001[Music] e [Music] he [Music] he [Music] he [Music] [Applause] [Music] he [Music] he [Music] he [Music] he [Music] [Applause] [Music] he [Music] he [Music] he [Music] he [Music] oh [Music] [Applause] oh [Music] he [Music] he [Music] he [Music] he [Music] he [Music] [Applause] [Music] he [Music] a [Music] he [Music] he [Music] a [Music] he [Music] he [Music] he [Music] he [Music] he [Music] he [Music] he [Music] [Applause] he [Music] he [Music] he [Music] he [Music] he [Music] he [Music] he [Music] he [Music] oh [Music] he [Music] he [Music] he [Music] he [Music] he [Music] he [Music] he [Music] he [Music] he [Music] he [Music] [Applause] [Music] a [Music] [Applause] he [Music] he [Music] he [Music] Britney can't believe take a nap take take a nap I'd like to call this meeting of the Amor School
002Board uh to session but before we have a a moment of silence and a um Pledge of Allegiance um I'd like to say that uh a couple of our school board members have had losses in their families so if you could please keep the orasi family and the Lian family in your prayers it be greatly appreciated so stand for a moment of silence and Pledge of Allegiance I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation God indivisible with liy and justice for all okay uh board I need a motion to approve the agenda I make a motion that we approve tonight's agenda do I have a second second all in favor I I anyone opposed we have an agenda okay recognitions we
003have some recognitions I'm gonna start the evening up here so we don't have to come back and forth so our first is our students uh of the month and I want to just uh when I call your name come forward and you can stand here in the middle and then we'll get everybody up here um and then a picture at the end we do have a certificate for everyone that we'll send back and and the picture we send to your building principal so they can give that to the students uh next week when we get the picture printed and everything like that so tonight you won't get certificate we'll give it to the schools they'll give it to the students next week so our first student uh is framers County High School Taylor [Applause] Gill
004and Taylor was nominated by five different teachers this month to summarize what they all said it is clear that Taylor is incredibly positive and respectful of all people no matter what he is always willing to help anyone who needs needs a hand and he is incredibly responsible Taylor embodies all that we do all that we hope to see in all of our students at acchs he is another kind of star as well he is another kind of star as well he is a star in our theater Department as you can see tonight um as he is currently playing the lead in the play tart Taylor has Straight A's and perfect attendance so far as well Taylor is truly a super student so thank you from a aec we had Jay Mullen I don't think Jay
005is with us tonight um but I'll read uh the teachers at and staff at a recognize Jay as a respectful and Cooperative his accepting of teacher supervision and participates well in class discussions and activities the student has followed the has followed GED Continuum and is now a point of official GED testing Jay is well on his way to completing the program and he's our star student of the month um Amis Middle School Annie Carver [Applause] Annie Annie is a remarkable student excelling both academically and socially her optimistic attitude serves as a great example to all students showcasing respect responsibility and resilience she is a true blessing con constantly striving to improve herself and make the world a better place for everyone ammer Middle School is proud to recognize Annie as October seventh grade student of
006the month congratulations manelis of Middle School Geron Harden not with us okay uh don comes to to school each day with a positive attitude and mindset that is focused on doing his best during the first quarter of school J had perfect attendance and ear an honor role with a 4.5 GPA he was well he was also voted by pi be the 20 324 MMS School president for the sgaa his classroom teachers State they that they appreciate his positive outlook and hard work in the classroom amalon Elementary School Payton Davis all right come on [Applause] up Payton is ready each morning with all her materials and starts the day with a smile she always has a a ready she always has a ready hand to participate as well as helping her peers Payton's grades and academic
007achievement are high quality along with her attitude towards challenging task she is much deserving of the recognition and she continues to succeed in class Payton congratulations from amoris elementary school rith Mason come on R is an absolute joy to have in class he is a positive thinker and comes in each morning greeting me with a smile he's an extraord extremely hard worker and is quick to listen he's also a great helper he is always willing to help when another classmate is in need great from Central Elementary School Emma Davis Emma has shined as a star student in school by being an active participant in all classroom activities she is a kind hardworking student who is always willing to help her classmates and her teacher Emma has shown perseverance when task have been difficult and has
008never given up Emma is considerate and responsible not only in our classroom but throughout our whole school way to go Emma elen Elementary School we have Liam [Applause] fix Liam is the elen student of the month because he is a role model for others works hard and brings joy to each day with his wisdom and humor all right congratulations Masson Heights Elementary Donna Kint Selenas Donna is such a sweet person her kindness is displayed in everything that she does she always has a smile on her face and is willing to help those who need encouragement and support congratulations and finally Temperance Elementary School Rachel Arkham bright Rachel continually gives 100% % every day even when the task is challenging for her she keeps a positive attitude and is always a team player congratulations Rachel so
009we're going to try to get a picture of everybody real quick so Mr Terry Stranges [Applause] and parents if you want to stay for the rest of the meeting you're more than welcome to but I know you may need to do other things so if you need to leave that is that is fine all right next we have our our forestry field day results and so um those who don't know our I'll let folks kind of clear out as they're leaving so our FFA team uh group competed at the State uh forestry Field Day contest at the state fair and they won first place overall which is the state championship for them that in that category so we want to recognize them um so on September 26 they competed in again in the state forestry
010Field Day contest they round against around 30 other teams from all over the state um it's kind of like the steel Timber Sports competition where they have different activities they have to do I know something that uh Mr M has been working very hard on over the last few years to get to this point and I think we're very proud to say that they they have achieved wi the state championship in this it's a great accomplishment so congratulations and I believe y'all have your own certificates things like that they gave you there correct okay but I want to recognize everyone one that did so um so second place when to call your name please come forward second place Crosscut saw Jaden Brown and Lance [Applause] Clark third place in the log toss is Bryson Campbell
011third place in log roll Kevin ham and Landon Mays fourth place in Indian pump Braden Hicks fourth place in Bosa Spike hunt and again their sponsor is Derek ma Derek do you want to say anything Mr ma real quick first congratulations thank you I know these guys put in a lot of hard work after school um and and it and it showed when they they went to competition and there are a lot of folks um uh a lot of my FFA members that helped out that that moved logs and and switched out cans and run timers and helped with uh fill up tanks and stuff and they're not here but they also contributed to the to the wind [Applause] so do we all stand up again theys around this is you know the best part
012of recognizing everybody so we also have another recognition of a staff member and um this is to Miss Lisa L Lisa you want to come on up you don't have to go all the way over so Lisa is the recipient of the Donna Sterling award and this award is given um to an outstanding educational leader in science and only two given across the state and so she's one of two teachers in the state of Virginia to receive this award it's a great accomplishment and great recognition for all the work she has done for us here in Amis County and across the state in leading uh science instruction um as part of her award um she receives a $4,000 uh reward from that and plus she gets to present I guess gets to is that I
013guess that's that goes with it she has she gets to present um at the vast uh training in December correct or it's next year next year tring share with them what I professional development so she has a good professional development and share back also gets she gets to get published in um either the Journal of Virginia science of Education or the science educator Journal so she'll be published in either one of those but again it's it's a great recognition and it just goes to show the the great work that she does um for our students and our School Division so I just want to congratulate you for for this accomplishment all right so our last recognition tonight um is for the melson middle school music department um so can Mr Tomlin please come forward and
014you know all your kids will that are here right I think so okay all right so I'm just going to read a little bit about what they're here for um manela middle school music department recently submitted an application to the National Association for music education to establish a chapter of the triim music Honor Society soety this nationally recognized and distinguished Honor Society is the only music Honor Society for middle and high school students in the nation founded 1936 and officially recognized and approved as the National Honor Society in 1983 the trim recognizes music students who have gone above and beyond for both musically and academically it provides students leadership opportunities to make a difference in their community and school through music based service projects triim chapters Across the Nation annually contribute a total of 7
015,000 service hours and rais nearly $1 million for causes they care about in their Community triim the triim holds student members to a high standard of Excellence I'm proud to announce that the melison middle school is now officially recognized as a triin music Honor Society school has been designated as trim chapter 9490 this is an exciting occasion from nison and the music department so we have a yeah we do [Applause] so I present to you and you can present get to so read the charter it is this Tri music H Society a program National Association music education Char of the certifies of Nelson Middle Schools identifies at chapter number 949 of the tri music Honor Society this chapter's purpose shall be to inspire music participation to generate enthusiasm for scholarship to stimulate the desire to
016render service and to promote leadership among the music students of this school established September 26 [Applause] congratulations um so these are our uh six of our first seven students that were inducted into the triam this is our student executive committee um so we have uh Rachel vul parthy who is our chapter president uh Khloe Chapman is our chapter um not the secretary you're the treasurer uh Trace par is our Sentinel Phoebe Hayes is our vice president uh Carmen Bryant is our uh recordkeeper and Rebecca vul arthy is our secretary um not with us tonight is our chapter historian who is uh Katie [Applause] Wooten [Applause] all right that concludes the recognitions tonight thank you again it's a great part of our evening to recognize our students and we want to keep doing this every month
017so uh thank y'all for letting us do this tonight yeah congratulations everybody thank you always fun to see our our kids and teachers getting recognized we'll give those a couple minutes if they're trying to exit so next next we're going to move into uh 3.01 public comment currently we have one person signed up uh Mr Porter board members I am I'm Jeff Porter uh I live at 478 Woody Lake Road in Madison Heights Virginia um it seems like in this month of November it's appropriate for us for me to give thanks and that's what I'm here to do I want to thank each one of you board members each one of you here who are staff each one who is online each one who is teacher or bus driver or Works in any part of
018our school system each one of you in your ways have Faithfully served the children and people of amers County you work so that every child every day will grow and mature in knowledge and wisdom in personal and social responsibility in respect for all creation and for truth our children are not just our future they are of value now they are a voice to be heard and considered now I am grateful for the ways in which you lift up our children and our teachers like what we saw this evening you know one of the roles of leadership is to lift people up to make them better and that's what you all do as you work together and for that I'm grateful for those moments and times in which you speak words of truth words of care
019for those moments and times when you speak out and your voice is clearly heard and for those times in which even though you might not see eye to eye there are times when when you have mutual respect and show each other honor that's important for our community to see we don't see a lot of that you all need and have been models for that and for those moments and times when you have I give thanks as I think about your plan as you've been working on your comprehensive plan I began to realize that one of the ways that I am looked upon is a stockholder never thought of myself as a stockholder but you all indeed have invested well with our money and with our time as citizens of this County as residents you've been
020good stewards and for all those ways that you have I give you thanks I give you thanks that we not only have a past history record of working together but are also in the place of moving forward together for every child for every time that's important and for that I give you thanks thank you very much thank you sir that concludes the people who have signed up is anyone from the audience who' like to speak okay seeing none we'll move on [Music] 4.01 so M Mr chair members of the board 4.01 is the amended uh contract with the superintendent okay Mr chair I would like to make a motion that we um approve the amended contract for the superintendent have a we have a second second okay any discussion all in favor I N opposed
021okay thank you 4.02 uh they need to make a motion to give you permission to sign the amended contract I make a motion that we um give Mr Terry a board chair permission to sign the superintendent's contract second okay any discussion all in favor I I okay there you go sir thank you moving on 5.01 go consent agenda I make a motion that we approve tonight's consent agenda second all in favor I okay moving 6.0 so 6.01 is School board committees so uh this is open to discussion uh but the desire for the board to if you want to to discuss um committees focusing on Schoolboard policy and so for uh I'll turn it over to the board to discuss okay board um any discussion um well I guess I'll I'll start it off um
022we've had some conversation um several board members um have talked with me um about our policy BCE and our policy BEC currently allows for um uh special committees to be appointed by either the board chair or voted on for us as a board um I've been on the board for seven years and there are times that I feel like we can be more effective if we were to have specific committees to help us do a little bit of background work to help us understand better um and one of the places that I have felt a need um is just to look at our policies or um see if we uh need to bring any up for review um if we are looking at some of our policies from vsba to help us sit down with
023the administration to look over some of our questions get them answered so that when we come here before the board the committee can share some of their findings with us um so I know that Mr Terry reached out about ways that we might be able to have that special committee or do we want to make it like say we were to approve a policy committee do we want to make it a standing committee in order to make it a standing committee we'd have to change policy BCE um so um our attorney has advised that we consider maybe just doing a special committee for policy for a year letting us try it and see if it's viable if it's working and if it benefits us it does it make us more effective if it does then
024a year from now we could address the policy change that we might need so you know that's what I would be recommending tonight um is just looking at maybe doing a special policy committee for a year to let us see how it works okay thank you yes ma'am I have a few questions um exactly who would be on that committee it's the first I'm hearing of everything well I think it would be um the board would have to approve two members that would sit down and work with the staff um and that might be something we want to consider waiting and doing after the election well I have one concern with that is it's every board member's responsibility to remove or to review all the policy I just that's that's our main job correct and
