001certify that only public business matters lawfully exempt from open meeting requirements were discussed and only such public business matters as were identified in the motion by which the closed meeting was convened were heard discussed or considered a second that motion can we have a motion and it has been second vote please hmm [Applause] okay motion carried i want to welcome everyone to our meeting tonight and especially we want to welcome mr cunningham a new school board representative from the hardy disk and mr vines from our windsor district [Applause] and i also want to recognize mr jefferson from board of supervisors he's with us tonight welcome at this time i'm going to ask miss times if she'll please or lead us in the pledge of allegiance in the moment of silence i pledge allegiance to the
002flag of the united states of america and to the republic for which it stands one nation under god an individual with liberty and justice for all thank you okay we are ready for our owl white achievers miss bricks good evening everyone the vision for isle of wight county schools is to create a learning environment that will enable every child to discover his or her unique gifts and talents the olive white achievers section of our board meeting gives us an opportunity to recognize and celebrate our students and staff for their unique talents and gifts so tonight we have a brief achievers presentation we have our seniors of the month and unfortunately our senior from windsor high is working tonight and not able to be here so i will say her name is mackenzie powers and mackenzie
003is going to come to our december board meeting so we will read her accolades then and give her her plaque and her recognition but we do have with us our senior from smithfield high school and that is vincent knee and i'ma have vincent come up he's going to stand in front while i read and then after i finish reading we'll get you guys to stand and we'll get a photo while he's standing up here not to put you on the spot there you go you hold that and then just stand up there and read some fun stuff about you okay vincent is a strong academic student who is always willing to help others he is participating in a jefferson lab mentorship program and plans to study to be an aerospace engineer upon graduation vincent participates
004in various clubs and attends the governor's school for science and technology he served as a freshman mentor this year and stepped up in a leadership role to help our freshman transition during freshman orientation quote vincent is a great asset to the school community i have enjoyed getting to know him while he has been at shs he is a dedicated student and one others look up to he has helped his family working while maintaining extremely competitive grades through this he has also kept a smile on his face and continued to challenge himself and be active at school he also helped with the transition day welcoming new freshman to campus i cannot say enough wonderful things about vincent and that comes from this yancey williams school counselor vincent plans to attend a four-year university and i know
005right now all the seniors are in the midst of applying so anna stated earlier he plans to study aerospace engineering we want to congratulate you and if you'll stan take a couple steps back and board members and our liaisons if you could kind of congregate uh closer to ms carr and as far as the picture if you're comfortable you're welcome to remove your mask for the photo because that would just be a few seconds mr elliot's pretty quick with those things you got it thank you thank you and congratulations once again [Applause] and that's going to actually conclude our achievers tonight so thank you thank you vincent thank you to his family members that came to support him and we'll have more achievers in december okay thank you miss briggs next on the agenda is
006special presentation eye on instruction we are honored to have carrisville elementary school with us tonight [Applause] good evening madam chair dr thornton and school board members my name is stacey catterbone i'm the instructional coach at carsville elementary our third graders from miss pateros and miss miss dawkins classes are here to present their project-based learning where in the world is my bulldog [Laughter] hi my name is ava landris hi my name is allen newberry hi my name is bailey dardy hi my name is aubry jenkins hi my name is sakari jackson hi my name is nathan curl we took our flat we we took our stuffed bulldog and dropped a board on him and made him fly let's watch what happens to our bulldog next baby doesn't want to look get it back into there where's
007the mouse i can't find the mouse excuse me there we go challenging our essential question is how do landmarks and land features have an impact on the world and people around them we learned how to write and we learned how to write letters and how to request information we wrote to family members around the world and asked them to we take pictures of lin and to identify landmarks and especially land features near where they live we took a field trip to the cotton gin in windsor virginia we discovered how cotton is cleaned and how it is made into clothes the flat bullet dolls and the letters that students show are done a our bulldogs is traveling all all around the world a family member will receive it and take a picture around the landmark online
008feature ms butler is going to receive our bull adults and send them on their trips i'm going to share the process we went through to begin our project first we looked at a map and found the places where our family members lived and they had traveled and we did a pre-write and wrote down stuff our bulldog could see when he traveled to those places then we did a rough draft and made revisions finally we did our final letter that we sent to our family members we include the directions our members will know to do with their flat bulldog that's stanley once we begin receiving our bulldogs photos we will map the location on a map where the where the bulldogs traveled then we will teach our classmates about the landmark or features he saw we
009are looking forward to we are looking forward to be to learn about many more landmarks and land features please join us on our december expo to see our final project [Applause] that looked like fun learning looked like you enjoyed that whole process and that's real world learning not just behind the desk but with paper and pencil you guys did a great job thank you so much we have a question from this time question well what is the significance of the bulldog is this your mascot maybe the audience would like to know or it's just you want the class like the bulldog well it's a picture that our school has a lot okay so it's like the school's mascot okay that's what i want to do there could be some people out here didn't know that
010so you use your school mascot and and i was while you were doing your presentation i was sitting up here thinking about uh a few years ago i got a letter it wasn't a letter it was a little letter and they sent flat stanley with it and i had they had to travel with me and my travels so that's pretty much what you all are doing and you chose the bulldog thank you you did a wonderful job great job [Applause] okay thank you [Music] that stuff and disappear it's nice i enjoy that okay that was fun next on the agenda is request to speak okay in accordance to policy bdd h-e presentations of information on any subject will be concluded at the discretion of the board no person will be recognized to speak more than
011once citizens scheduled on the agenda to speak will be permitted five minutes maximum time for their presentation delegations are requested to limit their speakers to two a maximum of 30 minutes will be designated for public comments persons speaking are asked to be specific state the issues for the board's consideration and attach a copy of your prepared remarks if you have prepared remarks they should be given to the board clerk please do not approach the board members the school board requests that speakers refrain from referring to specific individuals and that any matter related to a specific student or individual will be discussed in a closed meeting speakers are addressing the school board and will face the board while at the podium and not interact with members of the audience okay and the first person we have
012is jason moore okay next all right miss williams good evening i just wanted to talk i know we have a lot of new new faces and just wanted to make you aware of just some things in the heart of the community so it interests me how people can talk about the author style in books that we teach yet never had issues with the textbooks that blatantly focuses on division of cultures some may be one-sided interviews but let me tell you that our students are quite liberal in our classrooms equity fits the circumstances that leads to equality there is a difference you cannot eliminate something that you don't understand especially if you are not in the classroom breaking down our data development tiers to address specific needs of our students some of the statements from the
013youth you can't shelter us forever stop hiding and sheltering what we already know because you are scared to talk about what we are already seeing words give us options that hate you give does not my courageous teacher friends they said that no one in the world has ever done what we are doing now don't know a thing about modern kids and wouldn't last an hour in a classroom providing instruction it would be a learning experience for the school board to write a lesson and to teach that lesson to a class and we cannot keep future generations in check by brainwashing them with old ways of thinking what we saw at the last board meeting was a great example of what we call logical fallacies to be specific bandwagon and ad hominems in straw man pure
014politics for example the correct title for the text is called putting makeup on a fat boy the red lipstick symbolically focuses on women being stripped away from their strength during the 20th century it's called symbolism illusion 6.4 a 9.1 6.5 11.3 and 7.4 and 12.3 those are the standards of learning so i want you to close your eyes and hear these beautiful words while i feel bricks and refilled his water bowl daddy picks bunches of collard greens and from his garden he cuts roses have looms as big as palms that's a simile daddy spends hours out here every night planting tealing and talking and that's parallel structure he claims a good guard needs a good conversation that's personification that's from the hate u give a quite eclectic mind for an eclectic independent reader we cannot
015extract random lines from a book without full read and must be able to know how to annotate them just a dream the promises beyond it when the rain began to fall they didn't notice it but they did notice the sudden shift in the sound when it stopped what happens when we stop the voices of our children a wedge of light had forced itself through the dense clouds and the cotton the cottonwoods along the river stood out like pillars against the gray backdrop of the school of the sky school board i ask you to become that wedge of light that forces yourself into the shoes of every child in our community so that their voice can become a backdrop for our future and get us out of darkness and that comes straight from the book out
