is met is mailed to the family in the language spoken at home if the teacher notices a pattern of non-attendance a teacher shall report this to the principal School administration will meet with parent with the parent to discuss attendance concerns if not attendance continues the principal might referred the case to the attendance child study team if the attendance shall study team determines a pattern of non-attendance is development a meeting with the parent is to be conducted to identify potential remedies if the initial
097meeting does not resolve the problem the attendance child study team may implement the following frequent attempts at communication between teacher and parent School evaluation for an alternative Ed program attendance contracts the attendance child study team may also Implement other interventions including a referral to other agencies for Family Services or involved in the school-based social worker for assistance and further interventions the child study the attendance child study team shall be diligent and facilitating intervention services and shall report the case to the superintendent or designee only when all reasonable efforts to resolve the non-attendance behavior are exhausted if a student subject to compulsory attendance will not comply with attempts to enforce School attendance the superintendent or designee may file a truancy petition if the court finds the child truant or habitually truant the court shall order the
098student to attend school and the parent to ensure that the student attends school and may order any of the following the student participate to participate in alternative sanctions to include mandatory attendance at alternative classes to be followed by mandatory community service hours for a period of up to six months the student and the student's parents are Guardians to participate in Homemaker or parent aid classes services the student or the student's parent or Guardian to participate in intensive crisis counseling the student in or the student's parents or Guardians to participate in community mental health services if available and applicable the student then the students parent or Guardian to participate in ins to participate in service provided by voluntary or Community agencies as available in the student of the student parents regarded to participate in vocational and
099or job training or Employment Services we currently have 73 active petitions with approximately 40 pending processing students between the ages of 14 and 17 are subject to Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicle sanctions a student between 14 and 17 who has accumulated 15 unexcused absences and a period of 90 days is reported to the Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles the department of highway and safety motor vehicle sends a notice to parent to the parent or legal guardian of intent to suspend driver's license the student has 15 days after notice of intent to suspend to provide proof of compliance with attendance if the student does not comply his or her driver's license will be suspended we currently have 9 618 students involved in this process so now I come to recommendations and plans
100for the 23-24 school year recommendations will include continuing with and expanded upon many of our current practices such as taking a look at taking a closer look at the data create an a truancy interventionist position increasing the sense of Family School connectedness increase in a sense of belonging in creating a portrait of a chronically absent student excuse me first we have to take a closer look at our chronic absenteeism data to this end we expect the rollout of unified insights this school year we anticipate a few attendance related dashboards that will be available to the district and school-based administrators we expect these reports will be available this November these reports will make it easier for school and District administrators to identify students who are chronically absent and more importantly those who might be trending towards
101chronic absenteeism early identification and intervention is crucial the TR the superintendent has allocated a position to serve as a truancy interventionist this person will periodically run absence occurrence reports for 20 30 or 40 or more absences excused and unexcused this information will be shared with schools and principal leaders the truancy interventionist will develop a parent notification regarding these absences I spoke about the 5 10 and 15 unexcused absence letters that are dropped in in the Skyward Parent Portal the truancy interventionists will monitor this process schools will also mail this letter home in the home language a report of these students will be sent to the principal and principal leaders to monitor a process to notify parents that an attendance letter has been dropped in the parent portal will be developed and we'll also explore the
102use of a new technology the district has incorporated talking points so that the schools can communicate directly with parents and their Heritage language the currency interventionists will promote the importance of attendance to our community this will be done in part by presenting at parent academies working with parent working with parent engagement Liaisons across the district publish and attendance messages on a web page and more a district attendance truancy committee will be developed made up of school and District level administrators teachers parents and students to brainstorm ideas on reduced and truancy and chronic absenteeism the truancy interventionists will collaborate with various departments to educate staff on attendance and truancy to develop needed reports for monitoring and to refine processes for improving chronic absenteeism and the truancy intervention interventionists will participate in home visits with the social
103workers when needed part of our plan will be to increase the sense of Family School connectedness part of the plan will be to partner with the parent engagement Liaisons at the school to bring the importance of attendance to the Forefront with our families students are more likely to be absent when there is not a strong connection between family and school many families do not realize that absences even excused can impact a student's academic performance and many families underestimate their child's absenteeism parents of chronically absent students will be better informed on the number of absences and will be reminded of the importance of attending school each and every day to this end Dr Amana Levi whom I failed to introduce to my right senior administrator for Juvenile Justice Services recently presented on the importance of attending
104school at a recent lunch and learn with parents I should also recognize the effort of Miss Lisa Coffey director of Social Services and a group of social workers Miss coffee and a team of social workers called over 1 000 families this Summer that were chronically absent last school year to encourage students to come to school stress the importance of attendance and to see if their family needed any type of services or assistance this was a great idea a connect orange message is good but the personal contact is most important we will replicate this throughout the year and have staff Call families before they're chronically absent increased sense of belonging we have to reduce aversions and increase students since a belonging you'll recall from we previously stated that versions are factors that may impact attendance because
105the student feels they are unsafe or do not belong research highlights mental health concerns such as fear anxiety and depression as contributors of absenteeism disengagement includes factors which influence a student's desire to attend school students who lack connections to people to school people in the school will most likely exhibit attendance issues strategies for this year include but are not limited to a focus on resiliency and I cannot pronounce that word to save my life I messed up in cabinet so resiliency day in September I read Ribbon Week and the start with hello week and maybe before tonight's over I learned to say that word okay I'll make you an offer so the next time I have to say National dyslexia dyslexia that one I could say you'll say it and I'll do resiliency for you
106I got the resiliency down thank you sounds like a good trade yes definitely so promoting attendance awareness we will increase attendance awareness with all stakeholders including students parents teachers administrators and the larger community these are a few examples on your screen of the social media website posts for September keep in mind that attendance is not only important in September we will continue posting messages throughout the school year we will explore other ways to promote awareness and the district attendance truancy committee will assist with this before we can make a difference we really have to understand the chronically absent student why are they absent and what barriers to attendance can we help to overcome our students and parents are Guardians aware of their absences aware of the impact of being chronically absent what are the perceptions
107of absences today have perceptions both parents and students changed post-pandemic we will explore ways to gather information from families and most importantly students foreign so this brings me to the goals for 23 24. with all of this our goal this our goals this year will include but will not be limited to increase the average daily rate of attendance for the district decrease the number of chronically absent students collaborate with other districts in the Council of great City Schools to discover best practices increase stakeholder awareness of the importance of attending school and trained staff on truancy procedures and interventions needless to say we have a lot to learn and a lot to do superintendent I'll turn it back over to you thank you Mr Moody as you can see the data is quite alarming when we
108have more than a third of our students that are out 21 or more days for the past school year and all of the factors that contribute to Chronic absenteeism and the impact it's having in our schools and in our community I look forward to the board's discussion on the topic and our plans for interventions and how to improve upon this data okay thank you Vice chair thank you I appreciate this presentation thank you Mr Moody for for putting all of this information together I think that it's obviously a very important topic considering it's about a third of our students that this is affecting so I love the idea of figuring out of really digging into why these kids are absent chronically absent because there's a lot of different reasons as you said and I think
109that if we understand that better we can obviously fight the problem I think that it is one of the things that I read today as I was you know doing a little research was the idea of assigning a mentor to a chronically absent student is very helpful at the school and I love that idea because I am a parent of a child that was chronically absent for mental health issues had severe anxiety panic attacks before school that kind of thing had there been someone at the school that was that maybe called her or I could even send a text message to him saying we're having a bad day and then maybe that person would reach out to her it might have helped to pull her out of it or to at least help her get
110there I will say that her school was fantastic she had safe places to go in this in the school she had many teachers rooms she could go to that kind of thing we worked it out but what I'm trying to get at is I think that if as you say Well about the connectedness I think if they know that there is a staff member at that school that is counting on them to be be there that it can help some of our kids through this and to be quite honest parents parents need the support too it's not always just that they don't care I mean I cared I wanted my daughter at school every day and I think a lot of parents do I think that sometimes it's just different barriers in the way and
111I think that parents need a lot of support and help too so I think anything that we can do to bridge that connectedness I love that idea I do want to ask is it only does every school have parent engagement Liaisons or just our Title One schools correct or no correct currently we fund apparently Liaisons in all of our Title One schools there may be an additional one or two non-title one schools that fund it through District dollars but I'm not aware okay because I will say that those positions are extremely helpful for my schools that have them in my schools that have them have great engagement from their parents because of that position so you know that might be something we want to look at helping our other schools get and that would probably
112that could probably be extremely helpful with this situation but thank you again for the information thank you Vice chair and member Kester Dental thank you madam chair and thank you Mr Moody for this presentation it is alarming and there are so many reasons why kids are not making it to school it's hard to be a teenager these days I know that can you give me some more information about the attendance child study teams are they school-based and who would be on that team yes ma'am so great question and I failed to mention that yeah attendance shout study teams are school-based in individual schools they can include I'm going to make sure we're going to look to my right make sure I get this right but they could they'll include administrator teacher support person parents at