025it wouldn't eliminate that it would just help support that so for example there are times on on this board that I have suggested making some changes but I don't often have time to sit down with another board member and the staff and to sit there and ask some of those hard questions how does it affect the staff you know so it would just well make my understanding more well-rounded I think I'd have to think about it I'm I'm sorry I just the review policy that's every school board members that that's what we're here for to review policy to set policy for the school and I just don't see the purpose off the top of my head of why we would need a separate Committee of just two Schoolboard members to do that well I think
026the um I think the premise behind it is to just provide uh extra information to the board uh let them have those uh discussions like I said ahead of time time to find out the impact of some of the changes so and can carry that forward well I believe we've already have done that Mr chair yes ma'am okay for myself one of the benefits I see to this is that um it gives an opportunity for collaboration with um representatives of the board with Administration teachers those who are affect Ed um to research so that when we come to the board meeting everyone's doing their due diligence you know that's not going to stop but hopefully it can be streamlined a little in that maybe some of those questions that I might have or Lori might
027have anyone might have can have can have been researched already to be presented and then instead of saying so Dr Wells can you look into this for us this month and then we'll talk about it next month and then the next month comes and there well we need to have the lawyer look at it again we can get some of those things done before so that when the board comes together and they've reviewed their policies and questions maybe it can be more efficient with our time here in the board meetings and being more efficient with getting policy implemented Mr CH I currently already speak with our staff our teachers our community members our parents about the policy so again that's our job for each and every one of us to do that okay uh Mr
028chair Mrs Burg I agree with you 100% that is all of our jobs and that is the job that we will continue to do um there are times that we may want to have some discussion about making some changes in in a proactive way and those discussions might benefit us to hear from the staff to hear from people that it would involve before we were to even bring it up so those types of questions I mean people bring policy suggestions to me as Vice chair well I'm just one person so to have someone to collaborate with to consider things together those type of things can help move us forward in more in a more efficient manner than opposed to just throwing something out there to the wind and hoping it sticks we can talk about
029it we can do our due diligence we can not only just approve VBA policy but we can look at policy that might be of interest for us as a board I just have a big concern I just don't want to have an extra committee and then have I'm not naming names or anybody would do that just have this everybody else just be rubber stamping that they already looked for it or looked through it they already did their due diligence I don't have to do it when it's all our job all our responsibility to do that and again I'll re reiterate everybody on the board would continue to do their job yes ma'am so would you guys be like let's say you're on it and Ginger's on it would y'all be the points is that what
030you mean so if we have questions if we've read it and then we have questions we would go to you all or we still go to staff I guess I'm just a little confused I'm the Newbie so may explain it my thought is sometimes when there's questions it's like well here's an issue that we have but then there comes a time that you have to say how are we going to change it well there's been times that we are having to make decisions here as a board on how to change that verbally and I know one particular instance we were sitting here we had to take a break and we were coming up with verbiage just on the Fly and to me that's not professional to me we need to be saying okay if this
031policy that we are reviewing we have a concern with it and we want to change that then we need to maybe take time to word and do that verbiage change and then bring it to the board now the board can by all means review that change um but then that would just give us an opportunity to not have to flesh all of that out here at the last minute it gives us an opportunity to um if you have a concern you can go to the um Superintendent at any time you could talk with the fellow board member that's on the committee and then can work with Dr Wells to formulate some of the it concerns we may have in a viable manner before it's brought to us as a board and of course they can
032always bring the original they can bring something that has been changed it just opens some collaboration and communication ahead of time okay anything else from the board um Mr Terry ma' I would just mention that I know Bedford and Shan and DOA have um committies similar to this and have found it to be helpful in the fluidity of their process okay um we are we closing discussion Yeah well yeah okay um all board I would believing that a well-defined and purpose purposeful committee is a way for our board to mo more effectively manage our responsibilities and duties I move we create a special committee consisting of two board members and staff for the purpose of considering reviewing evaluating understanding and recommending policy or changes to the ammer County Public School Board which may include regulations
033or practices this committee would be a special working committee for one year at which time the board would consider whether or not it would be a standing committee requiring a modification of policy BCE I second the motion we have a motion and a second is there any discussion well I it's not really disc I listened to all of this so are we trying to is it an action item tonight or is it a thought well I've made the motion tonight so it's an action item I've just ask and uh I probably should ask this before how would the two or three people be chosen by the chair I should have asked him discuss that prob I would imagine they would volunteer but um volunteer so it's called the committee of committees I mean something like
034that yeah I I'll be honest I'm not performing many more committed I see the I see the justification behind it um and I think we'd really have to monitor that monitor that carefully uh for that year that it did not become um as M ber was putting up paraphrasing too confusing we don't want to take the power if I may use that word from the board from all seven members as long as we make sure that we stay in line that these committee members will merely um inject and help and have an understanding but we don't want to remove what seven people could have to two people be real careful with that uh and that could happen because uh I read policies and as as Miss Burg said we all have lots of policies we've
035read through the years and still reading some and I don't want we still need to do that so I imagine this this committee is just going to be a helper like you said to um now let me ask this this committee would talk to Administration ahead of time um yes ma'am yes I mean Dr Wells would be the one who would get it together typically it would be no more than two board members because you can't have more than two uh for meeting purposes you have two board members and then individuals from my staff would work if we if youall approve the way I Envision it would work with um my staff and reviewing policy so if it was a HR related policy Mr Gallagher might be involved in it if it was a student
036instructional type policy Dr nor would be involved with it but I'd be involved in all and so it would be working jointly with us to discuss those policies and then bring information back to the board regarding those policies and if there were recommended changes from the board for example if y'all wanted to change a policy then you could give the information to the people on the committee to come to us to help us work on phrasing what that polic the verbage of that policy so the board would give guidance to the committee members to come back to us to help rewrite the policy if there something I want it changed so I could I see it personally I see it as a way to um just help with some of if we if it's approved
037I think we could make it a way that could board still has their say and everything but just to be more of a leaon between Us in the board and when policies come forward they could have more information to share with the board again who selected that's up to the board y'all decide who gets on the committee um but it could be any more than two just because of meeting requirements yeah oh so I understand that that's a clear understanding so it's more of an adhawk committee so to speak we're just not using that word and so you would um bring recommendations um Solutions if necessary but the final vote will still rest with the board am I right just want to be C clear on that so I mean you know I'm okay if
038we wanted to Pilot it let's just say we going to Pilot this thing for a year and I don't see where it could do any harm as long as we keep in contacts that two people are not trying to carry the weight of seven as far as policy is concerned and that we don't have that type of situation here in amers I'm not really concerned about what other other boards do I'm saying in amher we want to make sure that all seven members are able to vote but I have no problem with ADD Hawk and kind of a reference to us or a guide to us okay thanks for I think for clarification too would need we might need to clarify your motion M Thompson would be a a year from today or would be
039the calendar year just the year would it be you know um the school year a a year calendar year or yall want to phrase that so just make sure we're clear on that as to make the motion I guess in my mind I was thinking that it was a year from when the committee started okay mandre do you have something well I just want to know if we you know change the board of the two around at certain times that would maybe help with Miss Berg's concern and then give everybody that opportunity to you know be on the special committee any other discussion so do you need the motion so y'all made a motion a second so you need to since you have the motion in a second y'all would need to take a a
040vote okay is it clear enough for you yes okay all right so we have a motion and a second uh discussion is closed um all in favor of the motion I I I all opposed opposed okay there you go so that being said I will um again think you waiting see what the outcomes are and this will give you uh December to kind of come up with the the the finer details of it per se and then January once if there are any changes to the board based off the election and that way it would be come to effect in January if we had to do anything things I don't think there's any need to assign committee members until we know what the outcome of Tuesday is um and once we get the outcome of
041Tuesday I think you could make decisions from that point okay well I think we could make Mr chair sorry yes ma'am I think we would make decisions like Dr um well said about the process but we will not change that the vote has been right you know sometime people think that new members coming on or not they'll said no we're not going to do that but we've already voted to do this for years we'll make that clear yeah it's the process and the members yes ma'am yeah they could affect who's on the Committees okay moving on sir 7.01 so 7.01 is a presentation on the comprehensive plan so we're required to review information from the current comprehensive plan and so this is on the current plan just so you understand that we're in the process
042now of developing the next comprehensive plan which runs from 2024 to 2030 so we're in a process of getting those committees and things like that now again as I said um last month you're all welcome to join to be a member of one of these committees I know two of you have graciously volunteered if anyone else wants to be on the committee um just let us know and we can we can plug you in on those committees as well again this is going to be a high L overview it's going to be high level I'm not going into the finer details you have at your place and on board docs a the more comprehensive analysis of the comprehensive plan but in the essence of time it would take me two hours to go through that
043I don't think we all want to sit here while I but if you have you can read it if you have questions about the current plan where we are what we've done uh reach out to me or to my my staff and we'll be glad to answer any questions you have again I will say before we get started with this as well um that you know this was written be this was written in 2019 this was written prior to co so some of the ideas and things we had prior to co um Chang during Co and so some things we had we thought we wanted to try to do uh we didn't get done because of the changes that came into effect from the co uh 19 pandemic there we go all right so the
044comprehensive plan is just a long range plan uh and how we collect data and uh move and the plan is developed with staff and the board approves this plan and you will approve the next plan hopefully by June because it has to go into effect by July 1st all right comprehensive plan analysis so again we had basically six areas that we focused on with the current comprehensive plan and again those six areas were Community engagement Equity Human Resources operations student outcomes and student supports and so again I'll go through these from a fairly high level view here so Community engagement with this again we are focused on how do we get the community against as say engaged with our schools um before Co this was a priority and after Co is even higher priority because
045during Co we told people that couldn't come into our schools and we couldn't be here because of the pandemic so we really wanted to make sure that uh postco um we've done some work on that aspect as well so I'm picking out a few areas here the main thing of this one is we have uh with this first one is community engage Community communication strategies and so these strategies we had a few high points here we had creation of communication plan so that creation uh communication plan has social media website design YouTube channel newsletters local media strategies we created a division wide calendar and uh we survey stakeholders regarding our their communication preferences and we also uh partially implemented the communication plan so the plan was we developed it but we couldn't fully implement it
046and some of that was because again of coid and and how we had to change what we did here um with with how we ran our school basically D due to pandemic and then after the pandemic how do we get everybody back in gear um the second one the second objective here was we want to create opportunities that Empower families and Community stakeholders to effectively collaborate in the education of their students so we developed we uh restructured the parent advisory Council again we focused on engagement and promoted uh through the volunteer program and show up ammer initiative and then again Co 19 really hit us here um we were I think we were starting to make some Headway and then March of 2020 the world changed and we haven't recovered from that yet the third
047objective uh was focus on developing Community Partnerships and so even though it's not part of the initial plan um we did enter into Partnerships with the Ed foundation and iron lives to form the show up amers initiative to start that initiative um I've been working with local businesses such as glad gri Buffalo AA and sweep Brer College to develop Partnerships that are beneficial to both them and our community and to us um we're encouraging business to partner with our schools and adopt a school and engaged uh in volunteering at our schools and then we also we had the community leaders breakfast in which we had community members come in and we had the community leaders breakfast uh to recognize them for their partnership and coordination with us what we weren't able to do um really
048get into the truth Partnerships with local businesses and have that list of Partnerships objective four was create a welcoming School environment and so here we focused on bringing the community back into our schools prior to co we were working on this again during Co it all stopped now it's been a point of emphasis to get them back into our schools uh We've also really focused on maintaining our grounds making our grounds uh welcoming to to to to the public um in order to help do some of this we did the community connections dinner last year which we'll do again this year and uh again the community leaders breakfast but also going out to people and uh doing that and our and we did our tailgates uh this year getting into Community to come to the