016of darkness um i do have something for you let's go forward um so this is the activity that that i do in um just don't yes the mappers um the activity i do in my classroom is called a walk in my shoes and i want to challenge you all to take part in that but you all have to trace your shoe and you have to write your story in your shoe and then you have to switch it with one of the other board members and they have to journal um that particular life for a week and so i supplied everything everything in there for you you have the paper um you have the directions and you also have a list of character traits as well to help you but there's one folder there's three pencils
017in one folder your job is to make sure that the person who does not have a pencil gets that pencil now that pencil that you do not have represents um a child who stayed with a single mother night before and came to school didn't have a book bag so he or she may not have a pencil the one who um who moms might be have been passed out on the on the couch and he's frustrating in the classroom and he doesn't have that particular pencil or the student who has actually been abused so your job is to make sure that your other students get that particular pencil and that's what the equity is but then it leads to equality and then i can teach you on an equal level thank you thank you okay okay
018um heidi schwartz good evening um first i'd like to ask if my resolution i proposed that the last board meeting in october has been discussed and brought forward to become a resolution to protect parents on their first amendment especially in light of more public allegations against 20 parents that continue to be brought forth from superintendent thornton i would be included as one of those parents and i personally do not appreciate this allegations especially when it is in the second time he's made allegations of parents second as a parent of a child who has experienced with the sped program since 2008 i can honestly state how overworked and much needed these groups of people are with that smithfield high school previously had six bed teachers this summer three of them have left they've not been replaced
019as far as i know that is half of their staff in the month of september my son's sped teacher was quarantined god bless her unfortunately since the school division so understaffed and substitutes are hard to find my son's iep was failed for over a week he received no services and that's against the law whose fault is that i blame the high up superintendent for not retaining good teachers and hiring and replacing those that are lost with that he's asking to take three hundred thousand dollars of sped money and use it for new chairs at hardy i ask that that money be kept in sped the middle school is still in need of a sped gym all of the two middle schools do you know that at the middle school the sped children have to do
020their exercises in the hallways and the stairs they have already feel different in the middle school and then they are seen by their peers having to do their sped exercises please look at me making a gym or even a portable trailer for these children and not divert their money teachers at the elementary level are reaching out to me all over the place we know that they're overworked at what point can parents become more involved why are ias who are hired to aid in the t for the teachers for learning gaps being pulled to cover classrooms for teachers who are being pulled for week-long training isn't the concern supposed to be about making sure the students are catching up after the one and a half years of covered shutdowns instead of all the extra training on
021teachers especially with this overpriced hampton city curriculum it was not vetted from what i understood by any teacher input this curriculum should have been started at a kindergarten level and moved upward not on students returning from shutdowns in the middle of grade levels whose idea was this i'd like to make a suggestion giving teachers time who have lost planning time lunch time and etc because they're covering for other teachers who are pulled out for planning maybe allow parents retired officers grandparents and any other citizen that would like to volunteer for parent pickup and bus aid as we all know the shortage on bus drivers is called timing issues and this takes a little bit longer allowing volunteers would allow teachers a little bit more time at the end of their day to get things done
022we parents and citizens want to help our teachers like we used to do before coveted shut down and if i may i'd like to take a moment to honor our dear bus driver kathy howan kathy was an iowa white county school bus driver of bus number two she passed away two weeks ago today from koben she was my son's bus driver for almost five years kathy would text or call me a lot and she was more than just a bus driver for us she might have gotten in trouble for this but now that she's not with us i'm going to tell a short story about her one day last year my son left his book bag at home it had his laptop in it we all know you can't do anything at school without your
023laptop anymore kathy called me while i was at work she drove her other students to windsor elementary and then she drove to my house i gave her the code into my house she went into my house and she got the laptop she drove it back to smithfield high school so that my son could do his work she was amazing i was texting her in the hospital until i feared that she wasn't giving me any more replies it was greatly saddened to me when i got a call that she had passed away i think she deserves to know that oil white county schools recognizes her death but nothing has been said about her in the two weeks that she's died i like to use the last bit of my time as a moment of silence to
024her can we do that so time thank you thank you um miss martha jackson evidently ms williams and i must have crossed paths because i have an experiment for you tonight too and i didn't talk to her in advance so good evening board members uh dr thornton ms sharp ms harris welcome to the new board members we look forward to working with you my name is martha evans jackson and i reside at 511a cedar street in the lovely town of smithfield virginia our minds frame our perspective and shape every experience at the october 2021 board meeting several speakers spoke on issues that concerned them you were met and dealt with loud outburst name-calling and outright utter disrespect there ought not be hateful spewed comments when one presents what is considered and what comes before this
025board those who have done so need to apologize much has been said about crt books that should not be read or be on library shells in our schools i submit that culturally responsible teaching is what is taking place in our schools and it is critical that it be done critical race theory has not been taught in any k-12 school in olive white county critical race theory has not been taught in any k-12 school in olive white county history has a good side and a not so good side both must be taught as a foundation for learning about the many inequities of marginalized groups crt marxist factually incorrect theories that shut down any conversation on race are most definitely marcus now parents your children see what you teach at home they hear you on the county
026non-pay-per-view live stream on facebook and youtube they see how you act when you want to have your views honored by board members as long as the board votes the way you want them to there is an atta boy if the vote doesn't go your way you gather your groups in meeting places and harangue methods that go along with your fears to fight any progress made to teach or to made to what needs to be taught or you seek to have them removed from the board by any means necessary it needs to stop many of the complainers don't have children in our schools want to see improvement in your children let them hear the nice things you say about others why not use this time to work with our school system are you promoting change in
027civics government math classes or just the lessons on equity have you spent time in any or all of our nine schools ask any administrative associate principal teacher food services worker nurse custodians bookkeepers members of the administrative team when the children unload from the bus or the car riders exit their cars things are usually calm sometimes by the first bell a child may have gotten hurt an angry parent demands to see the principal without an appointment one minute air air or heat is not working in some of the classrooms too hot and some too cold in others phone system goes on the blink internet connectivity off in some parts of the building water pressure goes down behavior issues off of the chain central office needs a report in 30 minutes at the latest all this even
028before classes even begin maybe some of you are familiar with the commercial mom i have a situation where situations like i have just described occur on the regular unless you have been there in it you are clueless contrary to popular belief schools are not chair child care or babysitting services as parents you may tell your children to read books that you choose you cannot or do not have that leeway in school your rights should not prevail over others who want to learn by studying diverse curricula certainly you don't want them reading about reality thank you so much miss jackson take i out of the equation at the end of each day say with conviction we did the best we could we appreciate that [Applause] these are the cards you are to pick one if it
029doesn't fit you then you should switch it with someone else and i will bring the rest of my notes the next time oh there you go next we have laura laura fletcher good evening ladies and gentlemen dr thornton changing the procedures regarding public comments is not a good look it gives the appearance that the board is trying to limit and control public participation in this most basic of american traditions the right to petition our government and elected officials i urge the board to not make the proposed changes to our public comments procedure in fact in light of the weighty issues before us i urge you to be more generous with your time more patient in hearing patients and parent and community concerns foundational to the process of petitioning our government is the friction involved in
030public debate as our elected officials and officials in whom we have placed our faith you should give us the courtesy of your undivided attention you should not control the topic nor manipulate the order to place inconven inconvenient community concerns as the last item on the agenda says everything about your commitment to the people who put you in office do not change the school board's public comment procedures leave things as they are and represent your constituents well returning to the issue of crt our newly elected governor has an impressive day one plan to remove crt from virginia schools it occurs to me that this may be challenging for isla white county schools as not a single member of the board dr thornton or the administration has acknowledged its existence i am asking all isle of white