113the school to support the family okay and so every school will put one together or they already have one well when they encounter chronic absenteeism yes they will convene a academic an attendance child study team yes ma'am okay so just to be clear that they have 15 kids at the school is the same team looking at all 15 kids or they does a team change up board member cassidano the team will change up based on the school based on the child's needs it can also include the safe coordinator could be the guidance counselor it could be a myriad of staff at the school and the staff members also that are important or the safe people in the students world at the school so to speak okay with so many kids who are chronically truant that's
114going to be a lot of meetings is this the attendance child study team do they only get together when a child is chronically truant or first five absences do you know that yet what time do they get involved it's a board member I just want to just clarify not chronically truant when it comes specifically to the attendance child study team meeting we're looking at very specifics within the statute so if the student has five or more unexcused absences in a calendar month 10 unexcused absences in 90 calendar days or they're habitually truant with 15 or more unexcused absences in the calendar month sorry and 90 calendar days we follow the truancy process and there are three school-based currency interventions that have to occur before that attendance child study team meeting happens so that they can
115try to drill down and get to the root cause of what may be you know after after these very specific issues now when it comes to Chronic absenteeism we're looking at both excuse and unexcused absences so those tally up a lot faster that's when we're not necessarily focused primarily on an attendance child study team meaning that meeting name changes based on the schools so it could be the mtss process or something different that's outside of the attendance realm however attendance is a huge component of that meeting and then how since these great these these truancy rates and absentee rates have gone up so much these last three years I imagine that's affected students ability to graduate have we seen a decline in graduation are they able to hang on and make up their work somehow
116so we did see a small decline in graduation rates for the year prior to last we'll receive graduation data for this past year soon part of the problem is that students can make up their work and teachers are incredibly liberal with that makeup time and so we they really are not being penalized because the teachers are being very flexible in allowing them to submit their missed work to missed assignments now for a child that is struggling academically and is not able to really get it either with the help of someone at home or on their own they struggle more but our teachers that's another problem is that the makeup work continues to come in long after that those assignments are due but they try not to penalize my time is up but I want to
117come back around okay okay absolutely member Felder you're recognized thank you Mr Modi for your report you and I had a lengthy conversation on yesterday and I guess well I am no apologies I am old-fashioned I remember years ago we had a truant officer had a Alexander she lived next door to me and she used to go around to all of the schools here to make sure in the parents houses for children maturing but one of the things that I mentioned to you and I'll say it again is that a lot of the parents of children who are truant they may not ever go into a portal or they may not use a computer and the address is sometimes are not where they live but they do all have a cell phone so I mentioned
118to you that one of the ways I don't know I was out when you were making a report but we could contact them on the phone because some of them may not even understand like chronic absenteeism you see what I'm saying because you may have a student who is ill and I don't I guess we can't change it maybe that's coming down as a state statute to call it chronic but people students that are ill I don't think they should be in the same category those students who just don't come but you've all called it chronic absenteeism one of my concerns is that and you say you have a team that's working specifically with students who are chronically absent what has that been like in terms of talking to parents see again back in the
11990s I would go to the homes personally a lot of people I'm not advocating that for people you do what you feel comfortable doing but I felt comfortable doing that because I understood the absenteeism and this particular student was extremely chronic so I just went to her house and had a conversation with her mother but okay what what have you had any success I mean what what have you done to try to combat that great question member Felder so you're looking at a team of one right now I say that jokingly but maybe one and a half so a lot of what we've talked about tonight is in the works is in the planning stages and yes I wouldn't hesitate to knock on a door any door to ask where the student has been in
120the research that I've looked at to prepare for tonight and for our plan throughout the year the one thing in in several studies that have been done or several reports that have been done has been the one key factor is communication they found success with communicating with the home so we've got to do a better job of that and that's got to look different that's good parents aren't looking at the parent portal in Skyward to identify that they have a five-day unexused letter so we're looking at a trigger an automatic trigger that they'll get that phone call automatically right we're trying to work smarter so the trigger will be as soon as the letter drops in Skyward they're getting a phone call you know connect orange that doesn't exist right now right now they're just
121hearing my voice on a connect orange of last week I sent a connect orange to over 200 I think it was 200 families that had 15 or more absences this school year so they got to hear my voice on Friday evening said you know you're going to be chronically absent if you continue this pattern and reach out to your schools for assistance is basically what the message said so they'll be hearing my voice unfortunately for families but but member filter you bring up something very important it is the communication to the families and it's also what member Byrd had mentioned is the support for parents right because they're at the Wit's End as well some of them are like they want their kids to go to school so we've got to do a better job
122of communicating directly to the family and to that end I'm talking about I don't mean to spill the beans but talking with the superintendent is the idea of calling having staff make that personal phone call so we're going to rely on this ask the superintendent she's agreed to do so I didn't mean to steal her Thunder but she has agreed to do that and I hope to extend that invitation to families you know how important how great would it be to say I got a phone call from the superintendent and you better get your in school right so yeah you're going to school tomorrow so I think that's that personal connection that personal communication families got to know that we care family's got to know that we're here to support them and families got to
123know that their kids have got to be in school yeah thank you I think what you just said it will mean so much to some parents to have a board member or superintendent someone to come call and say you know Janice has been absent these many days and some parents they would they would they would feel like oh you care about Janice that much yes we do we want her to or him you know to be in school so that's something we're working towards so I'm happy about that we're doing something to work toward that and not you know everything that's good on paper but we really got to put our boots on and you know go out there thank you so much member for aunt okay thank you Greg and or Mr Moody and
124your team I love it I've been in that situation where you gotta pretend like you got a big team but you know it's coming you did a great job I really love the idea of that member bird had mentioned about assigning a mentor I think that's a fantastic idea something that at the school level we could be letting the cadres know that's something that we'd like to implement I do believe that our schools are taking many great initiatives already I've been to a few of the different schools and one of the elementary schools they were giving kids a token every day that they got to come and if they got five tokens for the week they got a special treat so if they didn't come all week and they saw their friends all getting it
125then they would want to get that special treat it made them tell their parents like I gotta get to school a lot of the times I think it is it's a mixed between either parents can't get them they're not feeling well or kids are just not really wanting to go I think if we could offer I'm sure we're already doing this but just having somebody looking into each student and seeing okay let's talk to this family is there something maybe going to the brick and mortar school is not for them maybe Orange County virtual is something that they would do better with just kind of looking at that I do think really when you look at the data on page eight and you see the spike is really from the coveted year of 2020 2021
126and now it's getting even worse so I'd have to say after covid kids were asked like during covid kids were asked to stay home in quarantine although they were feeling wonderful and they didn't feel sick but they were asked to stay home so they would stay home for I think it was 10 days or 14 I don't even remember what it was but at the end of the year they all we they all graduated because we didn't want anybody being left kind because of the quarantining and so I think kids kind of have it in their mind that like I can just take a mental health day that's sort of what we just kept calling them is mental health days or whatnot and I think really having that communication with parents again and reminding them
127that the pandemic is over we do have to focus on academics we do have to get back into school even if you're not feeling up to it another thing that our teach ways that I think our teachers or our schools are taking great initiatives is through the teachers I've seen firsthand teachers picking up the phone like member Felder said going to their house but teachers picking up the phone and just calling even talking to the child and saying hey come on let's go to school this is the fun stuff we're going to be doing that might work better maybe even in elementary I don't know if high schoolers but do we see a higher rate at specific schools or maybe even during a specific time of year and I'm seeing a head a not a
128no back there from so member for Ron looking at the data as much as I had in the last month I didn't notice a particular Trend or pattern based on school you know but I'll I can get that information to you and look at it once again and see but I didn't notice any particular Trend because you know you would one might suspect you know certain schools certain what demographic may have social economic may have a higher rate but it was pretty much across the board but I'll look again and follow up with you I trust you if you've looked and you've been studying this for a while I'm sure you know and then just my last thought is the talking points with that texting I think it's fantastic I know as a parent I
129received the text messages from my kids teachers about upcoming events or things that they'll be doing assignments such as like that and so I don't know if that's even a way where a teacher could you could just send that message like hey can you shoot them a quick text I know it might feel like one more thing to to text but if it means their student is in their class and being able to pass it they might jump on board with thank you again for your hard work all right member cool would you recognize a couple of comparative questions I believe I heard a study that this is a national issue not just a state of Florida issue are we seeing higher the same or lower percentage of absenteeism in our 21 to 22 school
130year do you know that and if not you can let me know later so let me understand your question do you want the rate of our as compared to the national average of us I don't have the national average okay I can tell you what our rate was last year or and the 20 21 22 school year right that was on the chart I guess yeah I can tell you the year prior we were at 19.4 percent right yeah so now I don't have the national it is a national what I could tell from the literature it is a national concern yeah it's a Statewide concern I think every every District in the state had increased their chronic absenteeism rates increased yep yes do I'd also like to know because I'm sure you don't have
131this if there's a way to find out Charter in private schools and what they've seen before covet and post covid private private schools I won't have but Charter Schools this data does include charter schools within within Orange County but I can separate Charter and if that's different okay where I'm going with this is that I think this is a symptom of of a problem that covet exacerbated and all those interventions are absolutely essential getting communication to the families is absolutely essential but school just isn't relevant in the way that it's delivered this day and age to our students and certainly not to the marketplace so that is something that I think we have to continue to try to chip away at and we've done a great job with lifting our ctes so that kids can