049tailgates come back to the school the schools are doing a multitude of things that gets people to come into their buildings to try to encourage them to come back into schools we really want our volunteers to start showing back up and and coming into our buildings as well all right so that's all the stuff on that's the high points of community engagement are there any questions on that if not I'll I'll move forward again this is this is the 100,000 foot view the details are right there in board dos um so under Equity uh we had the next area was on equity and then we want to build culturally responsive schools provide students with access to the resources they need to maximize their education and identifying and removing barriers in our current policies and system
050and practices so first thing we need to talk about under Equity the first bullet there is a culturally responsive school and I think it's important to really think about what is a culturally responsive school because I think there's so many buzzword out there that people um don't really understand what it's talking about so I just want to clarify this with everyone and basically a cultural responsive schools or educational institutions that recognize respect and actively incorporate the diverse cultural backgrounds and expectations of their students and communities into all aspects of their operations these schools are designed to create an inclusive and Equitable learning environment for every student feels valued and has the opport opportunity to succeed some key characteristics of this are cultural awareness where Educators and staff are aware of the backgrounds of their students
051so we want our teachers and our staff to know the backgrounds of their students in the building um inclusive curriculum designed to reflect the diversity of the student body incorporating diverse voices histories and perspectives uh responsive teaching practices using teaching methods that accommodate different learning styles and cultural backgrounds we want a tailor instruction to meet the needs of all of our students cultural competence we engage in professional development to enhance the competence allowing them to better understand and support students from different backgrounds Community engagement again a key here um we actively Tred to actively involve parents families and the wider community in the educational process we want parents in the community involved in our schools equity and inclusion uh they PR prioritize equity and inclusivity working to limit disparities and educational outcomes among different groups
052so basically we want all of our students to succeed cultural celebrations we celebrate the diversity through events activities and programs that showcase various cultures and traditions and safe and inclusive environments efforts are made to ensure that the school environment is welcoming and safe for all students regardless of their cultural background so an educ the cultural responsive education recognizes that students bring their unique backgrounds and experiences into the classroom and that effective teaching involves connecting with and building upon those backgrounds you have to build those relationships and this is what is really talking about is building relationships with our students and understanding where they're coming from it's a holistic approach to education that aims to Foster not only academic success but also a sense of belonging and cultural identity and and you if we don't have
053that relationship if we don't know where students coming from is very hard to engage them in instruction and learning so that's I just wanted to hit that with you real quick so people understood what it is we're talking about and so when we talk about culturally responsive schools that's what it is basically we want to engage of our kids make sure we understand where they're coming from and focus on on their strengths and what we can do to help them so for the first one um again build a responsive schools so the highlights here we looked at uh minority Recruitment and Retention committee was created it um we're trying to Foster Community Partnerships we're looking at entry and exit data for staff um we're insuring consistency of practice for our administrators and we're trying to
054make sure we have staff that understands uh the needs of our students the next objective is provides all students with access to the resources need to maximize their academic growth and potential so we again we look at tag identification um we looked at the parent request processes needs to be clearly communicated and we we worked on that last year with going at elementary schools make sure they understood that you know where you need to be in math in sixth and seventh grade really impacts where you go as far as some of these other programs as far as Governor school and and stem and things like that um we need our administrators to monitor enrollment minority students in advanced courses we're focused on that um what we weren't able to implement was strategies could not be
055implemented such as an advancement committee and Associated responsibilities um and then couldn't build upon a student Mentor program so really wanted to get the mentor program going to student mentors but that kind of fell fell to the Wayside um during Co the third objective under Equity was to identify and remove barriers in our current policies procedures systems of practices that limit opportunities and remove students from the educational environment so what we've been doing there is training is provided regarding Equitable behavior management and disciplinary practices we have school-based atss teams which look at Behavior matrices data collection and monitoring and coordination uh with intervention and support teams so looking at student data and what is those students doing and what kind of behaviors they exhibiting um we look at school climate surveys and we've we've had
056numerous teams and committees uh to look at policy practice and data throughout the year or years over this polic over this objective and that is that summarizes Equity again trying to hit it kind of quick any questions on that one okay Human Resources the objectives for human resources the first objective was to actively recruit a large pool of Highly qualified representatively diverse candidates for consideration to meet the needs of our students so we have developed a comprehensive recruiting plan we utilize social social media as well as radio television Billboards and flyers uh we build upon relationships with lical colleges universities we had our career fair and try to get folks in here for the career fair those were some of the highlights of of active recruiting um employee induction so we do employee induction that
057supports professional orientation multitude of orientation or board and induction programs and we also had uh building principles Implement site specific new teacher orientation so looking at what can we do to make our teachers feel welcome and and wanted here in our in our school system objective three was uh Implement a comprehensive professional development that is inine with acps as mission and vision and here we're able to implement a division wide professional development plan we have building principles utiliz the framework of the comprehensive School Improvement plan and we annually survey staff to determine professional development needs and then we base those our PL our training off of those needs objective four was to implement a division-wide mentoring program um all new teachers go through a mentoring program or assigned a mentor uh all new teachers to
058the division not just new teachers but everybody who transfers it comes into the division and gets assigned a mentor and we have training for all teachers that serve as a mentor and we have a lead Mentor structure rure to include lead mentors that provide professional development to the division and objective five was Provide support and recognition to all employees focus on increasing job satisfaction so here we have we implement the employee wellness and recognition committee uh they Institute a teacher of the year and support staff of the year which we'll be getting for nominations for that here pretty soon we have a wellness program and we've been imp the staff recognition program okay operations uh any questions on HR before we going to operations okay under operations we uh we were able to do a
059lot of this because it just didn't require a lot of face to-face meetings with people so we could do a lot of these things under operations during even during coid so the first thing under operations was to assess the building capacity and facility needs so we did the facil needs assessment um and from that uh we just we looked at all the statute status of our buildings uh the high school construction project as a result of that assessment um we also separated the capital Improvement projects from maintenance projects in the budget and we explored opportunities for energy cost savings to build an efficiency we next objective was to establish maintain secure and safe environments uh for our facilities so we collaborated with local law enforcement and emergency services to revise the crisis plans we conduct
060walkthroughs of their buildings with staff and law enforcement we did digital mapping of our buildings we built the vestibules at all of our buildings to make sure we had security vules and entry entryways to all of our buildings and staff have been all staff have been trained and sto to bleed training so if there's is emergency they know how to uh do the stop the bleed training and threat management objective three was construct a consistent and contemporary virtual presence that promotes digital citizenship Co 19 actually helped us in this one because we thought this would be a longer process but within um seven days of of the uh shutdown we had one to one so um we went from regular always had we did it to one: one within about two weeks and so uh
061that's kudos to the staff are making that happen we also made sure all buildings are Wi-Fi outside and inside we updated the wi-fi at all our buildings and Co kind of led to that as well and the fourth one under uh operations objective for is look at the transportation system and so we're really focused on recruiting and retention programs uh with our transportation department we looked at software programs but then with and the routing programs and things of that nature and some of the things we were looking at due to coid and budget uh we didn't implement but they're going to probably continue into the next round as we look at the plan looking at our software U because the routing software you're only is going to be as good as the routing software lets
062you be because there's so many different variables that go on that how do we route students and really looking at how how can we be more efficient uh with that so that's probably I'm going to continue student out comes so really here we're focused on all students participate in educational experiences that prepares them for the challenges and opportunities of life in the Ever Changing world so the first one the first objective was all students prek through 12 will be challenged and supported to achieve a high standard of academic performance first thing on this most recent which isn't in this presentation is all in Virginia because we just started that last week when we were kind of working on this that hadn't come come out yet so one of the big things is imp implementation of
063all in Virginia um also all of our schools are fully accredited and admit state and federal assessment requirements um we've looked at looking our Master schedules to maximize uh instructional time for students we've implemented the division level support team and we have a supervisor of innovation and learning position that was created uh to really focus on Project based learning initiatives also on student outcomes objective two uh was to offer individualized and learner driven opportunities to prepare students for post-secondary Education a viable career path or military service so we really want to increase student enrollment in advanced placement dual enrollment CTE and Service careers uh we did see an increase in Early College participation uh however we have seen a decrease in Governor School applications for students that are qualif IFI for governor school since the
064pandemic um the school board adopted a textbook Chromebook package that allowed for the one0 initiative and am County Public Schools is focus on providing elementary and middle school students with an increased awareness of careers and opportunities in Amis County several initiatives to include the career B the career days the career bus which will be at Central tomorrow and the integration of workplace Readiness skills so if you get a chance to go to Central Tom tomorrow what time Craig 11 11: so it'll be there y'all can go last of students on the career hit the career bus um the third objective was Civic engagement and we want to assure all students uh will be offered opportunities to learn and participate in age appropriate Civic engagement activities so we promote student participation in community activities uh we
065have clubs extracurricular activities Community projects and Service Learning programs uh we conduct student fors at the secondary schools and we have the day of giving and um also tomorrow we're actually we're going to have um the Juvenile Domestic Relations Court Judge Butler and uh Mr Carver com attorney will be coming to the high school to speak with our high school seniors um at least half of them because they're there till 10:30 about uh now that you're turn 18 the differences in the law between a 17year old Juvenile and 18y old adult and what those look like we're going to try to get them there to get the rest of the seniors that aren't able to get this first day so they need to really understand that as they move into adult life because there is
066a difference from a legal perspective all right student supports last section um so here uh first objective was prioritize mental health awareness and this is a priority for us especially post post pandemic we we have seen you know the needs for this and so we're still working with this but we've implemented a mental health Team atss teams and resource mapping um we also the mental health team was formed in October of 2021 it continues to work towards a comprehensive mental health plan and we're also training staff in youth Mental Health First Aid to be able to train the trainer with their own staff in their buildings uh student support we also Obed to was create a culture of student empowerment so here we've had student forms have been conducted annually at the high school the
067middle schools and I I meet with students councils at the middle schools and high schools and talk to them uh quarterly regarding issues in the building so they can have connection with me and we get ideas about how we can improve instruction and improve life in the schools from them I talk to the principles about that the third objective was to acknowledge the position of schools in the Continuum of Care by engaging and collaborating with the community this was one again the co 19 uh really hit us so what we enabled to do though was engage with Community groups to promote parent education and supports uh we collaborate with Amis caring Coalition which is a trauma informed space right here across the road for family meetings or homebound instruction as well as a space for
068them to do laundry and other things when they need it so we're trying to work with our community on that and give them opportunities there uh integrate school and family supports again a student family support sport specialist position was added we have a supervisor community outreach position was added U we have summer school programming has grown two years ago was really high because all the funding for it last year it dropped I think this year we're going to have more funding again due to the uh money we got in the updated budget so we'll put more money towards that this summer we've also partnered with Johnson's Health Center to provide Wellness screenings during the summer and we provide meals uh to students are enclosure and summer breaks and also looking at local inter providers but
069that's been something we've kind of the internet providers ACC us was big back when we first started especially during Co but that's become more of a county function than a school system function so we've kind of given that to Jeremy and his team because it's more in their line than ours so that is the over overview of the current plan um again that's 100,000 foot view uh and next we have to hit our 24 to 30 plan which we're in the process now so look at the timeline on that so in August um to October we start a review we did we assigned subcommittees in October we'll do community forums November 28th and December 6th uh November 2nd we're here uh November 23rd through the 24th subcommittees will do their work I hope to bring
070you a draft in the March April timeline we need to have a public we're required to have a public hearing on it so that'll probably be in the April ail May timeline also in April May time frame uh revisions from the board and then in June will come to you hopefully for approval and then they'll go into effect July 1 again you're all welcome to get on any of those committees you want to be on but we can't have more than two members on any one Committee subcommittee just because of legal requirements so okay questions that was I tried to get it to you as best as I could a lot that's a lot of information anything from the board go ahead two things um one uh thank you for all that work it was