031parents grandparents community members property owners and teachers those that are paying people paying taxes um concerned about the evils of crt to stay involved in this process do not think for a minute that this is over they've invested too much time too much power is on the line and too much money is involved in pushing crt race-based politics is very profitable for the marxist left we must remain vigilant this is not a fight i would choose but it is at our doorstep it threatens our children their futures their friendships their success their self-esteem crt is a very destructive divisive soul-destroying ideology that if allowed to continue threatens the very existence of our american foundations i'm thankful virginians took a stand on november 2nd and elected glenn younkin who supported parent concerns about education in virginia
032from the outset of his campaign my final point is really a request dr thornton you made a very public accusation of the 20 or so families that have been outspoken regarding crt you were interviewed on a local news channel and suggested that one of us have threatened your life i'm publicly requesting that this matter be fully investigated and upon completion of the investigation i'm requesting an equally public apology thank you mr john collick good evening everybody i'm not going to talk about crt tonight um before i get started uh colonel cunningham i want to wish you a happy birthday for those of you that don't know today is the marine corps birthday um so since i was elected several parents have come to me and some employees of the school system have come to me
033and they brought a bunch of different concerns but there are two major things that i that i want to talk about that i think should be addressed sooner rather than later the first one is the mask mandate which was put into place by governor northam and the school board here you know put it in place for the schools but we have we have found we followed the governor's mandate there are there should there should be a medical exemption we have several students in alawite that can't attend school because they can't wear a mask there's no medical exemption for that one young lady is in high school i believe she's a senior she has brain cancer her doctor said you can't wear a mask the other one is in kindergarten he is going through preschool again
034because he's got lung issues he can't wear a mask and his family was told if he can't wear a mask he can't come to school that's my grandson so please revisit that a variety of school systems in the state have pushed back and said that's a parent's right to decide whether or not their child wears a mask the second thing that i'd like to talk about is the vaccine mandate by osha there's a lot of teachers that are very concerned there's a lot of employees that are very concerned that the school board may before january implement that and i ask you please don't let's wait at least until the courts get finished with it so far two courts today have said that is uh the president no she does not have the authority so if
035you please do not do anything with that before that is all decided in the courts and finally i've got a son with special needs some of you know about him he gets a ride to school every day into chesapeake because you know he the alawite schools can't accommodate him because he is profoundly disabled and i just want to tell you the transportation department is really second to none you guys have really one heck of a transportation director and the people working there particularly in the office and the drivers are great so you know every time i've come here so far i've had a complaint but this time i really want to say that you know you guys you've got somebody well in there you've got a few good people and please let them know how
036much we all appreciate them thank you very much reverend willie williams good evening our board members especially to you ms carr i'm sorry that you chose to step down and you're going to be sadly missed to all of the new uh school board member congratulations we're glad you're here but i want to just briefly talk to you about handling distractions distractions are aimed at getting you off course uh moving you in a different direction being the preacher that i am i'm not dressed like one tonight but i've had a busy day i can't help but think about the book of nehemiah and nehemiah wanted to do something great for his community which had been destroyed he wanted to rebuild the walls of jericho his homeland and as he began to build the walls of of
037jericho he discovered that there were three pests that was very pesky sambalis tobias and giesham they didn't really want any serious matter they just simply wanted to prevent him from doing something good something great and that was reconstructing the walls of jericho and not to have a wall to protect your city was a disgrace and i come to you tonight to say to especially the new board members and to all of the other board members and to you dr thornton and all other personnel to include the staff that's out here people will use all kinds of tactics to try to get you off course but i vow to you tonight that if you stay with the responsibility and the duty that you've been called uh to do uh that everything is gonna be all right
038you see you're not called to deal with everyday situations you can't deal with these little penny any stuff i mean if you gonna deal with a child nose need wiping what the heck you need school teachers for if you're going to deal with floors not being properly kept what you need the janitorial service for you need to deal with policy and strategies you need to deal with the future of ala white public school and not deal with this day-to-day stuff if a problem is a recurring problem then you need to put it in an sop if a problem is a one-time issue then you need to develop a single use plan you know do your job and stop dealing with this little stuff people pulling up your background uh little pen and stuff so you
039got a speeding ticket what's the heck with that so you you had dogs and you didn't have license for you know sick mining folks pull up stuff like that on folks and i can tell you black men's right now if you're black in america they'll use any tactic they can to criminalize you so but don't pay no mind stick to your calling do your job thank you mr ed easter at easter 1224 highway lane carrollton virginia thank you madam chair for allowing me to speak and thank you for your service to this community and i really am here tonight to thank people it goes back about six years but first of all i'd like to thank ms jackson that's from the hearts folks we're here for the kids we're not here for politics i'll go
040back to the short period of time i was on the school board which was really wonderful as far as i was concerned and the people that replaced me behind me kirsten cook vicki hulick mr wilson miss tines miss carr and the staff of the school system you have done in six years what no other board has accomplished as far as the management this school system is concerned the fiscal management the financial management the physical management of the school system and the improvement in the programs that are for the children of this community that's what it should be about folks it has to be about that because that's our purpose is the kids it isn't whether mr youngin got elected or not it's about what our children need from us and what we need for our
041children has been done well for the last six years and i hope you new members are able to improve upon that and i wish you all the luck in the world now to close a little bit i would love for any principal that's in the state of this virginia to come show me what their crt program looks like in their schools i'd be glad to visit them all right that's all i need any principal in the state of virginia that's teaching crt give me a call my name's in the phone book i'll be glad to come help you miss uh catherine smith good evening madam chair board members dr thornton my name is catherine smith from zunai carsville district welcome new board members i think we can all agree that the very thing that all
042of us are speaking out about pertaining to equity and inclusion which carries heavy crt characteristics and is political and you have so kindly allowed into our schools with our hard-earned tax money is the very thing that is now tearing us apart this division is a total contradiction to the mission and vision statement of alawite county schools stated weekly in the windsor elementary school newsletter the buzz the vision reads to create a learning environment that will enable every child to discover his or her unique talents the mission reads to enhance and expand on each child's unique gifts and talents to ensure every child is college career and life ready how can one teacher one aide and a handful of other teachers accomplish this alone with 20 plus students in each class i admire and appreciate my
043daughter's teacher in every way we communicate well electronically and we work the best we can with the restrictions we have but this isn't enough it takes teacher teachers staff and parents working together to identify these unique gifts and talents not isolation or laboring labeling parents as domestic terrorists or phonological awareness literally literacy screening that sounds phony in itself i use the pas pal test as an example since i have a child in kindergarten at windsor elementary school i was informed yesterday that she needs additional reading instruction based on a number which cannot fully identify her unique gifts and talents i find it interesting when she goes to the library and checks out a book they don't spend time reading it but watch pbs kids which promotes a far left agenda in this additional reading time
044now required another is this additional reading time now required another way to isolate and push equity and inclusion into their innocent minds how can you even get a good test result while silencing their voices with masks in our family we love honor and respect all people we work with our neighbors our sports teams our church our community every time i see the buzz newsletter in all caps at the top w-e-s one town one school one family how can i believe in that motto when we aren't even allowed in the school should it read one teacher how can we work together when the very thing you are doing is tearing us apart as a proud concerned parent i kindly respectfully ask that you let us be one town one school one family thank you mama chair
045that's all right thank you next on the agenda is board member committee reports and information okay madam chair you have something yes um madam chair this since uh last regular meeting i had the opportunity to um attend let me see on monday the third this past monday i did the 2021 virginia school board association fall top water regional meeting and that was virtual and they had that meeting prior to us going next week to the state meeting and uh they elected a new chair and a vice chair for the topwater region i also um did the groundbreaking which all of us did at hardy elementary school on october the 28th and that was definitely a proud moment and and not like i said there the day at the groundbreaking it was definitely a proud moment