132can graduate dual enrolled with a certification even if their next PATH is college or if it's going out into into the workforce but if we don't make it relevant and everything that you're talking about for the solutions except for the bridging the communication gaps is about making it fun well if it's relevant it's fun so and I'm I've just had another round table in the community and I had teachers and administrators and everybody there last night and the issues at the core I keep coming back to this one word relevant how do we make it relevant for them clubs and all of that are enhancements that we've often said at this table kids will come to school to because they want to participate in sport or their extracurricular or at craft they want to learn
133through what we call extracurricular which in my opinion is really life skills in core classes but that's not what's measured so until we can kind of change our Paradigm on how we're measuring the success with students and still meet the requirements we have to meet with the state and that's a big lift but I think we've got to or or kids are going to continue to disengage and find their own way to educate themselves if they're they certainly have the entire world at their fingertips but that doesn't give them the full well-rounded education to make them good citizens and Lead good full thriving lives because they've only had one kind of interaction so I mean we can come up with lots of short-term things which we have to do but we have to tackle this
134in a long term in a long range way all right thank you member gold remember Salamanca thank you chair a couple of things so to Echo what some folks set up here on the mentor support and how that can be a kind of a more scalable way to reach some of these students and families another one that I've seen in some of my schools that's effective is just peer support and so to the degree that we can work with principals to encourage peer support student clubs that are focused on making sure students are feeling included and are checking in on each other obviously without giving them any information about attendance or privacy or anything like that but some schools have this some schools don't I know we don't get too involved with print with kind
135of the student organizations on school but if we do have a little bit more thoughtful approach to what are some of those pre-organizations that are peer support for engaging of students I think that's going to go a long way if we as a district prioritize that and do Provide support for some of those student-led groups the other one I had was is there any legislation coming down the pipeline at all on got penalties Associated when you know there's multiple interventions many times once we talk to families a lot of this stuff is addressed but I have talked to school leaders and principals who say even sometimes when we reach out to families it's really hard for them to still like just bring the kids in do we have a sense if there's anything in legislation
136that's being targeted at the state level on this chronic absentism board member no we have not seen anything coming down the pipeline with that I will state that it is an issue that Dr Levi and I struggle with in court when we are there on a weekly basis the ability of the magistrate or the judge to hold the families accountable only goes so far and they can only do so much so you know part of the issues that we have had also stem from the lack of cooperation with some of our other community agencies and that we want to hold accountable and the judge does but we're not able to get the buy-in from some of the other community agencies to exercise their part of what needs to happen so that it really is an
137issue in the State of Florida right now truancy is not grounds for a DCF calls so that is another part of it truancy or not sending your child to school could be considered contributing to the delinquency of a minor it could result in you being referred to since Finn's Court which is children in need of services family in need of services court but it is not the basis for a dependency petition to be filed in foster care sometimes even when things get escalated it is actually really hard to enforce and so I don't know if this is something we can add to our legislative priorities for us to when we go up to Tallahassee continue to remind our policy makers how much of a pain point this has become for district and for the state
138I know we're always kind of talking about legislative priorities but I feel like this is one where we could get some bipartisan support for hopefully so that's one the other one is you know for transportation I saw as one of the big kind of top reasons as well as to maybe causing attendance issues I don't know how much we're tracking the types of reasons and I know you want to create more of that profile it would be helpful if we had more data on what percentage of these students are due to transportation we know we as a district are not anywhere near serving the transportation requirements for all of our families because we just don't have drivers we just we're limited by capacity but I'm always wondering if we were able to track this data
139better have a better sense of how much of this can be attributed to Transportation if we can start requesting maybe federal funds or state funds to subsidize Transportation if that is really one of the key reasons why we're not getting students into school or it's hard if a parent relies on the bus to come pick up their kid and they're not being picked up several times and those days start to add up because many times the parent can leave work to go take the student to school they're basically like walk home and just go home so I have heard that from parents as well and so I don't know if to a degree we can track how much it is transportation I think that would be really helpful also from a legislative perspective and I
140agree we do also look at Outsourcing for our students with disabilities and our students my Kenny vento students I will tell you that there's there's a shortage there as well and so even if we had additional dollars I don't know that the Personnel exists with the agencies that are out there transporting students to be able to meet that need but I do agree that looking at the legislation and identifying ways that either can assist families or give districts greater leverage because right now for some we really there's not a whole lot of teeth to what happens and we understand there's you know there's there's pros and cons when we're looking at holding parents accountable for students that are absent we know family lives and circumstances are very different but we certainly can look at the
141change in you know asking for a change with the legislation I believe board member for on had also reached out to me asking about how we might be able to look at alternative ways to transport students thank you madam chair okay so there was I have one question when you were showing the slides of the different breakdown of Elementary K-8 middle and high school can you go back to that one that one right there so I see K-8 for last year only had 16 percent and it's in the middle of elementary and middle but it's much lower and I'm wondering do you have any ideas of why that might be so let me explain the K-8 grouping and that may explain a little bit better is it's K-8 and special schools or schools that didn't
142fit in the elementary or the middle so they may be truly K-8 Charter and ocps but they may be some of our alternative schools as well and they're smaller so they could have a an impact on the numbers and it may also include also includes some DJJ in there where those be those students are residents and they have to attend so their their rate is 100 attendance rate is 100 so no it's just my grouping of K-8 and special schools may have may have had an impact on on the percentages but we'll look at that monitor see okay thank you for that and then I know that my experience teaching in a variety of different types of schools and different cities the best way that I was able to connect with my students was to
143do home visits and it's it's labor intensive sometimes I got paid a supplement for it sometimes I didn't but it always paid off in the long run and when I was able to see students in their home environment and I got to meet their pets and their siblings and their parents and saw the trophies and I got to know everybody from spending 30 minutes to an hour there with the family it paid off and I still know those families today there is such a connection made in that short amount of time and the parents felt like they could reach out to me because I've already gone to their home and there were times when you know the home setting wasn't the best place to go meet so we would arrange a different place like a
144McDonald's and we would bring the family there and have something to eat as well so but there are ways to get around that but there is nothing that is has been more powerful to me than home visits and it helps if we do that in the beginning of the year sometimes before school starts but there's a lot of different ways we can work you know that connection whether it's I know some schools do like before school starts a play date in the park where the teachers are there they Meet the Parents but just different ways to really reach out and make that connection I think really pay off and as far as mental health for our teenagers that is something that is a really tough thing to handle I understand that firsthand as well and
145I know that parents are struggling families are struggling students are struggling so I know that there's this component where we want to have teeth and make sure that we have you know penalty to push people to make sure that you're not being lacks but there is so many more I think that just need support and understanding and additional resources so I'm looking forward to helping to dive into this because this is important thank you member Castro Dental just a couple of quick questions you were talking about the calls going out to families I'm not I'm not sure if the idea is those would be I want to call them robocalls where a recording is made and it goes out I'm assuming that's what we're talking about because it would be hard for an individual to
146make that many phone calls pardon me yes ma'am we connect orange calls the robocalls connect orange calls that's what is primarily used but I think too it's that at some point in time there's some personal connection that needs to be made with here in a live voice as well so we'll do it yeah a lot of the robo calls and some of the personal connections as well so I think and I Echo member Kester Dental's comments and concerns a little bit because I don't the carrot or the stick but it's gonna be different for one family in the next and I'm not sure how you individualize that how do you know when one family just needs to get serious with their kids and make them go to school and another family has significant problems in
147pushing the kid and pushing the family is pushing them over the brink I have no idea and I think we definitely need to spend some time trying to figure that out in terms of the Outreach I know this is not it's probably not feasible on a broad scale and principals are just going to come unglued when they hear this but one of the leadership orange classes that I went to I don't remember what school was that and it's driving me nuts the whole time I've been sitting here I'm trying to remember but the principal talked about his approach to truancy I just coincidentally and that was several years ago but that when he had a child that wasn't coming it was high school and he would go out to the house and yeah and it
148was like it's a game changer and so I love the superintendent and I think she's just doing a phenomenal job and I was out we were out at the schools yesterday I think it was and they were raving about you I just want you to know that so don't take what I'm about to say wrong but but you've been a principal and Greg you've been a principal and everybody back there has been in the way back has been a principle so I think y'all will back me up on this there's a relationship between principals and their students every time I go to graduation I'm like I think oh if I could only be a principal because it's just so cool to see that relationship so I'm not sure that there's anybody other than maybe the
149teacher themselves or or classmate I think those ideas are really good or principal I think that they've got the magic touch more than a board member or a higher member of the administration without saying names might be a better way to approach that kind of Outreach and to the extent that it can be a little bit more individualized you can have a better chance of figuring out what's really going on to help decide how to approach each family recognizing that they're going to have different reasons I remember seeing some emails from parents that have just had horrific life traumas numerous traumas in their life and in their family structure I don't even know how they were holding it together and somebody you know a robo call telling them your child's true and we're reporting you
150and you know just not not not a good thing to do so just give us some thought and you know even if it's a robo call from the principal you know that might be a better approach and maybe it includes something that isn't just your child's been absent so many days but maybe it's also is there something we can do to help yeah we're missing him we're concerned and you know if there's something that we can do to help you and help the family and get him him or her back in school I think that approach might might also be better received anyway those those are my thoughts I agree with everybody else it's a serious issue yes superintendent right so just some information Mary Bridges you know is intimately involved with the social workers