071really nice to see the clarity of what's been done and what's left to do and um where you could piggy back on that that's really good there were two things that caught my eye that maybe as we move forward you can share more information um I'll forget them if I don't mention them now um one was um under student support objective one the youth Mental Health First Aid I know you've talked with us about implementing that so just maybe what does that look like and where are we in that process I think I me I don't mean you have to do that tonight prob tell you right now well that'd be great is this working okay um so youth Mental Health First Aid we had um Stephanie Mullen Camp actually got grant funding for um
072us to have several members trained as trainers um we we had up to seven or eight people trained but a few of those have left including Stephanie now so I think we're sitting at five people in the division that are trained as trainers um we have trained about 70 staff members in the division over the last year and a half or so um the goal is to train all of our staff but um that is a a lofty goal because we you know have a lot of staff and they turn over frequently so um we're working on it and we have used professional development dat we've talked about doing things on weekends um we've also partnered with Horizon who has trainers as well and they're willing to do things on weekends um so we're it
073it's in motion but it's going to take a long time before we get to our goal what are you training the staff in is it like to be a first responder yes it's like CPR but for first or for health well it's like first aid training but for mental health so it's it's about recognizing the signs and symptoms of mental health and then just what to do about that who do you refer them to to and how do you say things without making things worse how how do we communicate to our students who those First Responders are so students would just still go to their counselors because counselors are all trained in Mental Health First Aid so um this is something that would is like an extra toolkit for teachers and other staff it's not
074something that we would advertise kids like hey go to this faculty member they should still go to their counselors okay and the other question was um the gifted process um and the advanced um programs that we have getting that information to parents um I was noticing that it was something that had been started but maybe not fully implemented where has that breakdown I know that's been about two years ago we were looking at getting that rolling so is it that we've pushed it out and it's just not getting to parents or we are in the stages of still moving forward with that process earlier um in August I asked all the principles that have on their website the referral process so that anyone can refer someone to be screened for a testing I think that
075was part of the um holdup as far as trying to get that information to parents as well as school counselors and teachers as well so as of right now the referral is on every website um for every school so that the tag specialist would be notified immediately and that way it begins the communication process with the parent directly okay and teachers know know all of that point that yes teachers were informed about that in August as well okay thank you thank you thank you yes ma'am I just had a followup for Dr Patron um for part of the training do are we going to be or do we have training or doing training that it's going to help teachers and staff recognize um children going through trauma and picking up on different things with them
076so we we had done extensive training on trauma right before the coid shutdown and um we're starting to get back to that um I would say that we definitely need some Refreshers in that area and it's it's something we've talked about both in the mental health Team and um in other meetings at the division level uh having the time in the professional development schedule is sometimes a challenge um but it's on our radar and something we want to bring back out and do some refresher trainings on one more quick just popped in my head um are SRO or they trained in that do we know I honestly don't know the answer to that they have some basic some of them do have some uh CIT training uh Mental Health Training and they use this when
077they uh work with you know citizens on the street as well as some of them actually serve in the hospital settings to provide security at the hospital for mental health patients as well so a lot of them do have the CIT training and part of the SRO training does cover some how to deal with students going through crisis too that's part of their training with that but you know it's not the same level as what our St our teachers have been have been receiving we are going to do brush up on that though with some of our staff it's we don't have a date or anything yet but it's on the radar of things we need to accomplish yes all right if you can keep me updated on that I would appreciate it thank you
078so much yes ma'am thank you anything else from the board thank you Dr Wells thank you everybody moving on to 8.01 good evening exciting news tonight as uh the construction is uh moving forward um we've moved some equipment on I'm going to let Mr rookes follow up on that as he was on site the last day or two as the trailers moved on and then he's also uh the master of a couple of these maps and explain that yeah so I sent out uh actually a text to a few of the staff members late this afternoon and and uh as we approach the holiday season I called it it's starting to look a lot like construction uh we do have uh as Dr hod mentioned Jamerson leis moved that trail in this afternoon uh Virginia
079site Works will be conducting the uh excavation of the grounds and building the you doing the all the Excavating and things like that for the new parking as well as the new building they' moved some of their equipment on site this week as well so it is uh uh coming to for is now and over the last several weeks uh in conjunction with staff here at the Advent office myself and High School staff uh Mr Joey Crawford and his staff we came up with what we thought was a viable solution to help address the traffic flow and issues during the construction phase so basically what we have now we have the Juniors and car riders coming down Madam road which is right next to brow patch they enter through the mornings and afternoon through here
080and uh as a juniors go through the lot they Follow the yellow dott line as the juniors go through the lot they Park in the junior parking lot we have designated parking for the juniors parking for the uh construction staff as well as parking for any High School staff that may still be parking back that area so um this is the morning traffic here do you have the whole thing or just Okay so that's fine uh this is a senior parking really the only difference in the senior parking uh their traffic flow is there see the top part of the screen the red line up there the senors normally go through that top the second gate uh we have closed that gate off now and bring the seniors into the first parking area the first
081gate and uh they progress through there this is the parking area I was talking about the staff parking uh the 26 spots across the top uh the next row of parking is for the construction parking and then you see a large area there for the juniors parking as we know as the year progresses and our students population uh more of them eligible to drive uh that'll start filling up some more and then in the bottom bottom part of the parking lot uh in the afternoons this is where the parents who are picking up the car riders will wait and the actual car riders walk down to them so what that does is as normal all the traffic goes out lancher lane anyway uh and as you see right here in this uh this slide uh
082as the students come in in the morning mornings uh they bring their little smiling little faces up the ramp from the session stand uh or go across and enter into the uh vote votech Wing the CTE Wing down there and that's where the students uh have been there we have had additional staff out the last couple of days and actually the process has gone really well uh getting students into school as well as getting the students out of the school in the afternoons as far as this missile traffic again uh the car riders come in they Park in the bottom part of the parking lot the car riders uh walk out of the school with all the students even the Juniors and they go down and meet the parents or or caretakers who will be
083picking them up in the bottom part of the junior lot and all cars exit out through uh Lan Lane this is really the normal process anyway and that's all traffic goes out of there yesterday we had everybody out of the school all the students out of the school by 306 today we're out of the school by 302 in the afternoon so uh the process is going really well one area is going to have impact uh the winter sports if you will as you can see we're going to basically lose all the rear entrances off the high school back there um do the construction we have gated off that lot now since equipment is in there is considered a construction site so uh basketball games um any activities that occur in the gym all the buses
084and fans will enter through the front part of the school through the main entrance of the school and uh walk through the school take a left in the auxiliary gym and then proceed onto the new gym uh for any of those activities in the there as well this is where the construction trailers are the rear trailer is actually the location of Jamerson lewises construction trailer that was install today and Moore uh who's doing all the uh HVAC mechanical and Electrical Plumbing uh their trailer will be right behind there as we'll have some conx boxes and those type of thing as well so that's about it and like I said uh it's becoming reality they going to start vir SL works is going to start putting in the uh erosion setting uh erosion fence control uh
085probably this week sometime waiting for information when uh the lumber company will come in started cutting the lumber off where the new parking lot is so they can start building retention Pond and uh so again we're fortunate that it's finally becom a reality after you know 27 28 months now uh that we've been talking about this project is finally become a reality so we're grateful for your support grateful for support of the Board of Supervisors to help to provide the funding to make this project a reality and last thing is I know Mr rookes mentioned this but the last two days I think because of the maps and and getting this word out it was actually quite seamless I mean there were a few little things that we tweaked this morning that we did differently
086the first morning but really it was much better than expected and um thanks to vot for helping us they fixed up madm a little bit so that we could do that traffic through there so that was a that was a big help and also putting the road signage out made I think help to local law enforcements out there if if he came by of high school yesterday or today you saw the blue light slashing um just slowing people down making them remember hey yeah I'm supposed to turn right here so uh I just want to thank Dr hoden and Mr raches and Mr Crawford and everybody else to work and I know they were kind of cold this morning it was 20 degrees out there this morning so it went from 80 to 20 really
087quick so I just thank them for all the work they've done to get us ready for this and uh again next week hopefully we'll have a hole in the ground out there somewhere so thank you'all Mr Terry yes ma'am um quick question I was noticing on the diagram where it was the red x's on the rear exits does that impact our ability for emergency exits in a crisis and how have we handled that yes ma'am actually um probably two weeks ago I guess it was now I actually met with uh Brad bam at director of Public Safety uh and also the fire Marsh for amers County and we walked the entire area and walked most of the project but you are correct um we're losing seven interestes off the back which is basically all the
088entran is back there so uh the biggest areas of concerned are for instance the cafeteria where we have roughly about 400 students there and what we've came up with and the Fire Marshals approved the plan those students instead of re exiting out of the rear part of the building we'll be uh going up and exting out the theed hallway and into a courtyard it's that's open all the way out it's not a closed in Courtyard and then in the gym area over there um we are looking at a couple things there we are actually there are two doors two double sets of doors into the same Courtyard and they will be exiting out of that and going out to the rear part of the building uh if you see that Gap in the structures right
089there's like the Shaded area in the middle right that area right there where the cursor is that's what I'm talking about that courtyard that courtyard is exit is out all the way to the wood line over there and uh so there'll be exiting at those doors as well and the one of the things we have looked at we may have to do too uh is actually reduce the oxy load in the gym right now the oxygen load is 919 and uh since we're losing a number of the doors at that we might have to reduce that load also almost in half which for the most part I think we're okay um you know but that is a possibility as well but we are addressing those issues the contractors where other to and we're redoing the
090fire Maps we we conducting drills in the school for those to address those issues as well Dr and in addition when winter sports begin all the traffic will park out front and they will enter through the uh main entrance and go in the gym that way thank you okay anything else on the board thank you gentlemen yes um 8.02 uh student suspension report for October for your view any questions board thank you sir all right thank you uh Finance so next we have Finance Mr L conic good evening Mr chair m members of the school board before you tonight are your October 2023 Financial reports it's going to sound really similar to the report last month um when you look at the revenue and expenditures reports there's really no real concerns um our enrollment is
091still higher than projected um our Sal sales tax if you're looking at it compared to what it was last year it is down the same time from last year however when you look at the overall annual budget for sales tax it's down from what last year's um amended budget was so at this this point we'll still as always we'll still monitor it but it's not a real concern for us right now it seems to be trending in the right direction and October definitely looked better than September so I think we are in a good place currently um at the last board meeting we did talk about the new capit tool and that did come out we got a chance to look at it um when you first look at it it's it is higher than
092the skinny budget was is definitely you a positive um one of the things you do have to to look at if you don't dive into the numbers is that new C tool has the all-in Virginia funding so and that's outside what our budget was so we wanted to remove that and then we can have a true comparison to what our budget is with the board's approved budget and it is within $70,000 so the board's budget did call for a 7% pay raise to the contracted staff and because we were operating under that file the skinny budget we had only implemented the 5% the amended budget does call for an additional 2% increase to your staff and with that funding and us being so close to what that govern the governor's proposed which is what we
093we did the board did adopt we are now on the financial position that we can Implement that additional 2% um effective January 20124 for our operationally budgeted contracted staff do you all have any questions on this or any other reports uh board great news thank you thank you all right I have another another item and it is the update on the estra 3 funds we had done that a couple months back but we are required to update you on the SR 3 when we do this we just include all of our Sr funds and as you can see we have spent down 100% on the majority of them we really have just the three remaining we have the homeless funds mckenny vento AR homeless funds and then we have the large part the SRA 3
094funds we have we have spent 28.24 per. so we have about 5.2 million that we have to spend by that September 30th 2024 which seems like a lot of money but 87% of that going to the H the high school um renovation construction project um and then the last one is that we have is the HVAC funds the 84,600 to's going to that renovation project so we are in good shape with that we just wanted to present that tonight do you have any questions I had one quick question um going over the budget with everything are we going to be comfortable with like diesel prices going up and food prices we're going to be there's enough money left over yeah the board we had put we had put we had um adjusted our budget for
095for incre increased Fuel and right now even though it it was it's been going up and down we've been monitoring it and we are in a good place with that I haven't had to talk about that or electricity so far so okay good I get nervous over those all right thank you I as well thank you m Justice yes ma'am yes um actually going back to the previous slide so if I understand correctly um with the new budget and because of our conservative skinny budget the difference where all our step staff are receiving the 7% increase is that correct did I understand that it well if we had the 5% already and then we have the additional 2% and I did State the operationally funded because I don't want to speak for the Child Nutrition