046for me because as a first grader i entered hardy elementary school in the year of 1964. all of you math people out there do the math and i'm proud of my age and i'm proud of hardy elementary and on um october the 26th i attended the strategic uh planning uh management meeting at uh with staff citizens and all for alawite county public schools and the next strategic meeting will be on um was would be december the second i think well it's going to be on the other end of the county we're going to we're going to have it at the windsor community center okay and that's what i did thank you miss times did you have anything to share okay okay i want to share one thing um many have asked so i want to
047clarify why i still sought votes after withdrawing from the election for the isle of wight county school board many citizens as well as i learned that my name would still be on the voting ballot because the ballots were printed before my withdrawal we learned that if i still received the most popular votes even though i withdrew the opponent would not automatically win the seat a special election would take place and give the citizens a choice as my withdrawal took away their choice someone who may have run for the school board knowing i was not running would have had the opportunity so i agreed to support this effort and help bring choice back into the election and finally since the school board and the board of supervisors continue to receive several emails asking to investigate the
048threats on dr thornton i think it would be best if he addresses this himself tonight thank you madam chair unfortunately i feel as though i have to spend time addressing the threat towards me due to the fact that some individuals in the community continue to accuse me of lying and due to the fact the newspaper did not do a good job representing the facts after actually having the emails that i sent them back and forth from the sheriff's office and the fact that the police stating that there is no official report instead instead of saying that dr thornton has presented the threats and has been working with several officers i received the first threat on september 4th from capital r 1776 h at protonmail.com which read just look at all that equity i have a
049lot more of your queen and some of you too and there was a screenshot of miss kiana cox jones the next email will cc every newspaper and tv station in the state tick tock jimmy well i'm the one who received it and at first i didn't think too much of it until others members said tick-tock the way it's spelt is actually like a clock not the tick tock you have out there and tick tock could be a ticking bomb and with today's volatile society i took it as a threat so on on sunday september 5th i sent this to my i.t department and asked if they could find out who sent this i was told by i.t this is an anonymous email and only the police can dig deeper into something like this on tuesday
050september 7th i email lieutenant edwards who works with the schools and sent him the email and stated this is an anonymous email in the tick tock jimmy at the end sounds like a threat to me like my time is coming is there anything you can do to dig deeper before getting a response from lieutenant edwards i emailed the sheriff directly because i was told by my secretary that lieutenant edwards was actually on vacation and i felt like this could not wait in that email i wrote i'm including an anonymous email i received which has a thread at the end that says tick-tock jimmy like my time is coming can you dig deeper or make sure kiana jones and i are protected at the meetings and in the parking lot after the meeting i sent this
051to lieutenant edwards and i understand he is on vacation this week and we have a meeting on thursday evening this was sent from me to sheriff clark lieutenant edwards responded to my email shortly after my email to the sheriff and stated i have sent this to the sheriff lieutenant morgan of investigations and corporal johnson who will be assisting me with the schools from now on i'm out on vacation this week but expect someone to make contact with you on september the 8th i spoke with corporal johnson on the phone who was very helpful he stated that they would have increased coverage at the school board meetings and asked me to send him my address and phone number so that my house could be checked and that my number would go into the 9-1-1 priority protocol
052i sent him an email that day with my address and phone and three minutes later he responded in an email that stated i just added you to the checklist thank you sir i then went to tell kiana cox jones to reach out to corporal johnson with her address and phone number she sent an email that same day with a response from corporal johnson that reads thank you so much ma'am i will add your information to our patrol check and if you were to call 911 or the non-emergency number units would respond to your location priority one please do not hesitate to reach out to me if you need anything and i will see you on tomorrow evening for the meeting i will personally escort you guys out of the building as well and that was
053from corporal johnson i then received another threat from the same email address on september 15th in the evening that reads hey jimmy look what i found and it's a youtube of something that was going on in our schools it may have been the dress thing i don't remember that i didn't pull it back up you have a fan club i know you're so proud of yourself this is only the beginning tick-tock jimmy i then forwarded this to my secretary because i did not have lieutenant edward's email at my home when i received this and in that i sent to my secretary and i said send to lieutenant edwards another threat how many do i have to receive until someone finds out who this is my wife is scared to stay at our house alone as
054you can see at this point i was very frustrated and felt threatened and harassed and could do nothing about this on the next day sitting in the board of supervisors meeting i received two more emails from the same address and sent these to lieutenant edwards at no time during these phone calls and email exchanges did anyone from the sheriff's department tell me that i need to file an official report with all the back and forth i felt like this was being investigated and corporal johnson did an excellent job supporting me and my staff at the board meetings and that police were driving by my home lieutenant edwards did contact me and let me know there isn't anything they can do to track this email account and i should have i t block the account i
055did not want to block the account because i wanted to know if this person was still out there since the individuals seemed to be so obsessed with miss kiana cox jones and me i did not receive any more threats and felt good that things had settled down it was at that point when mr boykin started emailing officials and accusing me of lying about the threats because he checked with the sheriff's office and there was no official report i found this strange since i'd been in constant contact as you can see with these emails back and forth with many individuals in the sheriff's department i had first refused to send any info to the papers but after mr boykin's allegations i had i had to do it because it made it look like i was lying
056and i didn't want to send it to the paper because i didn't want to rile up the individual who was threatening me because these threats had stopped but the insistence of mr boykin and now others citizens forced me to share with the papers this is when detective potter told the papers that there is no official report even after my office contacted him with the information from the emails because i figured mr potter might not have seen those emails he insisted his statement was only there was no official report his email is an email from lynn briggs on october 12th to mr potter and i asked her to send this said tommy stephen stephen from the newspaper contacted me again today about the threat i spoke to dr thornton and he asked me to share what
057he dr thornton did on his on his end to notify lieutenant edwards and corporal johnson i also told stephen about the 911 alert and the home patrols that corporal johnson arranged in addition i shared the attached email messages with stephen to verify the matter our concern was that a statement of no official report and no active investigation would imply dr thornton's comments were false he did not want to publicize this information as i mentioned to you yesterday but needed to respond with these details he also asked me to convey that he was not aware nor told he need to fill out a report regarding the situation he has not received any more emails of late and will hold off filing anything at this time should he receive additional threat messages he will move forward with
058a report and you may not be aware but there's a deadline on tuesday to get the story out and mr potter did not respond on tuesday but on wednesday october 13th he responded to lynn briggs good morning just saw your email i've had to make a quick trip to western north carolina to take care of my parents who are battling kobe stephen did call me yesterday before i left and requested copies of any reports he had in regards to these threats i told them that we had no ibr reports because again no official report had been made but that we have had conversation concerning the emails received by dr thorne and others i also explained that lieutenant edwards had been monitoring the situation along with central office he did ask about the residents being on
059checklist and i declined to comment and uh operational plans concerning any security checklist lieutenant edwin's i did talk yesterday that no further emails had been received edwards told me he had talked with mr cooprider about blocking these email accounts or at least filtering them in some manner let's see what gets printed in the times well what got printed in the times was that there was no official report and as you can see someone was doing some kind of investigation there was a whole lot of phone calls and emails involving the police myself and my staff someone was investigating some something as far as i'm concerned anonymous threats of i'm sorry as far as i'm concerned anonymous threats are cowardice acts that can be caused by individuals watching meetings in which individuals raise their voice finger
060point and yell i took these emails seriously because of the volatility demonstrated at our meetings in the way some in society are acting currently what i find more troubling since the original threats is the accusations of some members of the southern in central citizens group particularly mr boykin stating over and over that i am lying about the threats it's clear i'm not lying about the threats so stephen maybe you can put that in the paper i know we have different views on some school issues instead of discussing these or following the paperwork and policy which we have asked over and over at these meetings month after month they have chosen to call me a liar and have kept this story going far too long every time this is brought up by these individuals is another