151she and her team along with Greg this summer did a yeoman's job but there are you know life is a little different than I say pre-pandemic and so people sometimes when they see the school number they don't pick up right many families when you're knocking on their door if they don't answer and when not all the times that when social workers sometimes are going out and doing these visits sometimes you're afraid they get upset they believe we're calling DCF and so it's a very different interaction than what we used to have before additionally but it's been at least five years Harvard Professor did this study and developed actually I don't know if it was an app or an algorithm and what they found and some of you may see this on your like water bill
152or your electric bill where you see how you compare to other people and if you're like me and you see it you're like oh wow I did really well this month on electricity that's why it was so hot or the water usage we must have you know maybe there's a sprinkler it's broken because we're way off from the average amount and so what they found is that many families believe oh my child's absent 20 days that's got to be normal or they're not really aware the number of days so by bringing that to their attention they saw a dramatic increase and they were doing it for absenteeism in the number of families that responded because now they were made aware oh wow my child's been absent for 21 days and the average is really seven
153it still doesn't capture everyone but they did found that making parents aware and how off they were from what the averages made a difference and it kind of brought it to light so I think it's a combination of things that we're doing and I wholeheartedly agree with you about the home visits they know the teacher but again that's putting a lot well it is it's one more thing it's usually after hours and so for us to try these things that may help us use technology may help us try and reach out to some of the families I mean if even if we make a small dent and getting students to come back those are more students that are engaged that are in our schools that are getting what they need and then we'll continue to
154look at the research it is a national crisis I can't tell you how many seminars I've been on where that's the topic of conversation and it does does it matter if you're a large District a medium-sized District or these small rural districts that are having you know a hard time we're blessed that we have personnel and we have resources in some of these small districts it is truly a one-man shot Mr Moody not not your definition of a one-man shop but it's it's it's a community problem and it's it's finding out why they're not coming to school and I agree if it's bus that's a at least we know what the fix is it's more difficult when they're not connected when they're feeling anxiety or anxious or they don't feel that they're that they belong
155and so we'll continue to look at what the research shows what districts who are having positive results with their initiatives will continue to collaborate and really try and make a dent in this these alarming numbers thank you superintendent two two last questions I have for you not have an answer now but if you can get back to us with sorting out how many of those truancy or absentees we believe are related to Transportation issues I think I think you can probably cross-reference that information with data that we have from Transportation if I'm wrong if that's not something that you can do without a human being I mean sit down and calculate that would be helpful to know and the other is the K-8 that was great question by member Kester Dental if you could back
156out those an anomalies if you will DJJ alternative schools and try to give us the schools that are more similar to these other schools because I think it would be interesting to know if there is some phenomenon about a K-8 that results in and it also if you find that it'd be interesting to see if the numbers on connectedness the student surveys are any different for K-8 but if we start with just seeing what this data looks like then we might know if we want to look any closer at K-8 to see if there's a difference so yeah there is do you say whoops there's research that supports the K-8 models now part of that is because they're in one school for a longer period of time so the teachers the administration is familiar with
157the family they the teachers they can connect to teachers who have had the child hey Maria is not coming to school you know what's going on and so they are able to collaborate and it also is much more the perceptions is much more familial so those are one of the strong benefits of why people choose a K-8 versus the you know traditional models that we see across across the country but we can disaggregate the data a little bit more so you can see that and I don't recall Mr Moody if he actually shared the differences in how districts calculate attendance that was another someone did not have okay so it's another aha moment for us so districts across the state use different metrics to calculate whether a child is absent and so when we you
158know look at comparing ourselves with other large districts it's not a true comparison because in some districts you have to be present two hours and some you have to be present two minutes or less than five minutes five minutes in some districts you have to be present half the day and so it's it's really not a comparison of apples to apples and that's also a little bit you know disheartening when you're trying to you know share best practices because we could next year change and say oh you know we're going to Mark you absent if you are not in attendance for for two for two hours so our numbers would drop significantly right and especially if you're thinking two hours could be your two electives and you're coming to school for the electives but then
159we really haven't addressed the real problem and so that was a little it was in aha moment for me when we were trying to compare the data and it's it's very different what the metrics are thank you I remember I'm discussing that and it's can be profoundly different bye sure yeah I just wanted to comment on the KA I would also argue that I would also argue that it is the small like you I think you touched on it the familial feeling but the small like okay let's think about how difficult middle school is for kids and when they go to a regular traditional Middle School our middle schools are 1200 kids but when you're in a Ka it's about like my k at my in my district is about three or four hundred kids
160that is a huge difference when you're talking about feeling connected and feeling like you're a part and feeling like you know you have those those friends and you know I think and I've kind of I've always kind of felt this way I really do feel that there would there's a great benefit to and I know we're not moving in this direction we're moving the opposite direction but smaller schools I just do I mean it's hard I know we have huge population here in Orange County and we've got more and more people moving in every week and no one has growth like we do but I tell you what I think there's a lot to be said for smaller Community Schools instead of especially our high schools that are up in like 3 000 kids I
161mean how are you supposed to have make sure every student is connected when you've got 3 000 of them I just I don't know I think that there as as a member Gould said we have to rethink things I think that's one of the things we have to rethink to so thank you member Castro Dental thank you Madam chair when it comes to Elementary and absences I mean that's pretty easy to record because a child is there with their you know their main teachers and you can if they leave halfway through the day they're kind of you know you know when they leave or if if they're absent but High School how is that really monitored when you can be absent for one class but then there for the rest you're absent for I mean
162you could be absent all year for one class but still not be considered truant or or absent or how does that work yes member Castle Dental that can happen and unfortunately it does in order for a student to be considered absent for a given school day you would have to be absent for more for more than half the school day so 50 or more so we're looking at at least four periods for a given school day for secondaries what we're looking at when we're looking at a student skipping or not attending those classes now we're looking at a disciplinary issue and that's really when the school-based team really has to get together to be able to drill down to figure out what's happening is it happening during first period or third period so that's all
163really going to be school-based okay thank you yes thank you okay thank you all very much great present thank you for the input to be done and I'll follow up on the questions thank you so much okay moving on to the agenda Dr Vasquez are there any changes to the published agenda no Madam chair there are no changes all right seeing no changes to the agenda is there a motion to adopt the agenda as published I move whoa that was a dead tie okay thank you motion by member Kester Dental seconded by member Gould all in favor please say aye aye opposed motion carries unanimously or with all members present voting in the affirmative do we have any public speakers that want to comment on our agenda no you do not okay then let's move
164forward to the public hearing 3.01 request approval of revised board policy dfaa use of surplus funds and Dr Vasquez you're recognized thank you madam chair we are bringing forth policy dfaa use of surplus funds as you may recall the board had a work session on August 24th there was notification to CTA and oespa August 23rd published it on the 27th of August rural development occurred September 14th and now we are bringing it forward to the board for final approval and I'll ask board member Excuse Me Miss envel if we have any speakers to this agenda all right no speakers any board members have any comments or questions aren't seeing none is there a motion to approve the approval of dff dfaa motion by Vice Chair seconded by member farant all in favor please say aye
165opposed motion carries with all members present voting in the affirmative we're on to the consent agenda if there aren't any questions or concerns member Kester Dental you're recognized thank you madam chair I wanted to highlight some things that are on the consent agenda okay do you want to vote on it first or do you want to highlight well do I think I discuss it before that's fine go ahead okay well I wanted to just highlight that on the consent agenda is a grant a federal competitive grant for clean school buses for five million dollars to buy and to replace our diesel buses with electric buses with zero emissions and I just want to make sure that didn't go unnoticed also on there there's a collaboration between ocps and Americorps for tutoring with for our VPK
166students and that's really going to be great if they're going to focus on early literacy and math and it's a great investment and you get the biggest rewards when you do that and then my third thing I wanted to highlight was a grant with otown compost to supply 21 schools with compost bins bags and weekly pickup of compost and we are lucky to have that partnership with otown and I appreciate that Grant I just wanted to highlight that thank you then you want to offer a motion I would love to offer motion to approve the consent agenda all right we have a motion by member Caster Dental do we have a second second by member Salamanca all in favor please say aye aye opposed motion carries with all members present voting in the affirmative that
167moves us to non-agenda public comment member I'm assemble do we have speakers yes Madam chair you have 13 blue cards you've received and under your pilot program if you have 11 to 20 speakers they get each up to two minutes okay all right let's take our first speaker hi I'm Mike again on the medical leader for Boone high school over the custodial Services I'm local high school for 16 years we had to serve and get the job done we also have fun while we're doing the job I love my family health it's my second family outside of my own very good positive attitude good love good sportsmanship so it's a good place to be from top to bottom the ladies come in everybody guys taking the furniture they do the Dustbin when they finish the
168guys go back and we start scrubbing the room getting the room ready for the fun to be returned back inside treat people with respect if you want respect you got to give respect to all the so after this we're going to the gym to start scrubbing and watching the gym feeling to know that we know we take care of the kids and the teachers and the parents our customers and our 18th so it's important to me to make sure they look good as well for the community my dad had been here for so long and I asked about the position he told me to apply and I did and got a call and I've been here ever since I want to make sure I make I make him cry like he only retirement thank you