096budget because that they did receive um substantially more and we really have to look at that they're completely separately funded so this is the staff that's in our operational budget and so the the budget we received from the state spec specifically state on January 1st so I only funded it from January 1st through the rest of the year so why we can't go back and retroactively pay because we're not getting funding to go back to the extra 2% back to July 1 it only goes from January 1 to the end of the school year so it's 2% increase effective January 1st which combined with the previous 5% one to the seven Great thank you anything else board okay moving on um where I put us 10 next we have instruction Dr Norman thank you Mr
097chair and um members of the board the first thing I'd like to just um draw your attention to is you have in your packet um the new actual updated framework from vdoe for um the office of school quality it is how they are now structuring how they're going to support schools through the um accountability process um so that is this just came out so this is just for your information we'll come back to this later on in the school year when they start talking about um the differences between accreditation and accountability and what we'll have to do for the state in regards to showing accountability measures um the next thing I'd like to have is Miss Smith thank you very much um I have asked Miss Smith to come and provide you regularly we do
098a um standards update for you this year our math and science standards are changing and I have asked Miss Smith to provide for you an update on how that will be implemented in amers County Public Schools Miss Smith good evening everyone um we just going to do a summary first of what we're doing for math this is just a history lesson almost inota Virginia in that all the standards are updated every seven years um our last dat for math was in 2016 so they were reviewed and updated all revised last year I got to help with some of that at the VOE with the beginning parts of that process um where we stand now in the timeline as you see June 2023 the board of education did the first review and then in July and
099August public hearings were opened we actually posted those on our website so that parents could attend iners or take part in the visual SE virtual sessions um after the feedback was given back from from those meetings edits were made it was presented again this summer and in September August around that time they were reviewing it and finally in September early September the standards were approved um right now they're looking for full implementation of the math standards beginning with the 2425 school year the 2023 mathematics standards of learning um the videoe has been very hard at work and prepping for this what you see here is a scaled presentation for all the content levels from kindergarten all the way up to Algebra 2 well actually with the new data piece with the new um math content
100areas you see data science discrete mathematics those are new additions that were created with the revisions and the updates um they've done presentations that not only give them give teachers the new standards of learning but they also break down how it Compares from the previous standards 2016 to 2023 they did presentations with um voiceovers so that you can actually follow along with somebody explaining the changes and why the revisions are made and what type of implementation is expected at the teacher level and they did that for each grade level so that was shared out with math leads already so that teachers can start diving in and seeing what the expectation is they also had many materials as well um the overview of the revisions is the top one that you see there the one in
101the bottom left hand corner is the prioritization the ones they really want us to pay attention to the standardss in the middle and also to the right the options that they're giv to us for implementation and crosswalk well there we go so when it comes to the crosswalk they gave us some options for transitioning into the new standards the first option is doing a full crosswalk year where we teach both standards the 2016 as well as the 2023 the second option is a crosswalk of partial content where we would prioritize that content that really we need need to make sure that students do not lose um the connectedness and the prerequisite Concepts that build on others that they may not get from one grade level because of the movement of how the S sols are
102being taught with the new um adopted um 2023 standards and then the third option would be not to do anything with the 2023 standards and just solely stay with the 2016 standards with any of these options the spring result is the same the students will be tested in the spring on the 2016 math standards so what are we going to do here in amers County we're going to do the middle option and I'm going to explain to you why with the example that you see here it talks about the critical instructional transition and this is an example from second grade in the First Column you see the 2016 standard as it is right now in third grade 3.9 C teaches about the number of minutes in an hour and the number of hours in a
103day um 3.1 3.13 talks about congruent figures next in the next um in the 2023 new standards that will now be moved to second grade so that means a student right now sitting in second grade when they go to third grade they will not have that that content that content at all because they would have missed the opportunity that is why we want to make sure that we're teaching not only the 2016 standards but standards such as this to the second grade students now so that when they go to third grade they will not have missed this and it builds on Concepts they will get in fourth and fifth grade they have examples like this in every single grade level it's not a a an overwhelming amount but it's they're very specific and very needed
104in order for a student to feel successful in their their next Progressive Concepts that they're going to get in the next grade level so that is why we're going to focus on and I'm just going to go back to the option two partial crosswalk year we're going to prioritize those types of Concepts that are going to be missed if students do not get them as we transition them to the new standards um our transition plan um is October 2nd the VOE released all the individual grade level presentations on the 23rd I sent that out to math leads so they could start reviewing and sharing with their colleagues um I actually collected some preferences from the teachers as far as which transition they wanted to do and I did make sure that we were making them
105a part of the process beginning November 27th that is when we're going to start prioritizing looking at the content from the transitioning to the 2023 and making sure that we're including that in our pacing and uh by the second semester we're going to start pulling teams together because really all of our resources right now are going to need to be reorder reorganized there's new naming conventions that they're using for the S sols and because of the movement we want to make sure that our resources are put in the right places particularly for new teachers that are going to be coming into the division or ones that just came this year who may not be familiar with how that crosswalk information is going to work any questions about math before I move on to science okay
106just a comment it's dangerous it's dangerous okay we're going to proceed with caution yeah and if I can add this is a the standard way that we normally embed standards move from one transitioning from old standards to the new we always do a crosswalk this is the first time I believe the state has actually given us options on what to do that is true science Pathways earlier this year I want to say August we sent a memo out to parents and we did share it with the board as well about the changes that we were making in the science Pathways this is what our previous science pathway existed as in fifth grade students had grade five science sixth grade they went to life science seventh grade they had physical science in those two grade levels
107the teachers were expected to cover three years of content in a two-year period so grade six so Concepts were embedded in life science as well as physical science and they were tested in physical science and then in eighth grade students took earth science for um High School Credit we have created a new pathway hopefully to create better outcomes for science we know as a division we are struggling with science and it's hard to expect a student to be able to really grasp and train science Concepts if we're condensing it in such a small time frame um a lot of surrounding divisions are following suit along with this and we think it's the best choice for students with this year 2023 24 we began teaching grade six science in sixth grade grade 7th has physical science
108still and they will be tested this year but in e8th grade we introduce environmental science they can still get the college I mean the high school credit while they are in environmental science but it's actually going to strengthen up their understanding of the science concept before they start taking biology as a ninth grader the transition moves forward in 2425 grade six science remains in all throughout this process but in seventh grade it moves seventh grade will now take life science and then eighth grade environmental science again but the final outcome that we want to see is what you see in the column for 25 26 General Science in sixth grade life science in seventh grade and physical science in eth grade that way you will have three years of actually going through the content before
109you are tested on it in the at the spring of 2026 when it comes to high high school that means that every student will start off with Biology as a ninth grade student and then they can start their choice of Pathways of what they want to take as a 10th 11th or 12th grader any combinations of these in the order as long as the prerequisite course has been made um the students will be able to participate in it you notice that with Earth Science it says in 2425 that will be through virtual Virginia until imperson availability right now all the teachers in Amis County that are endorsed to teach earth science are sitting at middle schools um we had conversations with them that they need to really be reflective about if they want to remain
110at the middle school or are they willing to move to the high school or and also with teachers who do not have the endorsement yet they might be considering working on the endorsement so that they could go to the high school and teach the earth science so that conversation has been had with teachers and many of them are just being reflective about it now a lot of them are teaching um environmental science or physical science and are really enjoying it it's it's given them a breath or like a revisit on Concepts that they really hadn't dived into for a while so they they're enjoying that refreshing but I think they're still I'm actually going to do a pulse check with them before the end of the school year I mean before the end of this
111year to make sure they're still thinking about what their goals might be for next year and the year after in regards to where they want to teach and if they want to go back to earth science I'm also working with um Mrs Miller goo about these Pathways because we want to make sure we're not reducing or limiting any opportunities making sure everybody's getting the science requirements in prior to graduation and that they feel good about the sciences that they're taking prior to applying to programs such as the STEM Academy Governor school and what options and supports we might be able to give to make sure that they feel prepared when they start those programs CH yes ma'am uh Mrs Smith um environmental science um when you reach 20 26 and you you know you've made
112the switch will students no longer take environmental science it can be given as an option at the high school but that will require a change to the program of studies I believe do we we have environmental science at the high school now but I don't think we have do we have an honors one we at this point the only Honors that we give through environmental science is through virtual Virginia virgia um we will put environmental science as an honors class and a regular class at the high school so they still allow that to be counted as either physical or biological credit not for no they do not it would be treated as an elected Department well that that's was my understanding so I was wondering if we had eliminated that I didn't see it on
113the chart mean this one right no it can be added on the chart okay it was just yeah that's an oversight on my part okay thank you any other questions four okay thank you very much thank you thank you m SM thank you all right good evening Mr chair members of the board I asked Dr Norman to introduce this part of her Section this evening uh while Mr Maddox will be familiar to you I wasn't aware that the board had interact with Miss Tracy Miller G who joined us from across the river and as you just saw a moment ago we are very glad that she did she has those answers for us at a moment's notice uh Miss Miller has been a wonderful addition to the team and as of late it's been doing
114quite a while of work with Mr Maddox on the program of studies and they brought that to you this evening for review specifically some of the changes that are being Rec recommended for that document what Miss Miller good wanted to also do this evening is provide a refresher for the board on our programs and how our students progress through to completion so those diplomas that they're getting what that looks like for them and their famili so I will turn it over to the team behind me good evening so we will present uh the program of studies as well as updates to the program of studies so can we go to the next slide I Mr mad hear her okay Mrs good you want to can you hear me now there you go okay go to
115the next one so for the program of studies it serves as a comprehensive guide for our students and families not only for the different diploma options that are available but to assist students with selecting courses that will not only satisfy their graduation requirements but also prepare them for their postsecondary plans if they're interested in going to college immediately after high school if they plan on going to a technical school if they're interested in the world of work so for this we wanted to provide additional information where students can receive information on their diplomas course descriptions of classes as well as the requirements for programs such as STEM Academy Early College um as well as the CTE Academy and other programs that we offer so for the different diplomas there are two diploma types and these
116are through the Virginia Department of Education so whether students are studying in amers uh County or if students are in Northern Virginia all of these graduation requirements are the same it's just regarding the courses that are available within that division so for the standard diploma this is the standard uh diploma that students can receive you see that those are the requirements that are noted on the screen in the program of studies it has specifically how these courses can be or these um requirements can be met for example for the science as Miss Smith had mentioned before for the standard diploma it requires three credits but within those three credits students have to have two different science disciplines so that's the reason it's very important for us to have options for students at the high school
117uh for the three different for the two different science op um options it could be uh or science biology chemistry physics but they would have to have the two different science disciplines for history social studies they could have a world history One World Geography whichever we offer whichever the students take advantage of 11th grade they would have American history and then 12th grade they would have government um one of the biggest difference between the standard diploma and the advanced studies which we will get to in a moment is that the standard diploma does not require a student to have a world language but if a student does complete a World Language it will satisfy one of the World Language Cultural Arts or the Career and Technical education um course these are required by the Virginia
118Department of Education one of the other requirements for this is that students must have a sequential elective and this is for both the standard and the advanced studies diploma there are many different ways that students can earn this sequential elective and that's the reason it's important for the student to work with their school counselor on making sure that they are meeting the graduation requirements also the school counselors are going to take um the initiative to empower the students and to teach them so that they too are aware of the courses that they need in order to meet their graduation requirements so there's going to be um some incorporation of students with their graduation requirements and classroom guidance for students to be aware of what they need to take for the advanced studies diploma this is