061chance to rile up the original person who sent the threats and has continued to put me and my family in harm's way and now they're the ones that are harassing me and my family not the person who did the initial threat i keep hearing that this is not personal month after month this is not personal some of those in this group have made it very personal and are a poor example of this county citizens this is a great county with great people and i'm not going to let a small subgroup of the southern central citizens group let me say a small subgroup of them not all of them to continue to harass me some members of this group who have come forward in a respectful way to address their concerns or who have followed policy
062to address their concerns should be commended for expressing their views in a professional democratic way i applaud them but for the rest of them who continue to misrepresent the truth for political and personal reasons shame on them and perhaps they are the poor example that their own children and grandchildren should not be watching i was the one threatened and this is the last time i'm gonna comment on this so i hope you get it stephen thank you [Music] [Applause] okay next on the agenda is financial presentation is anyone cold yes raise your hand if you were cold i don't know if it's the ac or whether they're conserving and it's cold outside they're not putting on the heat i don't know but i'm cold just turn off the air it's cold in here good evening
063good evening welcome to the board tracy mr vines mr cunningham dr thornton oh in your packet we had our standard financial reports so we'll start with i just wanted to speak to first your large ticket items you'll see one of them was for the carsville paging system you'll see that in there but the second one more importantly was a payment 38 000 to asset genie asset genie is an insurance company that rit department uses and what we do is we get a group rate for our families so we offer to our families to opt into insuring their device so our families would pay the main office in their school we collect the money and then ultimately we send that money in and we get the group rate and that's what this payment to asset genie
064is so it's not a budgeted item but it's a win-win because it also gives our families a discounted break on their insurance for their computers are there any other questions on the check register that was in your packets in your financial report i just wanted to point out um at this time of year expenses over revenues we did spend it's it's uncanny 33 of your budget a third and we're one-third into the school year four months july through october so that's spot on and if there's no more questions on the financials i'll move on to the student activity audit in your packet every year what we do is through the summer months the auditors in addition to auditing our school financials they also audit separately the student activity accounts of each of the schools so
065if you were to read through that you'll see a lot of numbers summarizing how much they have in in each category of accounts but then towards the end they do speak to any recommendations and i just wanted to point out a few things that you may have seen and this one is a standard one that they they cite i believe every year they did last year when i started here with the division um it says there is an inherent risk of misappropriation of assets however the um although the risk exists the cost of segregating these duties because what they want us to do is have very separate duties and to the point of having three people if you will hired to follow the different pathways of the money and we can't do that in the
066schools we have a bookkeeper at each school and they do acknowledge that the um the costs do not outweigh the benefits so um they say it's not worth hiring ultimately more people to to segregate the duties any more than we already do so ultimately it's on us the principals the bookkeepers to make sure that they're tracking each of the deposits the bank statements and ensuring that the money's kept told and you'll see some other things for example one of the items they had mentioned was interest was posted but as an adjustment like a transfer in as opposed to posting it as a receipt so the net result was exactly the same but the auditors didn't want to see it posted as a transfer so we'll make that change going forward there was some old outstanding
067checks that were older than the auditors would care for so they want us to follow up with the receiver of that check did you lose the check put a stop order on it maybe issue another check or just cancel the check all together if it's over a year old so we just have to follow up on some of our outstanding checks that are significantly uh several months old excuse me stephen i read that and and i think it was in one statement they said something maybe you could clarify this for me that maybe we could send those checks that have not been um satisfied as far as cash send it to the state of virginia that's correct okay that's right so it's all unclaimed unclaimed right property and after a year's time if you can't
068track down the person you sent the check to well this check you can't just take it back the money we need to send it to um the treasury of the commonwealth of virginia okay yes but were there any other questions on the student activity account no okay all right moving on and you'll see well another american rescue plan federal funds that we're asking the board to take action on tonight so we will be receiving and mr coleman can speak more specifically on the project but we're receiving one million one hundred thousand dollars from the american rescue plan specifically dedicated for heating ventilation and air conditioning improvements for air quality i was surprised to see that i was pleasantly surprised because schools i i see are in a need to constantly repair their hvac systems so
069with the board's vote and approval that would authorize dr thornton to request appropriations of the board of supervisors in this amount and again it's dedicated to hvac projects and the schools were windsor elementary um smithfield middle and carrsfield carsville carrollton smithfield middle school and windsor yes changing out the boilers these brand new boilers brand new boilers okay all right modern chair i would like to make a motion to accept the american rescue plan act coronavirus state and local fiscal recovery fund grant award qualifying ventilation replacement an improvement project and the amount of one million one hundred and one thousand one hundred and fifty eight dollars under the operation of maintenance and function and to approve the application to the virginia department of education and authorize the superintendent to request appropriations by the county board of
070supervisors you have a motion do i hear a second a second that motion okay we have a motion it has been second vote please motion carried thank you steve thank you next on the agenda is support services and operations full report thank you madam chair school board my name is chris cohn executive director of forest service and operations this is the support service and operations full report but i want to go into detail with first is i'm sorry eric it's vdot school warning lights there are several different lights around the division at this time dealing with transportation that we might want to investigate with vdot in order to ensure safety around division the first one is at carrollton newtown haven or road right on the actual a road right in front of carlton maybe to
071establish the light there to actually slow down the traffic that's coming through there just to give out a warning sign the next is at gtms the crosswalk right in front of gtms for safety purposes and the next one is on smithfield high school turner drive in route 10. um i've already reached out to the town engineer and he's actually reaching out to vdot so we can come to an understanding of what we can do and what we can't do so i'll be bringing more information back to you on the process of working with vdot with the school flashing lights and warning light signs any questions concerning the warning lights all right would vdot carry that expense it would be a vdot absolutely there's been several times in the past that the school system have actually
072reached out especially at turner antenna we tried to actually um lengthen the time that the lights are on in order to get the traffic off the highway and what we found out was it was actually a vdot function so we've been working with them throughout the time period was put on hold when they were actually building the hsrd station right beside on the right hand side out but now i think we have a time period we can actually get some leeway there and make some forward progress next we'll take a peek at the cars deal module classroom we had a meeting with the principal last week and the teachers of the fifth grade concerning the idea of the module classroom as you already know the board voted and we are putting together a modular classroom
073at carsville and we really want to dig in and get the teachers input also of exactly what they want in the classroom what they'd like to see and uh pretty much a wish list of going forward it was a very productive meeting with principal pam hedfield we talked about interior sound boards to divide the actual classrooms the positioning of the classroom on the actual property sidewalk awning and other things we talked about was extension of the trailer cabinet space was big for the teachers towel floors and led lights those are some of the initiatives that the teachers actually wanted to see right now we're reaching out for pricing and we're able to get more pricing for this so we can move forward but it is a collaborative effort between the administration the teachers and central
074office any questions concerning the actual cause truly thank you lastly i want to just touch bases for the division watchmen uh division water management plan now during the 2020 general assembly session uh the legislative past senate bill 410. now this is just requiring that the virginia department of education to make recommendations for the establishment maintenance and validation of water management programs now alawite has always been on top of the water management plant in the division but it's going to start changing slightly now the water management plan that we're about to enter into um this is going to be audited by the vdh the epa the deq and um oh and once again the mediation and the vdh is the local branch the epa is the federal branch and of course the deq is the state
075now this will inquire monthly and quarterly sampling that has to occur copper and lead sampling and um flushing schedule and backflow prevention all of this is in one plan it'll be located at the central office so that anytime we actually get any information concerning or any water issue occurs in the division we'll be on top of it and we can actually take our force with it take a forward progress with it are there any questions concerning the water management plan all right that will end the support services and operations report madam chair next we want to 15.2 the american rescue plan for the boiler project just want to go into more detail which you were speaking about earlier the bowlers that are in the division is going to be located at carsville elementary carlton elementary