169so today we surprise the teachers and staff at Oakridge High School with what we're calling back to school dreamboxes we partnered with a souls for souls and a gift for teaching and we selected five local Orlando high schools to benefit from these dream boxes it's important for our teachers to feel appreciated and I think today went above and beyond that expectation of that goal thank you teachers thank you so much at the coach Foundation we have a mission called dream it real that is around creating opportunities and removing barriers for the next generation of young people who have the courage to dream it real and we know that the next generation's dreams would it be possible without the support that they get from their Educators it is not a secret that sometimes teachers and educators
170are a little undervalued so feeling like the community is realizing that we are important so it is fantastic to see that they're actually going out there and they're doing their best so that we can feel appreciated and have reasons to keep going and keep doing what we do we hope this brightens your day a little bit and gets you off to an amazing school year so thank you for everything you do these young people could never achieve their dreams if it wasn't for you Riverdale Elementary School welcome home ten months ago it's all happened can you believe it 10 months ago and those 10 months were everything wrapped up into one okay they were hard they were amazing good morning welcome they were Bountiful as far as what a produced in our students and teachers
171it helped us create new friends that we didn't have before all these things wrapped up into one thing and what it reminds me everybody here that when bad things happen and they always happen good people coming together and we make it work and then good things happen three two one foreign I can't wait until these students and these parents walk through those doors and just so they enjoy what I did or what we just saw and it's going to bring so much joy to my heart today was just it was something we're looking forward to you know something we're anticipating wanting for so long I know and we knew that they was gonna come okay so that's kind of kept us hopeful and when things got were a little testy here and there and people
172you know it was just rough we said it's coming we're moving home don't worry when you can stand back and watch the smiles on their faces as they're carrying their boxes in and unpacking their boxes I just walked over to a couple classrooms and the teachers are so grateful and so thankful that's why we do what we do that's why we work for the district I mean to make sure that the students can be in their seats the first day of school and be happy and safe in a clean environment it's really nothing more important than that to us and facility this is the biggest small District in the nation and when I say that and I've had a lot to people who are talking is that it's all made up yeah there's a lot
173of us but it's all made up of people who know each other and have worked together in different capacities over the years and so when something like this happens you know everybody has an educator heart they just want to help they just want to reach out and make sure you're okay and that's what people did hi my name is Pamela Johnson I've been a school bus driver with Orange County Public School almost 30 years foreign check the bus we check in all the seat belts and everything make for sure they're correct me what is your main objective every day here safety make sure I get the kids to and from school safe because the parents put them in my hands I'm their mom now dash gauges I check lighting indicators I check fuse gauge windshield
174wipers heaters steering two-way radio how it works radio is on tablets is on okay we're gonna start driving we're leaving the compound my day starts at normally between 4 4 30 in the morning and it ends like 6 30 in the evening I have a break in between that normally starts about 10 to 1 o'clock my morning run consists of all ESC kids all my stops are door-to-door normally through the school year I'll have like 20 23 socks good morning to show Michelle good morning you're gonna say good morning say good morning good morning Miss Pam and is she your favorite favorite you never know what the kid has been through that night before so just the kindness and caring sometimes a child that's having a bad day you make them have a good day
175just knowing that you care I tell some of my kids oh I tell all my kids have a good day but it's our future these are the ones that's going to be running things so you just never know so you should never put a child down or anyone down bye sweetie see y'all later have a good day March is arts in our schools month in Orange County but in some ways every month means arts in our schools in Orange County so our star schools month is a way to celebrate all the amazing Arts education opportunities that happen throughout our district every day to over 145 000 students the district has a reputation for delivering Quality Art and students in the Arts as part of that a Lakeview middle schooler just won the district's art in
176the capital project meaning her artwork is now on display at the state capitol but for her the real beauty is what her art has given her our like helps helps me also in real life too like in classes to be more patient and to keep going not to like give up on something like the process to keep moving forward on any given day in the district there are multiple artistic events from theater shows to Gallery exhibits all accessible for you to see through the district's Visual and Performing Arts calendar part of the reason the district has such an emphasis on Arts is that for students artistic expression can be well peaceful it comforts me like it's it makes me more calm it's like a stress relieving and yeah I feel like I personally I just
177really like art the other perk is that in Central Florida the Arts can also mean a job so we know that Arts education in the schools provide students for the opportunity to be competitive in a very robust Arts entertainment industry that's right here in Central Florida and across the country so while we're wrapping up March the official designation of Arts in our schools the real recognition happens every day all year long in classrooms across the district I mean it's amazing what our kids do and that's because they have incredible teachers that guide them through that process of learning about Arts education it's also because we start them in kindergarten so our students are excelling because they have the Arts education all the way from kindergarten all the way until they graduate available to them and
178that's where our kids do such an incredible job here in Central Florida and Beyond this is the stem spark event at the Rosen Plaza where 130 students from Edgewater Evans and Dr Phillips got to see where a stem career can lead we are here to inspire and excite students about stem careers give them an opportunity to engage and interact with local Professionals in the stem area and students got to meet a who's who of big name companies all putting stem degrees to use Disney Engineers first robotics EA Sports and others all here to inspire the Next Generation meeting new people and getting firsthand opinions and experience from people who actually work in the field has been helpful and give me advice on what exactly it would look like what I would be doing if I
179were to get into this field but this is more than just coding or engineering there is a bigger lesson being taught to come here and see Disney employees who are females or who are minorities and again they're the ones presenting and they belong in the room they're able to hear their journey and for Edgewater freshman Venus Mejia that is a different kind of spark for me it means there's more hope for other women and let alone minorities like me I'm Panic I've heard there's some numbers out there there's very few of us out there to give hope to another Hispanic or black woman as I would be very lovely the clothes you wear can make a difference in your mood that smile says it all right there whether it's your everyday style or that perfect
180prom dress everyone deserves to feel that confidence and that's exactly what the team at The Mao Outlets are doing it's what it's all about you know giving kids that confidence and you know making them feel good about who they are giving ocps students and staff a place to get clothes and other essential items so the Mao Outlet is an on campus shop where students can borrow buy or trade or volunteer their time in exchange for items in the store the sustainable idea was created by a student and came to life last spring the outlet at the colonial High School location was so successful that they've already opened another one at Glenridge Middle School you know this is a way for all students to support their peers and support their school and sustain something on their
181own students quickly see the positive impact and want to pay it forward by volunteering I've gotten both my Junior and senior prom dress here it was amazing because it made me feel really really pretty and I've never really been confident about myself at all I would like to be able to help other people and other girls be able to feel what I felt in their prom dresses local businesses are also jumping on board to help we have one donation bin at our central location we are trying to get another one for our a koi location so at the end of the day everyone is coming together to make people feel confident one piece of clothing at a time it's just awesome to like feel something that sometimes maybe you don't feel a lot and just
182to have other people make you feel that way it has no price Taylor McGowan is a school-based social worker that's her title but her job her passion is offering students a place to be safe it's okay there's always next week too and to be heard you're welcome in the week after that my office serves as a cool down spot and it's also a place for kids to get direct services so if they need counseling or they have some sort of Crisis or they're just needing a check-in my room is this place to go McGowan is at wakiva high school five days a week offering counseling listening teaching students the tools to cope or overcome the hurdles in their lives students can ask for a pass to come and see her just like they would the
183school nurse mental health is Paramount and these kids are struggling I mean I think in general humans all of us are struggling but there is a need to have a mental health professional in every school because we have a lens that your typical School employee does not have it can take a lot of work to get teenagers to open up and in many cases McGowan may be one of the few adults who is listening I feel like and I remind myself that I am a constant consistent adult for these kids that they may not have at home an adult figure that they can count on and rely on to listen to them unfortunately sometimes these kids don't get that anywhere else but school it takes a special kind of person to do this job one
184who is always there who is respectful and relatable and when they look back I want them to remember like okay Miss McGowan is always in my corner she was always there helping me get through the day so that's what I remind myself because at the end of the day these kids are going to be adults and when they look back at their High School experience I want it to be a positive one and McGowan says she gives them the tools they need to cope to care to make it not only through high school but through life I can give them the tools to succeed and I can believe in them every step of the way and just allow them to believe that change is possible and that they can be that change at tildenville elementary
185school in Winter Garden the road to an education is paved in chocolate we did our afford a Turnpike for we were making chocolate roads and stuff how sweet is that to help celebrate and raise awareness about STEM related careers Florida's Turnpike Engineers taught fifth graders how to build roads using chocolate asphalt oh my God so we made a chocolate Road and we found out that there are a bunch of other Engineers that help around and built the roads of the turnpike oats sugar and walnuts represented the Aggregates while chocolate stood in as the tar and asphalt the idea is to give students a better understanding of the real life ingredients needed to build Florida's roads both in materials and in people just to introduce them and let them know how what is used for the
186roads that we use in order to maintain the construction and just give them the knowledge of them maybe wanting to do that in the future students also learned about self-driving cars and what it will take to drive that technology into the future awesome guys love the chocolate but the coolest thing I learned is the self-driving automated cars especially the one that Google made like 10 years ago because it says it's been 10 years I'm sure we could make a better one the idea is to not only teach kids about how roads are built but perhaps to inspire them to become an engineer but who knows where that road will lead did that kind of open your eyes to maybe wanting to be an engineer one day if my WNBA plan does not work third graders
187at Pinewood Elementary are learning about Black History Month but they're doing it in a different way it made me learn a lot of stuff when I was reading books I didn't know some words but I read it over and over again until I got it the class is working on Black History Month PowerPoints where each student chooses a significant figure from history and researches them for what they call a living Wax Museum and I will be giving you guys a presentation on Dr Martin Luther King Jr so the kids are having a fantastic time making presentations I'm learning about their special person that they're Chosen and then discussing who they chose with other people as well so that we're all collectively learning about a whole lot of very important historical black figures students are also