119um requires additional uh courses and the biggest difference is that this actually requires a world language students have to have three years of one language or two years of two different languages you'll see that this also requires a sequential elective one of the things I want to point out is that the sequential elective cannot be used if if the courses are used to satisfy a graduation requirement for example if students are working on the advanced studies diploma and they have three years of one language such as Spanish 1 two and three Spanish one and two is not sequential but if they were doing the standard diploma it would satisfy that graduation requirement so once again with these they could be unique to uh specific students to their graduation requirements and their post-secondary plan so they
120will work with their school counselor in order to ensure that they are meeting their goals for the advanced studies diploma it does not require that students take all advanced level classes I know that this is something that I have gotten throughout my career but students do not have to take all advanced level classes they can take those classes to challenge themselves to have additional rigor in the subject areas that they are most comfortable with but they do not have to take all AP All dual enrollment or all honors classes in order to meet the requirements for the advanced studies diploma now with that being said all students have to complete at least an honors level class an advanced placement class dual enrollment or pass a career in technical education credential for the Career and Technical
121education credential most students get that by taking the wise assessment when they have completed the economics and personal finance course which is also a graduation requirement as far as the CTE credential there are other um industry credentials that students can earn with the Career and Technical education programs that they complete this is another requirement through the Virginia Department of Education all students have to complete a virtual course whether it's credit or non-credit bearing So within the economics and personal finance course it has an online component which is called everi so as long as students complete that then they have met that virtual course component in addition to graduation requirements students also have to complete certain so requirements we also added this information in the program of studies as to which courses have an end of
122course so um so you'll see that for English writing English reading these are all requ these are required English sols that students take in their English 11 class you also have one math one science and one history social study so for the science sence it is required that students take the biology so for the math some students are taking Algebra 1 at the middle school if they pass Algebra 1 and pass the so that will count towards their graduation requirements however there is a requirement that students must take a math so at the high school as well all right Mr Maddox will talk about the changes that have been implemented EXC yes ma'am just is this bill or good there we go good sorry that's okay um okay so on that previous slide I I
123think I heard that they can take algebra one at the middle school and as long as they pass the so and the class they're not required to take it at the high school however they have to pass the so at the high school another one so at the if they take it at the middle school uhuh so if they're in Algebra 1 they pass Algebra 1 and they pass the so since that is a high school math credit that will count towards their graduation requirement however all students as part of the Essa I think is every student Su success Act is that all students have to take an a math so at the high school so they just take the test twice one no no so for example if they take Algebra 1 in e8th
124grade they would do geometry in ninth grade and so they would take the geometry as at the high school so they're not repeating the um they're not repeating the math class unless they expunge it or have it omitted from their transcript in their eighth grade year essentially they if they're um taking algebra as an eighth grader they're choosing to take geometry so in high school thank you you're welcome anything else board okay okay so when you look at the uh program of studies I'm getting too quick here so these are things that was added to the program of studies uh descriptions for the following class levels standard honors advanced placement and dual enrollment we also added more comprehensive information on the requirements for the standards and advanced studies diploma options we added a section on
125diploma seals added a section explaining the verified credits added advanced placement and dual enrollment classes under the AP and dual enrollment sections and also added a section on the Virginia High School league athletic participation and NCAA eligibility we also added more detail to special doing outside programs like the AP caps Capstone gov school early college STEM Academy and the CTE Academy we added virtual Virginia and AP symbols to the key of symbol sections and we added the course numbers also we added the AP statement to all the AP courses that this course follows a program of study that has been reviewed and approved by the College Board of advanced placement programs so some of the changes with CTE okay so uh we changed Advanced marketing it's going to be strategic marketing that was a video
126e change it's basically going to take the advanced marketing and students will be able to use different strategies for certain businesses so it's going to kind of narrow the focus down for some of the marketing strategies um addition of the following CTE courses uh removal of our intro to cosmetology ology to implement cosmetology 3 remember for us to for our students to be certified and able to take the cosmetology exam we have to have a three-year program uh to make sure we get enough hours so our students can set for the exam the intro to cosmetology course was something we did for students our seniors that did not get into the cosmetology course because we had to start with sophomores and that was something to give them a leg up on you know what they
127were going to have to do when they graduate when they go to you know go off to cosmetology school so we're phasing that out so that we can add to cosmetology 3 early childhood education 2 we're adding that to our program we have early childhood education one this year so that will be the U Advanced program for that career pathway students coming out of that program will either be able to go go out and get a job or they'll be able to go do postsecondary education such as the um Early College I mean Early Childhood uh program at cbcc and then we want to intro do the intro to hospitality tourism and Recreation this is a new program it's a new course we're in the process every CTE course has to be approved by vooe
128so right now we're in the process of getting that approval uh part of that is surveying students uh we have already surveyed our students at middle school and high school and had a 47 responses it's been about 70% of the students said they would like to take the take the class or may be interested uh so that's a good sign because that's part of that application process and just want to talk about the timeline um briefly is that for that um within the next two weeks the program of studies will go to the printer and there will be meetings with the middle and high school counselors to provide updates now it's with the middle and high school counselors at this time because uh we will be going into the eighth grade classrooms to be talking
129with students and then the school counselors will be scheduling those students um and then as well as at the High School to talk with students and then to do that scheduling elementary school counselors will also be informed of the program of studies as well as these changes when we have our division school counselor meeting in November so they also will be aware of the different opportunities that are available to students um we will have limited paper copies so for students who would like or families who would like a copy of the program of studies other than that it will be available um electronic copy will be available on the website um and it will be shared electronically with students and their families uh the projected date to start is that we would like to start
130in late November December that's to give enough time for the counselors to schedule the the times with the teachers at the high school a tentative plan has already been created so we just have to wait for feedback from the teachers just to see when the school counselors can go in and meet with the students and start process the projected completion of students course selections is slated for early February and just based on some of the future forecasting with weather permitting um that we will be able to complete course selections by that time any questions board any questions yes Miss Justice yes I I think this applies um Mrs um Mill good um the the Central Virginia governor school do you have a feel yet as far as what the interest is among our students so
131I just talked with Miss Clark at the um high school this week and not at this time they're still going into classrooms and then the representatives from the Governor's School will um present to students in January thank you anything else on the board yes I have a quick question one just clarify for cosmetology you took away Co intro to Cosmo but we still have one two three I thought that way I just sort of didn't hear it totally okay thank you anything else board okay thank you thank you thank you um and one of the reasons the program of study is coming to you so soon is to get that process in place so that you have a really good sense of uh Personnel that's needed at the high school and the middle schools when
132you go into budget um season in into January first part of February okay Dr Norman and and your staff when it's available and up on the link I on the website can you'all send us an email and let us know because I may forget to go check it but I'd like to look at it yes ma'am sounds like some great changes thank you okay the next item on the agenda 10.03 Building Bridges to success show case um I came to Dr Wells last week I believe or the beginning of this week no last week and we have had such a great start to all in Virginia building bridges to success program in ammer um and I everybody has been all in our students our families um my team here at the Schoolboard office our teachers
133our IAS custodians our classified staff uh you name it people have really just done what we've asked them to do and have done so in a good-hearted Spirit of knowing that it what we're doing is good for kids uh so I requested that we highlight and showcase each of our schools um for the next several months regarding what they're doing during this time of our 45 minute block for Building Bridges to success and Mr Hutchinson drew the Short Straw and he got the first time so I'd like to introduce Miss wheeler who oversees uh she's supervising and overseeing the all-in Virginia program building bridges to success for amers County and then turn it over to Mr Hutchinson to say what Madison Heights is doing thank you Mr chair members of the board thank you for
134giving us a little bit of time to come back to you this evening and talk about our building bridges to success program um so just very quickly before I turn it over to Mr Hutchinson to brag about madis Madison Heights a little bit um we have just completed our first full week of our bridge program where our students kicked off our session by um researching Bridges and developing a plan to build a bridge as well as constructing that bridge to see exactly how much weight um it would hold um during our week um our students used over 88,000 popsicle sticks 39,000 rubber bands and 22,000 and clo pin among a lot of other items um that you can see there and some not on the list that were not included in the lesson plan but
135nonetheless they had fun creating those bridges and testing them um since we have started our program our students have logged um about six hours um of Hands-On lessons learning and applying um skills in real life situations reading and researching doing uh practical problems in math and I think are having a lot of fun doing so um before I turn it over to Mr Hinson I want to just show you a brief uh one minute video of some of the highlights um from across the division from this past week and you can just imagine some very quiet relaxing music being play as we're watching the pictures so as you can see from the different brid is there um our bridges held various weights anywhere from 12 cans of pl- to 10 library books um and cans
136of soup so a lot of fun there but I want to turn it over to Mr Hutchinson to let him talk about the fun that his building was able to have this past week thank you so much I was only given five minutes so I'm gonna get through this rather quickly Mr chair members of the board thank you so much for um allowing me to come speak to you tonight about our experience with the the building bridges to success program before we start uh looking at some of the pictures from Madison Heights I want to thank Dr Norman and her entire team just for all of the work that they have put in to uh making this uh this kickoff of success um no joke 88,000 popsicle sticks and 39,000 mber bands thank you for
137that by the way we appreciate that and um but from an administrator point of view we really do appreciate we were given the groups um and everything that we needed to go right from the very beginning and it was a lot of work um on her and her the team here so we're just looking at some highlights from Madison Height specifically um as you can see on your screen um our bridge program has truly been and all hands on deck um in addition to our teachers our support our student support service such as title um our El teachers our sped Department have all uh Been instrumental in providing the opportunity for our students in this picture you see here our C our uh School nutrition staff who are working with our math uh lead and
138our science lead to help prepare the extend lessons and the materials for the Friday steam lessons and so they are all working to uh provide those opportunities for our for our students so how is Madison he using the bridge time so we're focused on the core content areas of math reading and science which also fall into our continuing School Improvement plan the bridges program provides our K5 students opportunities to participate in science investigation and really allows them to enhance those foundational skills it allows students uh exposure to Concepts they may not otherwise have access to I was uh subbing for uh or I was filling in on one of the bridge we had a teacher absence so I stepped in to do one of the lessons and so we had this great conversation with students
139about what kind of effort it does actually take for someone to build a bridge like how much math and how much thought it goes into it you know we we take those things for granted so uh this past week the the learning opportunity really provided the chance for our students to expand their thinking on how bridges are constructed and tested for safety our students also understand that this program is there to help scav and accelerate their learning um and to fill in any of the gaps that they may have um and we really appreciate the opportunity use to use those Hands-On lessons and those materials such as I Excel um both reading and math to uh reinforce those targeted skills for um for them individually you can see all of the pictures through here we
140this was uh so this was a kind of a collage of beginning all the way through Friday so down in the bottom corner you'll see we have um like we said earlier the student support staff um uh their picture there is our school counselor and our PE teacher um our we have a sped teacher there and then some classroom teachers in and out um in the middle pictures there but the quote from the student it was fun we had to spend time thinking about the design that could actually hold the bo they actually really became very competitive with each other about uh which uh how many popsicle sticks they could you know band together and and really create it so uh on Friday we had 19 groups that were able to construct a total of
14172 Bridges the winning Bridge or some of the winning Bridges uh held uh Chromebooks uh six Chromebooks 39 dominoes 48 bear counters and seven decks of game cards um it's been really exciting to see the level of Engagement with our entire School Community because all of us are invested so everybody is having this conversation with them our uh custodian are asking them about they were I had a they were having a conversation about how they could arrange the popsicle sticks in a certain during lunch and so it's really quite exciting to see and of course our school nutrition in there um building excitement for students as they go through the serving line I think I might have finished before five minutes congratulations um do you like that thank you so much I'll be happy to
142answer or wheeler uh any questions that you may have B any questions yes one quick question what were like how long did the bridge have to be or is there any so there were some constraints in place um and I my head is wrapped around the ones from this week that we're moving into but we had to take two Bridges or two desks and put them uh put them 18 in apart okay and so now there was some slight interpretation between the teachers right about what that could look like but um Everybody agreed and they all worked so 18 in and you can see in the picture there the bottom right hand corner um the the boys with Miss Clark and Mr Rankin there they uh they pulled the desks apart and measured it and