076smithfield middle school and winds elementary now what we're looking at is the construction and engineering the design the commissioning the bid documents and the removal and installation of the new boiler what you have in front of you is the actual action item for that news and to move forward are there any questions concerning the actual ebola replacement project okay it's a little bit more than what we're going to get from the gr from the money the federal government yes it is yes so will that come the extra money will yeah so so that's an estimate we've received from ssc so it could come in under it could go over but if it is over we do have money in maintenance and operations that we can utilize okay right can we very well tell them that's
077all we have is the million dollars that's coming in negotiation so this still has to go out to bid and we'll get bids and if it doesn't come in and in the price and and that's the same as the trailers once the trailer bid comes in that may be way over because of the way cost is so we'll have to rethink and and maybe come back to you so all of this in this very volatile market right now you know we'll see but we know it's going to cost well over the 200 000 so we need your approval to move forward okay madam chair would like to make a motion to approve approve the alawite county school's boiler replacement project in the amount of one million one hundred and ninety five thousand six hundred and
078sixty nine dollars for carsville elementary carrollton elementary smithfield middle school and windsor elementary a second that motion do we have a motion it has been second vote please um [Applause] motion carried thank you mr thank you next on the agenda is our transportation report good evening madam chair dr thornton board members i haven't had the pleasure to meet everyone here my name is todd christensen and i'm the interim director of transportation in front of you you should have the monthly fuel and transportation reports i did want to draw special attention to a couple of items on there firstly the monthly meetings that we've been establishing with the drivers have been going really really well this has allowed us to have an open line of communication drivers speak directly to county leadership having their voices heard
079we've heard some great ideas from them we've heard their concerns we've been able to enact some changes already and this is going to be an ongoing process with them like i told them at the last meeting it's not a one and done let's talk about it and move on we've got to continue to have those channels of communication open and i look forward to meeting with them in the months ahead additionally i did want to pay our respects to kathy howran driver of bus two she did tragically unfortunately passed away recently she was a dedicated employee she always went above and beyond the call of duty she was universally respected within the department she loved her students and families and they loved her and she'll be dearly missed so our thoughts and prayers definitely go
080out to her family at this time i'm happy to answer any questions you might have i have a question how are you uh with the um as far as the drivers do you have enough drivers now do you still need more to cover all of our routes or and also well i'll let you answer that yes ma'am we always need more so it's uh we are getting applications in that's been encouraging um however we've also recently um had a few drivers that have left for other uh positions as well so it's sort of one step forward one step back but we when i say we it's really um our routing technicians are making it work it's not always ideal every single morning it's it's something new it's a puzzle they're putting together um but we're
081making it work the best we can but we we are absolutely still looking for more drivers and i would like to thank you as well because i know you have transitioned in that position sort of like you know pretty much during the school year and um it's good to know you're doing a great job thank you thank you appreciate it i'm sure the bus drivers appreciate the monthly meetings yes we've heard really good feedback from them um i think just being able to look somebody in the eye and voice their concerns and ideas and it's great for me too because i'm learning and i i need to hear as much from them as possible so it's it's a win-win right now thank you for that i appreciate that thank you everyone donation items yes ma'am
082madam chair members of the school board we have for you is a excuse me it's a donation item this will be the recommendation for donate two older model buses to the smithfield fire department for training purposes this is something that has been done several times in the past anytime we have a bus or cars or vehicles on the actual campus that we have um we have utilized until we can't utilize it anymore pull pods from it maybe take the engine out of it the it's actually ready to um actually not even be auctioned off but take them to the junkyard at that time sometimes the volunteer fire department may actually use that so what you'll find is an action item to approve the donation of the two buses to the smithfield volunteer fire department madam
083chair would like to make a motion to approve the donation of the two buses to the smithfield volunteer fire department second emotion okay have a motion it has been second vote please i want a bit oh motion carry thank you next is the technology device purchase laptops good evening madam chair board dr thornton uh this request is usually in many years back now was one we brought in may to purchase laptops for the upcoming school year on july 1. we would then get those laptops and prep them and have them out to the buildings before the first day of school new reality state that we need to think further ahead last year we bought our laptops in march and barely got them in time this year we're looking to make the purchase before the end
084of december to make sure we have them for next year so this is a request to move forward with the purchase of those laptops this is what you call being proactive right yes ma'am do you want to make that motion i've never been accused of not being a planner [Laughter] i agree we need a motion this is i make a motion that we purchase the laptops for the high school students in the amount of 417 600 seconds okay we have a motion it has been second vote please motion carried next technology device purchases for the ipads yes ma'am uh so these ipads are for elementary it's k2 um it is 1250 ipads again preparing for next year and we'd like to get the purchase in so that we're not having concerns okay did we buy
085this many last year i don't remember so we didn't buy lap i mean ipads the last major ipad purchase we bought was the year dr thornton started okay we need more uh we need to replace the ones we have that's right i'm sure i would like to make a motion that we purchase ipads for his elementary students and the amount of is that i i can't remember that four sixty six seven sixty six two fifty four hundred and sixty six thousand two hundred and forty actually okay we have a motion and it has been second vote please motion carried next on the agenda is the technology cell surf plus equipment yes ma'am i have a list there of approximate uh items that we're looking to sell um we do this by contacting it i think
086last year we contacted seven vendors i'm not sure how many probably seven again this year to get the best price for each particular model sometimes you get better prices from one person than another for each model and some of those models listed are older than i've been working here i have a question yes sir in lieu of contacting vendors have kind of looked at selling reselling these used laptops back to the families the schools to families that need them that are located in the school district uh what i've previously been told and and pac may be able to relay more is because they were purchased with specific grant funding from the state we had to dispose of them in a lotted public manner because it purchased mostly with what's referred to as vpsa money which
087is state money for sols so make sure we had enough devices for all our students to take sols and so i've always been told previously that we cannot directly sell to a person because there is the illusion of impropriety does it make sense like i could turn around and sell to dr thornton a laptop i may be able to sell and get more money for the county and their citizens maybe i can sell it for 75 dollars when i sell 500 of them at once but i could turn around and sell it to dr thornton for five bucks and so there is the illusion of impropriety and so i've always been told never sell directly to a person always sell back out in lots in public ways and pac if you can update me on
088that i would love it but that was the last i'd heard and so that's what i've always followed couldn't the county conduct a public auction for the families and and be auctioned off there is an auction website that we have used before but we always get tremendously poor response you did say that again you get what tremendously poor response okay so for instance the last time i put something up there i put um it was a lot of projectors 175 or more projectors i put up there we had a bit of one dollar wow i turned around and took them to a scrap yard and got the check for like 1200. okay so one last question so how was it marketed on that site because marketing if you market that right and me then i
089from the i.t background it would seem to me if it's marketed correctly to the public you will get an immense and enormous turnout i'm not certain on that i can definitely investigate that um the other concern is is probably a large chunk of these items don't work oh okay [Laughter] there is definitely a percentage of these that do not turn on we don't have to deal with that so okay rather than also spending yeah this time figuring out which ones those are we kind of put them all in a pile and say take it all right i like to make a motion to approve the request to sell surplus items as presented okay we have a motion do we have a second a second we have a motion it has been second to vote please
090i have a question mr coop router before you leave okay anytime you ready okay well did it wait a minute okay i don't think passed it yeah okay motion carry okay thank you um mr cooper i want to ask you a question of concern it came to me um we have some ias and some other buildings like middle school high school eyes i don't know about the elementary but their concern came from some of the middle school high school they have been issued ipads yes ma'am but because of some of the um instructional things they're doing with the students on the higher level some of them feel that they needed a laptop yes ma'am and i was my question to you do you have extra laptops where if nothing else they can check out as
091needed maybe put put one you know the different buildings or something for the ias to use until we can get uh maybe a laptop issue to them in the future just a question i don't know um so that has a many folded answer as everything in life does um so first off we do issue one-on-one devices for all our students at the same time we are aware that not all students bring their devices or don't bring their devices charged to every school every day so i have also ensured that we have a ratio of additional computers in each building that is at principal discretion and they have issued those student devices to ias when they feel it is needed um there is also if we were to go down that route um there would have