188celebrating the culture and customs and even dressing the part everybody is wearing a dashiki because we are proud to represent our ancestors we're proud to wear clothes that represents royalty it makes me remember my ancestors it feels like Freedom when I wear these but this is about more than just learning it's about being inspired so I can gain the same reputation that Martin Luther King has in this world those are big shoes to fill but these third graders seem ready to take the steps to get there all for Grace one people doesn't deserve it be kind work hard and perhaps that's the biggest lesson here it's not just about history it's also about the future I need them to know that we are standing on the shoulders of giants and what we do going forward
189is all attributed to the people who came before us so if we hold their values dear to us we can use that to push ourselves and the Next Generation followers Tina Bullitt has been a school counselor at Cypress Creek High School for 15 years and in that time she's likely helped more than 6 000 students we give our students hope and Inspire them to reach their goals by teaching them the skills that they need and giving them the resources necessary to be successful at Cypress Creek school counselors work with students grades 9 through 12. that's 3 500 students and with eight counselors each will help more than 400 students a year so a typical day would involve parent walk-ins parent-teacher conferences student meetings classroom guidance presentations group advisements counseling on College admissions working with students
190and they have a mental health crises right now bullet is involved in scheduling when teachers bring their classes in and counselors meet with each student one-on-one we're looking at the courses that they're selecting for the next school year looking at their progress towards graduation and making sure that the classes they're selecting matches their post-secondary plans and some students need much more many of our kids are homeless unaccompanied they experience home violence pregnancy even deportation for us it's important to reach all students so that they have the skills and the resources to reach their goals counselors work it seems is never done and thousands of students later Tina bullet is delighted to have played a role in shaping their future it's a great job when you love your job it's it doesn't seem difficult and then
191at the end of the day you know you know you've made a big difference at gotha Middle School it's cool to be kind thank you we are all accepting that we are practicing kindness every day that we are being respectful every day and that we are you know purposefully making decisions based on kindness instead of just going throughout our day the school is going all in when it comes to celebrating random acts of kindness week be kind students are crafting chalk messages of encouragement others leaving kindness notes some even decorating lunch bags showing kindness Can it can really help people it may be the struggling maybe something's going on in their lives they're showing a little bit of kindness can really make them you know feel confident feel great good about themselves for the school
192it makes sense their motto is be safe be kind it's a great day to be a Grizzly but teachers wanted students to really live that idea our campus and school is really grounded in kindness we do a lot here to try to spread kindness and build a community of love and support So this fits in so well with the gotha culture for the school this is becoming much more than a day or a week to celebrate it's starting to something bigger because kindness spreads try try to make a difference try because it really helps you feel better that you're helping someone else and it greatly impacts them too it's not every day that a busload of students and teachers from France show up at your school it's a great experience for our students to be
193here and to maintain the relationship between America and France since George Washington and Lafayette and we are very happy to be here as part of an American French academic and cultural partnership with a high school in Lyon France Boone high school students welcomed their pen pals 36 students who have spent the last three months communicating with them through email or Whatsapp all in each other's native languages but it culminated in a real-life meet and greet everything is crazy it's really big everything the French students were also amazed at the specialty programs that students at Boone High School could take something I've really noticed is how there are special classes which have more practical application be so like we saw journalism people who were writing things so I found that really interesting and for students at
194Boone the key takeaway was in realizing that despite navigating each other's language they weren't all that different just watching everyone walk in it was kind of hard to differentiate you know who's French who's American and I think that speaks to the diversity City both of America and of France but also just how similar everyone is and for Boone French teacher Dr Sophia Mommy that's the key lesson it's not just about teaching a language but in truly understanding each other I teach French I teach the French grammar but honestly I teach them to be tolerant accepting to other cultures the second annual school spirit run powered by Delta Dental is officially in the books set with nearly 2 000 participants there was no shortage of spirit as students teachers staff family members friends and even mascots
195made their way around SeaWorld Orlando to support their schools for one ocps family it was much more than just a race when she crossed that Finish Line it was wow you just did a race with your school you're a kindergartner way to go oh my goodness girl you did it an early Milestone the senesis worried wouldn't come Bridget didn't learn to walk until two weeks after she turned three years old she was born with Prada Willie syndrome and part of that is low tone and so she struggles with gross motor fine motor speech all of that Bridget was determined to run the kids race With a Little Help from her PE coach she went walked right up to him and just said you know coach a will you run the race with me so I
196was actually very honored to be able to run the race with Bridget I actually felt special they came and you know she asked me as we're about to get ready to the race she looks at me she looks up at me she goes coche just throws my hand out of the way she goes I got this you know big smile as she crossed the finish line and knowing that she did it the foundation for ocps decided to make that smile shine a little brighter on behalf of the foundation I wanted to give you this very special glow-in-the-dark metal right can I put it on you and this is for finishing the kids school spirit run I love that ocps can you know be there for these kids who have some extra needs some special needs
197that they can make sure that they all get to experience that inclusiveness that they are not pushed aside and that they get to share the same experiences as all of their peers an unforgettable experience for a strong kindergartner who is ready to Take On The World we say my name is Bridget and I can do anything I'll pick them into anything I am just glad to be part of it you know being able to help as much as I can for her to like succeed we're so grateful for you know this run and for the foundation for giving us those opportunities foreign County if you want to focus on a career in cooking or perhaps medicine or business well then there's a program for you Magna programs are designed to promote or investigate talents and
198interests of our students here in the district there are 46 magnet programs that exist inside Orange County schools and three Standalone magnet schools totaling more than seven thousand students the idea is to entice them by focusing on what they're most interested in doing the goal for any magnet schooler program is to provide something special for students in our district It's a Wonderful way to investigate your talents to see what your interests are and to really try on a career but this isn't always a career path and that's okay because it's still a road to learning but what you are doing is seeing if what you believe you want to do is really going to fit you do you love it we hope you do but if you don't well then we're going to help you
199maybe with even another program the deadline to apply for a magnet program is coming up soon February 15th there are currently 4 000 applicants but no preference is given to when you apply the district says just like the programs offered come see the drawing power of a magnet program I would say check us out know what we're all about know that there's opportunity out there there's Choice out there that you can go visit the schools talk to the Personnel you can come to our website and see our virtual magnet Fair going on right now check us out and see I bet you'll find some things there for you thank you at Orange Center Elementary students in the coding and Robotics Club aren't just working in robotics but in Legos this is the first time we've
200ever done anything with Legos they had a little bit of experience with coding last year but really they never were able to make something move with the computer that all changed when Disney stepped in and donated more than one hundred thousand dollars to Orange Center Elementary to enhance their stem programs and provide first Lego League programming for students at the school through 2026. through our partnership with Disney they were able to give us this sponsorship where we were able to work with the hubs and open up the first Lego League robotics the program and really make them be able to build and create things that work in complete designs that they want them to complete and the students went to work building all kinds of cool stuff a solar-powered car with a panel rotates to
201soak up the sun even a water powered hydroelectric generator pretty impressive considering these are Elementary School students but what they lacked in years they made up with teamwork we all have to work together and always respect each other and help whoever needs help and with that Spirit coded into them the students went to a qualifying competition against 17 other teams from across central Florida they were by far some of the youngest competitors going up against mostly middle schoolers I thought you was going to lose because if you would have stopping the kids at the room at the competition I was like oh my God we're gonna lose but these budding Builders won the award for best robot design and will compete in the central Florida Regional Championship on February 11th now the pressure is on
202to build rebuild and sometimes just start all over when you feel that means you can prove your work and make it much better and if you can't tell this is about much more than assembling robots it's about putting together the building blocks of a child oh and if you ask these competitors it's also about winning at the we got to prove to prove to one at Audubon Park K-8 school teachers are literally taking a deep dive into education what a better way to kick off the week than to bring in a new cool exhibit in our library and this is the new library exhibit you'll want to check out two black diamond stingrays oh and they're Brothers if you can't tell they're fresh water they're very Hardy animals so one of the most heartiest so
203I figured with 1200 kids probably putting their fingers in the tank these would be the best to start with Kelly Roberts believes teaching needs to be much more than books and worksheets the school already has lots of other animals a sand boa tiger salamanders axolotls tarantulas and alligators but apparently they were missing something so Roberts reached out to the Center for Stingray biology in New York she sent me an email a beautiful email explaining to me what she was doing here at the school okay and I was really impressed with what she was doing she actually wanted to buy the stingray but after I heard what she was doing here I wanted to be a part of this and I offered to donate the race to her Roberts even flew the biologist down to teach
204the students about the raise for the scientists these animals are a lesson in more than biology keeping pets is I think a responsibility and it's a good way to teach the kids that responsibility get them to clean their room not so easy but get them to take care of an animal completely different because they're so invested in it the students have already learned their school is unique a bunch of schools don't really get to have animals and Audubon Park this is really one of the schools that gets to do that and it's just cool to be able to learn about them in person and for Roberts well the best part of her day is the moment she comes to work but it's so worth it when the kids come in at 8 15 and their
205faces are pressed against the tanks and they're just excited to be in school and if this is one little thing that will help them enjoy school then I'll do anything to make it happen see composing it's a great art form I like it a lot my experience is not it's not the average teenager experience when the doctor told me if you don't do the treatment you're going to be here for only four months because I got cancer I get brain cancer it's the third time that I got it now every nine-year-old has to see their mom lose hair and the whole process so I was a lot closer with my mom than most other boys yeah well John started virtual school and I think was the best thing that I could have ever done for