143you know built it built it accordingly but it had to then they added the bear counters or those types of things so it was fun that's cool thank you anything else for yes sir Miss Justice yeah um if I understand correctly the our the bridge um Endeavor this is unique to amoris this isn't happening all over Virginia correct yes ma'am so what we have done is taken the uh what the state superintendent provided us that Playbook that we talked about last month and really tried to adapt the best practices to make them meet the needs or meet the needs of our students and so we deemed the the program building to success and really felt like in addition to that high dosage tutoring that the VOE platforms hopefully eventually um we're still any for those
144will provide us we wanted our kids to have Hands-On opportunities to reinforce those skills too so yes ma'am it's Unique to us how we've built it good job ammer Innovative and ahead it is definitely all in it's for support great anything else board thank you very much moving on 11.0 Human Resources Mr Gallagher Human Resources yeah Mr chair members of the board good evening to you I only two small items for you this evening the first one is uh this month's addition of the vacancy memo for your review so that does EB and flow a bit monthly U slight additions the Elementary number actually is down to two as we have made a hire there um at Central Elementary School so that has gone down um interview today that was very successful and promising for
145the special education position at amalon um we have interviews next week for the community outreach position I believe we have three drivers currently in the hopper uh in training so that's promising as well don't have a specific time frame hopefully that will pan out well for us um and again as I said last month we have two contracted custodial staff through wall Services one at elen and one at the high school so that has we still have the vacancies but we do have two of those filled through contracted Services currently and just in a way to try to help get these filled we are currently we have created Flyers to push out to our colleges and universities throughout the state and uh using our contacts to push these out to students and hopefully promote Amis
146County Public Schools to the December graduates for a lot of our teaching positions we're in the process of developing the language for banners we we're going to create three three banners uh to put on buses across the division that will also help promote some of our support staff positions uh to get that word out there so it's not just our social media platform and our division website but if you have any questions yes ma'am um one quick question for um the bus drivers you said we had three in the hopper well training I'm sorry in training is what I to say well is that going to be for part-time full-time a mix I believe those are full-time positions Dr hoden if I'm not incorrect all right thank you anything else board thank you Mr Galler
147oh you're welcome uh so the next is actually a memo that outlines a revision to regulations um is pertaining to our professional staff and support staff leaves and absences So currently in a nutshell this has to do with the amount of annual leave our staff members can our contracted staff members can AC crew um ultimately um this doesn't change anything as far as payouts we're all able to ACR double our annual um I'm sorry uh come up to our double our annual acral rate for payout so in other words if I if I acre 12 month 12 days over the course of a year I can ultimately have that acrel up to 24 days uh for payout uh but in any given year if there are additional days beyond that so if I um annually
148acrew for example 12 12 days of annual leave and I have available to me if I have AC ACR over time um say I end the year with 30 days typically I would lose six of those because I can always bank and acrw and carry over to the next year double what my annual cruel rate is and if you you can't transfer any more over to the next year um without losing them that's been the policy the regulation in the past uh this outlines that those additional days beyond your limit of cruel will be turned into sick days so that's a benefit and that's consistent with other divisions uh within our region not all of them but most um and we feel like that's an appropriate benefit as there's numerous individuals including myself who uh
149typically lose annual leave days at the end of the year U because I don't you know they're beyond what I'm allowed to carry over the following year so instead of going into sick the current regulation in case that they are they're just lost um so this is we feel an approp revision to our regulations in that area just wanted to bring that to your attention for informational purposes and for awareness but I'm happy to take questions I hope I explained it properly but it is broken down for you along with um the actual regulations as they currently stand uh with the highlighted language as to where this change comes into play for both of those uh regulations Bo any questions I don't have any questions but I want to just say thank you I think
150that's a great change absolutely I think it a good change as well thank you Mr Gallagher thank you moving on what 12 next we have information from our student Representatives so we have Lilian and John so y'all whoever wants to go f us thank you good evening amers County School Board I'm sorry I had to miss out on the last meeting I was away on family vacation but I'm glad to be back um I've been staying busy between show choir welding working and Senior activities um both show choir groups have been hard at work and we're making some great progress the amoros have already finished learning all of their choreography for their shows this year and we are now cleaning and perfecting our vocals and choreography and the bells um have learned their choreography except
151for their last song which they will finish up this upcoming week both groups performed at the Apple Harvest Festival and we did a great job as well as fundrais with a snack table which was lots of fun and gave us all an opportunity to volunteer um both groups just feel like a big family and I love being a part of them and coming up next month we have a Winter concert at um ammer High School in the auditorium and it's on Tuesday December 5th um in welding we're continuing to work on our Shield metal arc welding and I'm currently working on welding in the overhead position and I'm about to start carbon AR cutting and I've also been hard at work completing college applications and I'm very very thankful for our Lancer Center and Miss
152kefir for everything that they do they truly show that they care for every student and want what is and wants what's best for them they make our next steps After High School School Problem free and I'm especially thankful for the college fair College Representatives coming to visit and Miss kefir making time for private student meetings to work on things that are specific to each student we also recently had Virginia college application week which held many opportunities to talk to college Representatives participate on in onsite Admissions and to get help on college applications we ended that week off with future Friday which was a day to way their college shirts or College colors and it was meant to show school spirit and to push students to start thinking about their Futures and tonight the lanter Center
153hosted an FSA ID in financial aid night and they were Helping Seniors to get ahead on their fasta and learned how to make College way more affordable with financial aid professionals from local colleges now for a quick recap of what's going on in our schools and community our schools in our community recently we had Unity day where students were asked to wear orange and this was a reminder for our students that we need to remember kindness acceptance and inclusion and as I mentioned earlier amers County High School hosted the 52nd annual Apple Harvest Festival and there were a lot of different vendors and entertainers from our community lots of students teachers and community members showed up to to enjoy everything the festival had to offer offer and it gave am County members a chance to
154volunteer and it also gave our school clubs and groups an opportunity opportunity to show their talents to our community the AMR County Fair was also going on this weekend and um that was a great way to bring our community together and put a little life into our community it also gave great volunteer opportunities for our students the ammer theater traveled to VTA recently and competed with the play tarto or the impostor um congratulations to them for getting top 12 in the whole state they're performing actually probably right now or finishing up and I hope they did well tonight they will also compete at another theater competition this weekend and I wish them lots of luck um yesterday we started the new traffic pattern at the high school since construction is starting the new parking drop
155Dr off and pickup system went very well and um from what I saw and heard parents and Guardians and students followed directions pretty well I personally feel this new traffic pattern was the best way to deal with the construction and even after just one day there was like a lot of improvement of how the traffic pattern went today we're all very excited to see this project start to improve our high school and Advance our programs and more specifically I'm excited for arts and CTE programs to expand and improve I'm personally very glad that our choir theater band and welding programs are finally getting some space that we've needed and just I want to say a thank you to all amers County Public School administrators counselors and staff who do so much for us it does
156not go unnoticed and I'm very grateful for all that everyone does thank you for caring for our students and making School enjoyable and thank you for letting me share tonight I hope everybody has a great night uh good evening I hope you all are doing well I just wanted to report on a few school activities that have been going on so since the last time we met we had our Powderpuff football game where the uh underclassman and upper classman girls actually won against each other in a flag football game um actually turned into a tackle football game a little bit throughout it so that was pretty fun to see them get competitive like that at a sport that they're not used to playing and U myself and a few other my teammates actually had the
157opportunity to coach the upper classman team so that was fun to be able to get out there and um those type of events and activities are just really important to help bring the kids in school together and just let us be a to have a good time um we also had our Trunk or Treat for the community up at the high school um myself and a lot of other seniors actually volunteered and took our vehicles up there and helped give out candy to the kids um that was a really fun activity um to do that evening kids everywhere were lined up open up and down both sides of the parking lot so we had a great turnout there um definitely would do it again it was a lot of fun just to be a to
158get back to the Youth of our community which I think is very important um our fall sports are coming to an end uh volleyball and football have had their senior nights and football is actually finishing up tomorrow night and Liberty bford and um winter sports will get ready to kick in I know track will be starting um next week and many other sports will have already started conditioning the last time I was here we spoke about teachers being more outgoing and welcoming to um the students in the building and I would say from what I've been hearing that has definitely been going on and the teachers have definitely been making a difference in um some of our students days throughout um the school day so I just wanted to point out that the teachers have
159definitely been um taking on that challenge thank you thank you thank you guys board anything you want to okay uh Dr Wells moving on to yes sir my computer one I had some notes make sure I don't miss them all right so uh legislators visit first of all um November 30th at elen we don't have quite an agenda yet but there it's going to be at El Elementary School November 30th and we'll give you more of a timeline things like at once we talk to our uh we're waiting for Tuesday to see who we need to invite because there a lot of contestant races so we're just waiting to see who wins some of the uh House of delegate and state senate races so once we get that we'll invite everyone and we'll have more
160information for that as as it gets closer uh Veterans Day is Saturday November 11th I just want to ask every everyone to uh take a moment to recognize our veterans remember our veterans and also just let you know that most of our schools going uh recognize Veterans Day November 10th I know am Middle School is doing their ceremony that morning and um I'm going up to elen that afternoon and speak to their kids that afternoon for a little bit up there at elen and other schools are doing different things as well so vir majority of our schools be celebrating on the 10th and then Veterans Day is on the 11th so again please take time to recognize our veterans um American Education week is November 13th through the 17th and as part of that uh
161Mr Gallagher and Human Resources will be providing a staff with pin and some other goodies throughout schools be doing things throughout the week in honor of American Education week um I did get to attend the vast conference uh Sunday night um through Tuesday and that was this past week in Richmond and and so uh when I was there we had multiple speakers we had Secretary of Education G spoke as well as state superintendent Dr Coons and we had other speakers throughout and it it was a good chance to uh hear Insight from the state as well as other leaders across the division of superintendents across the state so that was a good opportunity for us to sit in and talk as as superintendant and kind of get caught up on a few things one thing
162it is coming uh we feel is coming up fairly soon will be the state is looking to separate accountability from accreditation so um they're looking for accreditation to be focused on do we have people hired in the positions S soq Type positions are they licensed and so forth and accountability again looking at student results and things of that nature on S sols and other testing so probably in next they're working on the committee now but I think it'll be coming to us in the next year or two that they'll be separating those two out and there there more to come on that um nothing been writing yet but that's kind of what talking with this the state folks that's kind of where the think we're probably going to hit listening to the U Board of
163Education and so forth there to State um School psychology awareness week is next week and so we want to recognize all of our our three School psychologists for all they do uh for our students and uh for our staff as well uh we already hit Building Bridges to success uh we're now finishing week two uh as you heard from Mr Hudson I think we had a very good start to the program I've had just I went out and oberved some classes and it was very positive you know students you don't expect fourth and fifth graders telling you about the the 20 different kinds of bridges out there and how what bridge they want to make and why they want to make this bridge and why they and their name of bridges that do you wouldn't
164you know most people don't even know exists Canal levers and all these types of bridges and talking about that so I mean that was at the elementary level and so it was good for them to do the research and actually to try to put a bridge to build it I think someone kind of realized that even though it sounded great when they researched it trying to build one of those might be more difficult than than what it looked like especially with popsicle sticks and uh and the supplies they had rubber bands and things like that but but seeing them do those activities and then just hearing from staff you know staff that sometimes aren't the most positive uh were saying they really enjoyed doing this at these activities with their students and learning with their
165students so uh I was very pleased with the with the input from staff and how in the students and talking about that with students so um it was just very good I think it was a very good activity and this week we're working on it as well and what's tomorrow's Wanda what's tomorrow WEA structur so tomorrow they have to make a weather proof structure yeah so if you want to go see some of that sneak out let us know come out to a school um but we do you know we we know why we're doing it we realize you know looking at our our students what's best for them and we know that yes we need to focus on the areas of that we don't we didn't hit quite as well on so testing wise