092to be the consideration in the long term of replacement so it always whenever dr thornton asked me to do something new i always have to figure out how am i going to ever support this and how am i going to make sure it stays forever relevant so should we wish to go down that route that would definitely be a topic of conversation would be all right how do we then replace these devices because currently our rotational schedule on all devices pretty much rotates devices down and through students hands until they hit seven or eight years old and then we put them on the surplus shelf um and at that point they're difficult to use um and that's current that's our current rotation so for instance so if i buy a laptop for 9th graders it
093rotates up to 12th graders it then goes to 7th graders then to 8th graders then to carts then to the surplus shelf so it's this continual life cycle rotation the other devices we have for instance the ipads they don't really last that long five years is really the usual age that you recommend for a tablet chromebooks is usually three to four that you recommend before replacement so all of the devices we currently have have a full life cycle that's built into them and so we would have to change said lifecycle if we extend it out to a new job subset so what i did hear you say that you have assigned extra laptops to school builders yes ma'am every building has a different administrative school administrators and they do okay so this is this is
094one of those situations where they need to be in contact with the building principle to see if there's something and then it would also have to be um i'm using letting you use a laptop during the school day but because you're an hourly employee i have to make sure returned check out something in the morning and check it back in and even yeah okay so that's something they need to work out on a building level yes ma'am thank you will you do something for me of course will you um contract maybe the principles of middle school high schools and have them to check with their ias to see if they can work something out on that level i can definitely appreciate it thank you of course thank you i'm just going to stand here for
095the next one report from the superintendent oh we do we got we got we got to make a motion right we did i know we did the motions okay a all right report from the superintendent strategic plan today we're going to get some work done today we're going to dig into data today we're going to look at isle of wight objectively clinically statistically and this morning we're going to provide you with the tools to be able to begin to decipher that data and make even more targeted questions and observations on where your school system is strong where your school system has struggled recently where your school system has been strong and has struggled pervasively in order to identify what strengths and what challenges the community of isle of wight has relative to student learning [Music]
096today we're really looking at data specifically alawite county schools data from the divisions perspective in comparison to the state specifically we're looking at assessment data we're looking at suspension data we're also looking at absenteeism so of course those things that allow us to be accredited according to virginia department of education but we're also looking at what are those community things that we need to do to possibly reach more of our students what does the climate look like in our classroom what additional supports do we need for our teachers and how can we ensure that we're continuing to recruit hire and sustain quality and qualified teachers within our school division today's conversation was really strong and very interesting we took a deep dive into the demographic data for our schools here in the school system as
097well as some of the outcome data for how our students are doing we were taking a look at what those data gaps are so we know how to ask those important questions and get the information that we need just a really great conversation to see where we are in the now so we can plan for where we're going to go tomorrow but you also got to be careful because when you spend too much time looking at data numbers replace humans and we start thinking about aggregate as opposed to humans individuals so as a steering committee the soul of what we do today is going to make sure that we're good at the science of data review while remembering that the decisions we make impact human beings they impact your community we cannot have a fits
098all plan our plan needs to be for all students and that plan needs to be flexible students need to have high expectations but different expectations based on their abilities our next step needs to be setting goals what do we expect to see accomplished in our county and so now our goal is to say okay we see what we've done and now how can it be better how can we make sure that we are reaching all students how can we set goals to make sure that we do have those expectations for parents teachers students so that we are even more successful in the next five years at the next meeting we are going to start the sub committees that will be included within the steering committee and so those subcommittees will then have the opportunity to
099look at those specific goals or identifiers that we have identified today and then start to think of solutions to help to resolve the problem you know i think that today's discussion of seeing where our students are how they're performing where those gaps are in access as well as in those credential attainment within those next steps is really going to inform as we move forward into those planning stages for setting new policies creating new initiatives even new data tracking mechanisms that we're going to need so that we can better tell the stories for our students and our school system there was a there was a moment at around 10 30 today where i noticed as your facilitator that the the tipping point of identifying all the problems transitioned into identifying innovative practical and necessary improvements and
100that is a powerful point for a community and for a team to find itself at so madam chair and board members we are far into the process now we were past the first meeting where it was more get to know each other and set the protocols to really digging into data and we're capturing every time we meet because we want to share the process with the public and what is going on through this process for vision 2028 is what we're calling it and just wanted to let you know the third strategic plan and standard committee meeting will be this coming monday november 15th and what's really going to happen at that meeting is amos our facilitator talks a lot about north stars or priorities or goals and to start to narrow those down based on
101data we've looked at and information to maybe get it to 10 priorities and then to after every one of these meetings they take back all of the reflections from the people involved they synthesize it and they meet with my executive team and we talk about next steps so what's going to happen is hopefully we get it down to around 10 12 goals we'll synthesize that and then in december we'll come back to the table again put all those back up there and we're going to try to get it to four five six goals because on a strategic plan that there's lots of things we do like the last strategic plan we had literacy as one of the the primary goals we didn't mention math at all we still do math but it wasn't a priority
102in that plan do we still make it a priority yeah we want our kids to do math but we have to identify what are those north stars that we want to accomplish and and so it's exciting that we're getting to that point and then in january is when we'll start breaking it into work groups so the steering committee is there to kind of oversee what are those noise tests and then we'll break into smaller work groups with if it's a special ed issue if it's a safety issue we're going to bring in experts in our community and in our school staff and parents to target that area and bring strategies back and so that's kind of the process of where we're at and where we're going and i know ms times serves and our two
103liaisons serve and give great insight and it maybe they can speak to it but i've been very impressed when they are in a room full of adults put on the spot and ask questions and then just just answer and it's great to see that you guys have come through our school system and are able to have that great communication and give us great insight as a student so it's a very diverse group and it's been a very good process so far and i know mr cunningham has graciously agreed to serve we could only have two board members served because once we have three it's a meeting and but at some point we bring this whole process to the whole board and to the whole community to give input so i'm excited about where we're going
104and hopefully we will have a lot of input and have a great product as we move forward thank you okay next on the agenda is the teacher pupil ratio report from mrs goetz good evening adam chair members of the board dr thornton i'm susan goetz i'm the executive director of leadership tonight i'm going to share the annual report with you of our class size student teacher teacher people ratio report for the current school year let's see eric okay um so we're gonna just dive in and um as you go if you have questions please stop me and i will be happy to answer them so just you're gonna see now is the current enrollment um and as for comparison just to look at what we were last year compared to this year this time and
105you're going to see our numbers are up how does it compare and as you see we have 192 students greater than we had last year so what we're seeing are students are returning that maybe we're at home during the pandemic have come back to us kindergarten is probably the most dramatic that you're going to see we've really increased our numbers and you know we knew this last year we had heard parents say we're going to keep our students at home we don't want to send them in the current situation we started at school um it you know looked different so they wanted their kids to stay home and maybe start kindergarten this year so we expected an increase and and we definitely got that so these numbers are i'm sorry i can ask when you
106finish are you sure i was i was looking at the middle schools and it seems like in the both middle schools you have um they decrease in enrollment uh do you know i know you won't know exactly why but i was just wondering with something darn no middle school was just okay no and as you see they kind of jump back up in high school so but i i don't have exact reasons of why that is okay all right thank you okay so the these reports are required um for standards of quality this is the way we do have to report them i'm going to share it with you but then i don't know how relevant these are really class averages are more important but i am sharing this because it is required and one