206him I called Miss Gurley and I said I don't think I'm going to be here for for the graduation which is in May is there any way that I you could send it home and so then my assistant principal immediately we got on it she said okay let's let's do this I said she actually said well can we do something for him and these ladies my God a whole thing started I didn't even know what's happening it was like emails back and forth we wanted to make this as memorable as we possibly could from balloons to pump and Circumstance to words of encouragement to actually having the photographer there to take the pictures it was amazing I'm really grateful that this was able to happen I would never thought of something could be possible like
207that for them to come here bring balloons giant 23 balloons the cap and gown the diploma and everything it was awesome I wasn't even sure if she was gonna get to see me graduate at all so I was really stressed and worried about that but now that she got to see me graduate you know we celebrated we had a cake it was it was nice it was like a weight taken off my chest I have never in like in my life people that I have never seen in my before I've never seen these people before they became like family after I had finished talking Mr Ray she held on to my hand she squares my hand really hard and she looked at me and she said this is girly now I can die happy to
208summarize she gave me strength because even when she was in a hospital bed or whatever she was always smiling she was always trying to cheer me up always trying to let me know that everything's gonna be okay so she is pretty much the main reason why I was I'm able to continue and persevere and I guess have hope my name is Watson Hewitt and I'm a senior at Winter Park High School I would describe myself as a very curious person I just really like to do everything that I can I'm in student government I really love computers I started this tech refurbishment club at my school and I also play football and then I'm in IB that community of just doing something together as a team whether that's the orchestra or like the offensive line
209it's also a part of me that's just like that loves the challenge of it I feel like when I'm really pushing myself that's when I'm growing and when I'm growing I just feel like I'm the most happiest I'm currently the student body president and I've done Student Government since like sixth grade so it's really always been a big part of my life I always like the ability to make a change within the school people always said it's like the Jack of all trade semester of none but then people always forget the second phrase like but better than the master of one I just have always had this approach where I just want to do a little bit of everything really Winter Park has just offered it all for me to so many different communities I
210can be a part of whether it's student government or orchestra or football it gets they're all there and everyone's just very collaborative and supportive of each other definitely my parents they've always driven me just to be the best person I possibly can be and just really try everything next for me is University of Florida I'm looking into double majoring in finance and computer science there thank you hi my name is in tan and I am a senior at accelerations East High School I'm from Malaysia and I moved here about six years ago there's a lot of doors for you to open and if one closes just open another one I am into enrollment and after high school I'll just have two more semesters before I get my AAA degree and it means a lot to
211me and my family because I have four siblings including me and for me to be able to lift off some financial burden of my parents and for my siblings it means a lot my parents taught me about being humble first of all being humble and no matter what no matter any obstacles that come you'll get through it Miss Roka I would like to thank you for helping me when everybody closed the door on me this car my art teacher she was there motivating me really dug out the artist in me I didn't know I could paint I want to be a foreign language interpreter and hopefully I can work for the United Nations I'm an avid lover of languages because I believe that with every language barrier broken it's more perspective that's learned you know
212there's a lot of hatred in the world I believe if you understand each other a little more peace is possible hi I'm AJ from University High School I had a friend who recommended that I take part in the musical at the time which was Legally Blonde in my sixth grade year in middle school and ever since then I just never stopped I fell in love with it and just wanted to do more wanted to do better honestly I don't think it's anything even physical that you can describe it's just this feeling that something you're able to just exude on the stage and the connection you have with the audience why do I do it's fulfilling and I think anyone else who is in the Arts World there honestly just does what they love can all
213just say there's a genuine love and passion learning behind it a hundred percent the entire Arts faculty but if I had to give it to one person it would definitely be Mr Mendez he often saw things in me that I didn't even see in myself and would pushed me further than I thought I can go but I'm grateful for what UHS has helped teach me because it's that rigor it's that Integrity it's that work ethic that otherwise I don't think I would have had that set me up to succeed in the actual line of work I want to be able to go through as many doors as I can or even create my own door you think about the sacrifice that I made my grandmother made so many sacrifices she didn't do it thinking oh
214my God I'm going to be rich I'm gonna do it for me but she thought about the generations you know coming down from her and I think about what am I doing that could set up not even just the future of my own family but the future of the world the people like what is going on that I can hopefully spread a love and Good Just Energy hi my name is Samaya Russell I'm a senior at Timber Creek High School I do social clubs like K-pop Club ebony Club ASA and also some service and academic clubs like pre-med Club National Honor Society as well as on teens United which is a team-led organization we passed out medicine to elderly Homebound and then I do sports like for four years I was in Bowling I was
215Varsity for the girls team I want to do a bunch of things about what I do like settle down and really gained a nitty-gritty of life I don't have any regrets the secret to time management is that you have to make sure you plan ahead you don't want to wait till the very last second to do things you wanted to make sure that you do bite-sized chunks of it so it doesn't seem so daunting a teacher that's made a big impact in my life has to be Miss Stevens she's the biomedical teacher here she really taught me how to enjoy medicine and look into the why of things and she's really made me appreciate my strengths I overcame being bullied because I had to look into myself and find a strength within myself because sometimes
216you can't rely on everybody else you have to find what's inside you that makes you special who makes you glow specifically my mom has helped me a lot she instilled on me being very organized as well as working hard for what you want and not settling for less and she always instilled in me to be the boss rather than work for one my advice would be that problems will arise it's just what comes with life it gives it meaning I would just say it's not as daunting as the first appears so get involved try new things take risks my next step is to enroll in UCF in the fall and go into the Honors College my sophomore year in a major in biology My ultimate dream is to be a physician assistant with a specialty
217in dermatology foreign high school over the custodial Services I'm local boy high school for 16 years is my second family outside of my own very good father attitude good little good sportsmanship so it's a good place to be from top to bottom the ladies come in write a guy taking the furniture they do the Dustbin when they finish the guys go back and we start scrubbing the rooms getting the room ready for the fun to be returned back inside treat people with respect if you want respect you got to give respect to others so after this we're going to the gym I'm sorry Dr Vazquez do you have any comments for the board no Madam chair anything I may have had to say I think I've said or can't wait for the next meeting all
218right and miss emball I just wanted to get some of your comments on board policy pedh the pilot program because we have today's meeting and we have October 10th and then the pilot program was over because you said through the first marking period so I had I had sent you all some data points so you can see those and there's just a couple things I want to make sure that you're you know what what has gone well what do you want to keep how are we going to move forward because we have to know the next board meeting will do it the same way we have but moving forward after that board meeting we need to know staff needs to know how we're going to if you're going to keep the pilot program in place
219do you want to make some tweaks to it are we going to extend it are we going to go back to what the policy says we have to do a policy revision so I just need some input on you all what you think has gone well and what has not I did have a good discussion with member Gallo today and I can share her some of her information but I kind of wanted to hear from you all so that we can plan moving forward how we're going to advertise the public and what those changes may be thank you member Gould is lesdin so I you know I like the format of the agenda I think if we're going to keep this format In fairness to the public we have to start earlier and we had
220discussed that with the pilot you know it takes us so long to kind of go through even the opening of our meetings that those who can make it here and we need to look at the sign up time then in adjusting that obviously but when they can make it here we might be through the pledge and through some of the Proclamation stuff and maybe in the middle of recognitions and then get into the meat of our meeting and then have it but 8 45 I think is very unfair to the public and it's rare that we're done before 7 or 7 30. so I just feel like I like the flow but I am feeling very bad that maybe our intent was to be more inclusive and allow people to come to speak and it
221becomes too late for them to stay or they don't even bother to come down because it's going to be too late so I think maybe get input from each one of us on what we think maybe the start time would be and also what time sign ups should go till that would be my recommendation and I don't know that we need to do it all here now because we could then bring that survey back but that would be my thought okay member for Ron oh I hope I wholeheartedly agree I think as we've seen this play out I think all of us had great intentions trying to understand like how we can help broaden the time get more people in a lot of our Middle School teachers weren't able to get here at the four
222o'clock pre-agenda meeting the way we did it before but I agree if we're going to continue with it like this which I don't mind it I think it's it does flow very nicely but I would I would be in favor of starting it again at four o'clock but keeping those public comment time sign ups till five o'clock just like we are right now or I don't know that it would even go till I don't know are we able to maybe just survey I can even go online after this and just see how long it typically takes us to get to public comment time and that way we can give the public still kind of that time to get here get signed up but also not be here so late we have so many staff as
223well that have family who need to get home they need to get home too and so I would be in favor of starting it earlier at four earlier if we needed to just to get kind of those housekeeping things so if I can respond to your question fortunately well fortunately we haven't been doing this very long I think it's what 12 weeks has it been so I don't think it would be difficult to go back and look at what time we have typically gotten to I don't want to commit the superintendent's staff to that huh I was going to say I will personally do it but I think it would be a good idea for us to know about how long it takes so that we can then look at how if we want to
224back it up so I think that's a good suggestion remember Salamanca yeah I second that I like the flow I like that folks in the audience get exposure to a lot of the things we talk about rather than just put the comment and leave I think and folks have said that they like it but the time is what's really tough so I would be also in favor of moving it earlier and I will also be in favor of maximizing the time that folks have to sign up to speak especially because I think there's so much more content now at the front end of the meeting that sometimes they want to speak to things that come in later and I think that's a good thing because it just feels a little bit more like relevant to
225what happens in the meeting rather than perhaps what some folks wanted to come and talk about that was you know planned ahead and stuff so that would be great okay member gallo that's what it says right here remember Dallas I know I you know I agree my only concern would be just I want to make sure that we are careful about our teachers especially our Middle School ones getting here if they want to sign up so yeah I think if we can keep that ex that period to sign up long I think the I love the flow I think everything's good I just I want to make sure that we give them plenty of time to sign up but I know that's also a staff a staffing issue but you know I think having just