166but we also need to really get them engaged in the Hands-On instruction and Hands-On learning and this is all part of it you know the science aspect you apply your reading and your math skills into the science aspects of it to make it all come together so it's applied ma it's applied learning it's not just here it is read about it they have to actually apply it and learn it and that Hands-On um makes a big difference so the tailgate um we had our tailgates we've had three we had our last one this past Friday thanks to all you who could be there um appreciate the support and I appreciate all the work that my staff put into it the preparation and during it and the clean up after I think we got this I
167think we got the system down pretty good there at the end we're what we S I went back up after senior announcements at the football game to help clean up and they already had it all packed up and gone so I was like well okay I just walk back down to the field um so we kind of got the system down and now we'll do it again uh hopefully do it again next year but you know we had our community tailgate for the first home game and then we had the two staff tailgates and I think we had very good participation I think people enjoyed it and it's something we want to continue doing uh vsba convention November 15th to the 17th again you're let us know if you're able to go or not I
168know some of you have already registered um if you're not able to go let us know so we can cancel hotel rooms and just again get with Miss McNerney on that if you would and then the last one of the last things I have is conflict of interest training um you're all required by code to complete it so ask if you haven't completed it um complete it and if you need access to the resources M McNerney can get you access to the resources I believe three of you have completed it and so we just need to make sure uh we complete that um before I think January just it did line so make sure we get that done then that's not on my on my list and not on board docs but on the agenda
169but Randolph College we recently entered an agreement with Randolph College where every student with a 2.5 GPA or higher um who's passed Algebra 2 um can get a direct admission into Randolph they just have to apply and it's not they don't have to go through the big process um so looking at that and if they do have issues in math they have things they can do to help them out if they have like a 3 five but they had issues in a particular class they'll work with them and kind of give them some remedial math on that but we just enter that agreement so that'll be good for our students they just you know and open up those doors um for students to see that yes I can get into these colleges and I can
170I can do that so that's a plus we want to thank them we'll be doing a press release it hasn't gone out yet it'll be going out I want to talk to y'all first it'll be going out next week or maybe as early as tomorrow on that on that agreement with Randol so that's all I have unless y'all have any questions forward any questions for Dr Wells okay all right thank you thank you so we're going to move on to uh we're going to do 14 and 15 at the same time so if you have a committee report you can give that at the same time but miss sandre I'll let you kick it off again thank you I know I was getting ready well there's so many students to congratulate I don't want to
171leave anyone out so can I just make a broad y'all are great um and congratulations to Miss lob my kids had her she's great um Hands-On learning so my son at ODU who's an engineer student actually did this and he was so excited so as a 19 and 20 year old and Wanda knows she had him he was just EST static I wish he could have done this when he was nine but this is such a great it's like Dr well says the applied and you can see that it actually works but the Hands-On for so many kids is so important that that's how their sensory work so they need that so and I love that everyone was engaged even to the you know cafeteria staff that's great and we are so lucky to have
172out of thebox thinkers and creative thinkers here at ammer so thank you Dr Norman and team um Good Luck on our for our students on our on your applications I know that that's stressful so take your time and good luck and that's all I have thank you ma'am Miss Justice yes sir thank you very much um so at Governor's School we didn't have a board meeting but great opportunities abound at Governor school so um the dual enrollment anatomy and physiology class had a guest speaker um from Ortho Virginia um Dr Douglas Dickerson and um some of the things that really encouraged me were a collaborative presentation by the senior class on their mock Grant proposal for scientific research in Antarctica I hope someone picks that up and it goes to the next level I think
173that sounds pretty exciting um the Juniors um are going to test their designs of egg protection containers and analyze the forces at impact using high-speed video in the annual physics EG drop project um as someone who eats a ton of eggs I have a high investment into better egg produ protection um as we listen to um Dr Wells talking about the partnership with Randolph um I think of the University of Lynchburg um partnership that the central Governor school has um for dual enrollment and I am blown away that here little amers that people like to say is way out there have has um multiple relationships with local higher education um organizations and the opportunity is there if you are hungry for it if you're thinking about it it is there just go out and reach
174for it everyone's here to support you um families students and commun community members I just want to urge you right now to investigate the gov School opportunity coming coming out of the pandemic don't be intimidated please if you have an interest imply nothing risk nothing gained um theater Roosevelt is um credited as saying in any moment of decision the best thing you you can do is the right thing the next best thing is the wrong thing and the worst thing you can do is nothing so don't let fear stop you um thanks to um the transportation department for the county Fair my kids look for it look forward to it every year driving down Route 29 looking for those lights that appear out of nowhere in the field it is truly like magic and I
175know Mr raches you and your team if you weren't doing it it wouldn't be happening because there's no way to get there so thank you for what you did um Building Bridges to success is another ammer original engagement Innovation and creativity and everyone is all in and this is representative of the amoris culture it has been for generations and it's beautiful to see the teachers hearts and the administration and the kids and the parents and the community diving into this um we hear about struggles with science and yet here in ammer we have Miss law who was one of two teachers for Science and again we have a gem right here in ammer so in final at the beginning of this evening we saw 12 students and what stood out to me is optimistic resilient
176prepared helpful kindness perseverance overcoming and humor these are the characteristics which build success in life success in life is less defined by accomplishments but more by the character revealed through the obstacles you overcome and every month I'm seeing students that are exemplifying what is going on in these schools and they're not alone so thank you for all you're doing here thank you ma'am Miss Berg um yes I just wanted to recognize again all our students were recognized this evening um truly showing what Amherst is and it's a great way to show up Amherst come support your kids that are being recognized I I really like to show up Amherst and also um congratulations to manelis and middle school for their music Honor Society um congratulations to our forestry students um for actually showing up at
177States and cleaning house um and also thank you to all our staff for putting everything together for our presentations this evening and for our elementary and our Middle School teachers and staff for putting together the all-in-one Virginia I know they had to be under a lot of stress and we appreciate everything everybody body he did for that and making it a success and thank you to our student reps and I hope you guys are going to be able to get some sleep after doing all those college applications I it's very stressful that time of year and also um thank you to Mr Porter um the words that he gives us especially this evening they thank you so much it really meant a lot to me it's nice to actually hear people say nice things to
178the board and to the school and also um if everybody could please keep the orissi family um in your thoughts and prayers I would greatly appreciate it thank you so much thank you ma'am Miss Lian okay well kind of ditos for all of the congratulatory people and as Dr Wells had stated early on it's a wonderful thing to see young people come out and be recognized I think it gives them a little more encouragement to to want to go to school when they think they know the people are really seeing what they're doing so from forestry to singing that's pretty good right there you know logs being rolling to opening your mouth singing that's pretty good so I was excited about that and um I'm just taking notice to all the changes of math and
179science which is uh I said dangerous because every time we the state goes through these dramatic overnight changes um some school system get caught in in in the system of the achievement and what the numbers look like but I'm confident that we will overcome that by the option that you chose option two I think so we always watching Math and Science I I look at it also in high Ed that subject is all day long uh as to what is going on so we appreciate everything of course the comprehensive plan great work done that's our road map anyway I just I read that I was looking at all the the targets that we have and at the end of the day it's all about student achievement and all of those things in our comprehens plan
180we get us where we need to be so thank you Dr Wells and your staff we thank the staff anyway for all the good work we're just here to read it and enjoy it but uh a lot of things have been done um and to the Reps uh the Lancer people good information uh thank you for updates and it sounds like you're enjoying yourself in your senior year nothing like it trust me CU When it's gone uh it's it's and yes the tailgates good hamburgers good good stuff going I miss the last one but every other one was just wonderful so uh you can't get much better than that uh someone that I brought with me from another area said I've never seen superintendent work like yours is and I said don't try to take
181him either just don't get no ideas you know come have your hamburger and leave but don't get no ideas but it does it does not go unnoticed uh not just the superintendent but his entire staff are down there uh cooking and eating and having a good time and and then closing um I think we mentioned it but we we are concerned still in the comprehensive with mental health I think uh Miss Thompson and some others mentioned that that's that's got to be on the Forerunner um can't be on the back burner anymore because that itself is part of what controls the day-to-day living in the school system so I see that as just number one I'm watching that at all times and also thank you thank my AC thank Amis County public school system for
182being there for me during my loss and uh it's nothing like good friends and family and y'all are my family so those of you who came to the services who called me who send cards it does not go unnoticed and I hope I can do the same for you that's where we are if we don't have that among us we really don't have anything so that's it and I don't have a report from Laur and I'm hoping to go to Williamsburg if uh superintendent drives me down I'll drive you know I don't ride I don't drive one these roads you know that's thank you thank you Miss Lian Miss Thompson um yes thank you um I first want to start off and thank Mr Porter for his kind words um your words of appreciation um
183I just hope that I can live up to those um but it was very nice to hear thank you um also I'd like to thank the staff and Dr Wells um for highlighting all the recognitions tonight um I could go through and repeat them um like Miss Lian say just ditto but um it's just nice to be able to celebrate that and I just want to say we have some Stellar students and teachers and recognize them and recognizing them is a true Joy thank you um and the bridge engagement that we see um has that's been fun um I know the kids have enjoyed it and it goes right along with our theme about engagement and so I'm looking forward to the the next one um I know it takes a lot of effort on
184everyone's part but thank you so much um Lillian I think thank you for bringing up the Lancer Center um I was with someone going through the school the other day and just highlighting that I think it was one of our legislators and they just didn't know what it was and so it was a joy to be able to share with them um all the resources that are there so thank you for highlighting that I think that's uh we're blessed to have that and John um I'm saying thank you to all the teachers who took your challenge and are opening up and being more welcoming and providing that environment and thank you for recognizing that um I want to thank all the teachers for all they do all the time and I know that's an extra
185step to say I've got this and this and this I got to do but I'm going to get out there and I'm going to take time and do the important work with my students and um and communicate with them so thank you appreciate that report um and then lastly um I want to say two things I want to say that my heart goes out to our two board members that lost um family members um and know that y'all are loved and appreciated and um that our hearts are with you and I also want to thank all the veterans who have served and those that do serve today um serve our country and they sacrific so much and I just want to say thank you very much thank you ma'am so um kind of stole my
186thunder there I was going to start that off with Veterans Day so uh we do need to uh um remember Veterans Day and and your activities that you do this week weekend thank a veteran for his service uh there why we get to do what we're doing right here tonight it's a it's a great thing so thank you for everything um Lillian just remember JMU you know just just throw that out there um now you guys are always giv us some good information um love hearing what comes from the schools seeing you out there doing things um I did get a chance to come up and uh participate in the tailgates uh the Apple Harvest Festival the fair the am trick or Trunk or Treat that's Community engagement all those things you bringing the community
187to the schools or we're taking the schools out to the community that's show up amorist that's what we've been trying to get out there for years and it's awesome to see it um trunk retreat was very hot that day it was was pretty Dar and hot um the bridge program you know student outcomes that's that's part of our uh that's part of our comprehensive plan so that's showing kids how to do things outside of just the classroom that along with like our our trout programs and our River programs and those things getting them out there getting their hands dirty doing things that that more than just showing them how to use a pencil and paper um more student support you know just going through putting the students first with all with a comprehensive plan um
188student support more you know talking about our students of the month talking about our forestry programs lifting them up when they do those great things because they do have some awesome programs going on our Middle School uh Mrs lob's um Rec um recognition it's you know some great things going on the um Good Luck guys with the traffic pattern at the high school I I've seen traffic patterns change and that always gets better as it goes people learn how it all works but really looking forward to seeing that dirt moving uh it's like I said it's long overdue [Music] um I know I had something else but I can't find it I hopefully I'm going to try to get by and see uh Central Elementary tomorrow love seeing the the career bus go out the
189uh elementary school kids seeing the high school kids come and teach them something show them something there again that's our our our students learning how to give back to those who are coming behind them uh I think with all these things that we've we got going on here we are producing excellent citizens of Amis County send them out the door on their way teaching them how uh how we want them to be so uh thank y'all for all that you do the reports that you give us are awesome um there there's good news there's bad news we take it as it comes and we just roll with it so thank you very much um yeah okay thank you all right so uh close session so pursuant to section 2.2 3711 A2 of the code of
190Virginia it is recommended the board Cony a closed meeting for the following A2 student matters the consideration for religious exemption request will be discussed okay so do we a motion a motion board I make a motion that we go into close session second all in favor Mr oh I got to read this I got to read that one piece okay think you just said all that so in accordance with Section 22- 3711 A2 of the code of Virginia I oh I need a motion from the board to convene and close meeting to discuss the following a to student matters the consideration for religious exemption requested in disclosed I have a motion I make a motion that we go into Clos session for those reasons I'll second it again okay all in favor hi close [Music]
191session