226having cards available like I love the idea of being able to just sign up and go grab a card and sign up if you feel the need if something moves you and you want to speak I know at other Council meetings City Council meetings I've been to that's they're always out the cards are always out and you can just go up and get one at any time I don't know if that's something we can do but but yeah I just want to make sure we leave time for them to sign up later if they can't get here by four but I would be in favor of starting earlier as well okay thank you superintendent getting it so we can certainly extend the time to to sign up at and I mean we can leave it
227open it we would require staff to stay some additional time but I think by opening by starting earlier that reduces the amount of time later and I think the data that Amy I was trying to think for a title I'm so sorry I was going to call you Deputy Council but you know it's not your title general counsel and it's only been shared I know right four years I think she shared that the data we had a number of people signed up by five o'clock but I don't recall that there was anyone that signed up after 5 15 so that may be The Sweet Spot is to leave it open till five o'clock and that way staff stays just a little bit later and then they're able to leave additionally remember we're we're getting very
228close to the electronics sign up and so when that happens I think the time element will be a non-issue for signing up because they'll just be able to do it electronically we'll still have cards here for anyone that wants to do that but I think it'll it'll it'll help with some of the concerns you have about middle school if you do start at four they're not Middle School's not going to be able to get here right because they're not done at four o'clock so that's the one thing that I need for you to just keep in mind okay one one observation and I think once we look at when the public comment has generally been taking place what I heard from some board members is that you like the idea that the public that's here
229to speak for non-agended topics also is here to understand a little bit more and and I've heard positive things too from people Just one thought is if we move if we keep the sign up time longer than if I'm coming and I know I can come at five but the meeting starts at four I'm probably you know I'm probably going to wait till five so to the extent that it was initially important to some members on the board to have that awareness we may not have that just I just want to put that out here I'm not advocating one way or the other I just want everybody to consider that I also think when we go to electronics sign sign in it's going I think it will be helpful to us to before we start
230taking public comments is to make sure how many people are actually here so this evening we limited the time to two minutes and we didn't end up with 13 speakers and if we had asked ahead of time everybody would have had three minutes and that would have made a big difference when you plan to speak for three minutes and you come in so when people can sign up in advance electronically the commitment to be here is not necessarily the same you know I mean if I was thinking I don't know if I'm going to be there or not but I'll go ahead and sign up because I might go and then I decide not to go and then maybe we think we have 30 people signed up so we cut the time down to like
231a minute and it turns out only 10 of them showed up so I just I think it's just going to be from a process standpoint important for us to take a roll call kind of before we decide on the amount of time does that make sense I mean it's an easy enough thing to do but we I think it's going to be important that we know and I don't I can't take your question right now but maybe a show of hands how many people agree with that oh exactly that's what I'm thinking we'll get a show of hands of how many people are here that have signed up perfect yeah okay let me go and so does member Kester Dental okay so I'm gonna go member Caster Dental member for and then back to member
232gold member Caster Dental I believe you all are very smart you can figure the time out I just wanted to say that I appreciate keeping the different employee groups and students in our regular meetings that we adopt thank you for farant remember ferrant sorry I didn't do that I had a total like brain space out here I was trying to think of what anyways we'll move on it's late I do agree I think the having CTA and all of them at the beginning especially the student and council members coming in was a super helpful I think if there was a way I know we have a structure of how everything flows but if we knew for instance that say we were to start at four and we know we're going to be recognizing a middle
233school for something sporting event or something like that instead of having them have to leave school early or something like that could we move that recognition to later in the evening is that legally possible or I don't know I always feel like we have the legal team like that is actually not legal I think you can move them later but I think it's going to be important to keep it consistent because if we're changing things back and forth that's when we get confusion okay so if I feel like the only way I would do that is if it were a middle school who truly couldn't be here because school is still in session at four o'clock but I think if we can do it a little earlier but somehow have a flow and maybe be
234like consistent but there is a little bit of give there here and there I that's I'd be in favor of that member gold I would suggest that we take a look at the data that we find out from the meetings that we've had on the pilot on how long things take and revisit this for a final suggestion it seems like everybody does like the current format I just think we need to find the right time for the majority of our community to be able to to be here when they want to speak and they may miss a little bit but honestly it takes us so long to get to some things I know it'll be sad for for some of us that recognitions might be or some of the recognitions might be missed but I
235you know if you're intended on coming here you're going to come from wherever you're coming to get here because you never know we could be really fast that night right exactly rare it could happen it usually happens when I'm not here yes okay yeah it's true let me just one thing I think we do need to clarify Maybe This was done when I when I stepped out for a second or I think it's advisable frankly that we continue with what we have and then come back and finalize what we're going to rather than go back to what we were doing and then bounce back to this because I just okay okay so we're on agreement that we're going to continue this pilot and then we're going to come back review the timelines and then make
236a final decision okay great now we need to go back to 1801 which was approval of our legislative agenda and am I calling on Dr Vasquez am I calling on Mr lagash who exactly am I calling on well I'd be happy to comment so the board as you know recently discussed at a legislative meeting they're proposed a legislative agenda both at the state level as well as at the federal level and this is an opportunity for board members to make comments or any you know changes prior to your vote to approve the agenda huh I'm sorry I may not remember correctly at this point but I think we baked in all of the changes that we wanted to have so can we call a vote tonight or does it have to come back yes absolutely
237okay so I move that we adopt the state and federal legislative position papers that have been submitted all right I'm sorry you second motion by member Gold seconded by member Castro Dental all in favor please say aye aye aye opposed all right motion carries with all members of President voting in there I was just trying to speed things up a little there but all right before I call on board members for any committee reports I think all of the business at hand has been conducted but there is there is one thing I would like to take a point of personal privilege to address my good friend and board member bird who sometimes gets a little full of herself when it comes to Apopka high school so I know okay and I love Apopka and I
238love Apopka high school and I know when it comes to sports that there almost invincible but not entirely Invincible in fact I don't want to rub salt in a wound but it seems to me that they might have lost a recent game so they are coming to Olympia next and Olympia just happens to be the school that all four of my children went to I actually sat on the planning and the board of zoning adjustment to approve Olympia being at that site it's a school near and dear to my heart and so I want to extend a little wager or challenge if you will popular with the Titans okay yeah yeah no I hear you I hear you I hear you and you know what I've gotcha because when Apopka beats Olympia okay you're gonna
239come in yeah if Apopka yes oh wait you're putting it on right now yes how are you putting it on well I don't know I'm putting it on look look look look I mean hey I know you know what this is the thing I mean oh my God I don't think your team I don't think your team oh my gosh I don't think your team has three three three state championships how many championships does Olympia have I just asking just ask it off off the top of my mind I can't remember oh wait we also have you know 13 players that have played in the NFL and four state runner-up titles but wait wait wait wait wait wait wait wait wait wait wait wait we have TR we have Trevor oh my gosh Trevor seriously
240he was Olympia and Trevor yeah and he is NFL yeah Trevor Trevor yeah no Trevor he's my boy he's my man yes exactly yes he made NFL yes two two on your two NFL players and you know what you don't understand is the beauty of high school sports because anything can happen on any day you just you know that is very true this is very true it's very true so but I do know that this is going to look really nice on you next board meeting okay is this your favorite color I'm a blue girl oh okay all right challenge accepted challenge accepted wow yeah take a picture we got to see the jerseys yes right here are we taking bets no I no I don't think I'm gonna take bets from this group Pizza
241bets all right go ahead go ahead and then I'll take a glass comments the board members have oh we do have a committee report okay go ahead committee reports go ahead so we had a Communications committee meeting today with a pretty robust discussion about School marketing and really expanding our Communications of all of the wonderful programs within our schools and some of the how to's to do that and I appreciate the communication staff and Scott howett and the great ideas that they had for maybe helping to implement that and I know that's the beginning of the conversation and it'll continue but I think it was a really important one to have because so many of our parents even don't don't know what all the wonderful assets are right at their fingertips for their students and
242the students don't know either so that's it and we'll put the notes to them committee meeting in the next board doc so people can look at it all right thank you member Felder since we're my challenge doesn't come until a while back with board member Gould but I'd like to invite board members and members of the cabinet on this Tuesday night Jones High School will be having their coronation for Miss Jones High if you've never been to a coronation of Jones High School I'm telling you're missing a treat starts at seven and you can be my guest if you want to come and I tell you it is royalty at its finest these young high school students dressed in all of their evening gowns and you know carriages and it's just wonderful so if you're
243not tired and you feel like coming is next Tuesday at seven o'clock we will begin our homecoming week so I'd like to invite all of the board members to come if you're interested in coming thank you thank you member Salamanca my district is getting a new High School and you know I we have multiple opportunities every month to come by the site and check it out it's been really exciting remember you know we've had Vicki and I have been there for a barbecue a couple times yeah and so folks want to do barbecue at site 50 come come through District Two we'll host two and it's a good chance to get on golf cart and a hard hat and see what the new high school Portal type looks like too because it is the newest
244prototype it is a very large school 3 000 something has actual capacity it's going to be large to begin with but that whole area is growing and we need it so I am excited to have a little bit of extra time before I start continuing to advocate for a new high school I don't know and so I do just want to always welcome my fellow board members to get on a golf car like a member Felder and I did and right about in heart in a good hard hat it was a lot of fun sounds like fun can I wear my jersey all right we're we're going to adjourn in just a minute let me well if there's no further business we are adjourned but board members and Miss McGill if you're listening birdie told
245me a little birdie told me that Miss McGill has a birthday coming up later on this week so if everybody will join me I've got a cake in the back here and Miss McGill if you will join us and of course we will rely on member Felder to lead us and happy birthday I did thank you foreign