107is the actual rate ratio um which again it's taking all of the students all of the core classroom teachers um and giving the ratio of that that's not always really accurate but it is something that has to be reported it's ridiculous if you want to really know the truth about it yeah and i can't even tell you why this has to be reported in this manner i don't know but it is a requirement so i'm sharing it with you but i am going to share averages which is more relevant it's going to be more meaningful to you that the actual ratio is what you're saying average no that's not even the average it i'm going to show that to you okay yep so actual is taking all of our students dividing that by our core
108classroom teachers total ratio it includes all of your resource teachers so a lot of times on the state reports that's the number you're going to see and in fact when we were in strategic planning teachers were saying i've never had a class of 18. that's what they were saying and we're like well that's because it includes pe music you know it concludes everybody who was a teacher in the building other than sved so it's really not accurate right okay so these are our numbers for our ratios for elementary um we did want to share in person versus virtual you know we had a lot of talk about what the numbers were going to be virtual as you can see they're very small so here's where i think you're most interested because this is actual class
109sizes for um carrollton um as you see um kindergarten is still pretty pretty high we're we're within limits um we're okay um but as you see the numbers are are kind of high there which again we weren't shocked we did have to add a teacher in third grade because our numbers were very high in third grade so we actually had to do a little shuffling and take a teacher who was in kindergarten and move that teacher to third grade you're probably going to say why didn't you hire ideally we would be able to hire unfortunately the market is not good and we've had elementary teacher positions posted and we have no applicants so we had to make do with what we could so we had to problem solve the situation and we had to do
110a little shuffling in-house this year okay um so now we're going to move on to carsville i mean carson's standard you know they have two teachers per grade and they're pretty much set that way and it works for them hardy hardy also we had to do a little shuffling we had to add an additional kindergarten teacher there as well windsor elementary windsor elementary had to have two teachers added we added a kindergarten and a second grade teacher so we actually had an ia who miss couch convinced to go back into teaching because she had a teacher certification she was just being an ia but she graciously moved back into the classroom and then we had a teacher from carrollton actually moved to windsor elementary to take the position so we got set there but as
111you see i mean windsor elementary really increased in numbers west side all numbers there are in good shape so secondary again this is actual ratio total ratio this is how it's reported again not that useful for us what we really look at are looking at averages so we're going to move to that first virtual middle school not that many gtms average class sizes as you see resource class sizes smithfield middle school resource classes and then we'll move to high school um and only 28 virtual and this is full-time virtual not just i'm taking a virtual class but this is all of their schooling is done virtually so our averages for windsor high school as you see resource class averages and then smithfield and resource classes at smithfield any questions or anything i can go back
112and slide absolutely so the cte that's all the cte programs correct and many of them are capped at 20. so that some of them are not so that's why there's not exactly 20 in every one but many of them culinaries capped weldings capped so okay we can't go higher than 20. thank you all right you're welcome thank you and next supported employment dr thornton yes madam chair and board members supported employment is an evidence-based approach to support individuals with significant disabilities into real jobs in our community where we can fulfill employment aspirations and achieve social and economic inclusion i received some materials and shared it with you from ssc our partner and i put in executive content because i don't have permission to share that out at this point but i've been working with ssc
113our partner and talking about how can we get our our students with significant disabilities who they may graduate when they're 18 but stay on with us for three years afterwards and they have job coaches and we work with them or they may graduate at 18 and go out in the real world unfortunately there's not a lot for them i'm sure you've probably seen some of these individuals in our community maybe at kroger or other locations we have some that work with us in our shredding of our paper and i know there's been some i think there's a task force with the county looking at this issue as well because what do these individuals do after high school and they can contribute to our society and what would you see in the values of the support
114employment that ssc has shared is it gives them a real job within a chance to learn skills that they can perform and once they learn those skills they're on to the next skill so there's constantly job training for them advancement and to be part of our community and part of our society and get a paycheck and go to the store and spend that money instead of going home and i don't know watching tv or having people care for they can contribute i've seen this work in other locations so it's kind of a side thing i've been talking to different people about and it's not something the school can take on as an initiative it really does need to be a county initiative i've talked with ssc it probably is going to take a position that
115the county funds to be a job coach to go to businesses tell them why this would benefit their businesses check up on those employees because there are some challenges that will happen and so that's going to take some work but as step one we feel like ssc already has an established program we could do something here with our custodial maintenance and grounds and at least start something here so it might not necessarily be our student it would be open from ssc to hire adults in the community that fit this significant disability model and put them to work in our community so i will be pursuing this with ssc i volunteered to be on a community task force and i think it's a another example it may be a small group or a small subset of
116our population but it's an important subset of our population that i know we've done the best we can to get them to there but i think as a community maybe we can do more and get these uh young people employed so just wanted to share that with you is it possible to work something out with off this full service company that we contract with to get them into the restaurant you know type business and we'll look into that as well with chartwells that chartwells is under the same uh larger company as ssc so i'm sure we just haven't had that opportunity to reach out to them yet i'm sure there may be possibilities as well i think that's great i think this is absolutely wonderful thank you okay next on the agenda is action on
117closed session items personnel report we need a motion to approve the personnel report item 17. okay madam chair i would like to make a motion that we approved the personnel report for the month of november as it was presented second motion and it's going to make a point the addendum as well oh as i'm sorry as well as the addendum yeah i'll do it madam chair would like to make a motion that we approve the personnel report for the month of november along with the addendum as it was presented second here we have a motion it has been second vote please uh okay motion carry next on the agenda is the adoption of consent agenda meeting minutes donations and financials i don't share a motion to approve the consent agenda as attached and presented a
118second that motion here we have a motion it has been second vote please [Applause] so promotion carry next is policy updates and revisions policies for first read are there any questions or comments on the first read policies that was four listed okay next on the agenda is regulations and exhibits [Applause] any questions with that okay 19.3 is policy bddh bdd h dash e k d and k d e okay this was brought up at our monday meeting our special meeting monday night and we had some revisions that were introduced and in the discussion we decided that we would like to make another revision [Music] and was that what was the um that they didn't have to submit the information or what they was going to speak about before on the back end if they were
119going to speak up and if it wasn't related to the agenda he thought that they had to a day before present we said we have a sheet out there for them to sign their name and we were going to make right so so madam chair the the the change was for those who would like to speak on the meetings agenda item they have to submit a form one business day in advance but for those who would like to speak generally on any topic we the policy now requests that you should do it one day in advance so the clerk and people can thing but nevertheless you can still sign up the day of with a sign up sheet outside right that wasn't in the revision so you had to go back because it was discussed
120but that's correct you had to go back in so that that item the revision has been made to under um bddh dash e and kd dash e under section 1c okay are there any discussions we discussed this pretty thoroughly monday night with that as well and you were going to help make those adjustments to the revision policy so there is no more of a 30 minute limit that would restrict the time of how many citizens would be allowed to speak there's no longer a time limit but the individual limit of speaking goes from five minutes to four minutes which is consistent with the board of supervisors time allotment and then if you want to speak on items that are on the agenda then that request must be in the superintendent's office at least one business
121day before the meeting if you want to speak on something that is not on the agenda you are free to sign up at any time the night of the meeting through the meeting for example if you are held up in traffic but you still want to bring a concern or information to the school board and you're in late before that piece of paper is taken up people the paper is going to be there until it's time for public comments at the end of the meeting the end of the business part of our meeting so we now have two public comments that will be on the agenda if this is approved one at the beginning near the beginning of the meeting for citizens who want to address things that are on the agenda we need to
122hear that before we do school board business and then there's going to be another public comment part of the agenda near the end of our agenda which would be after we complete the business on our agenda does that cover at all anybody have any discussion with that i i think that i think that addresses the issue because folks were complaining that the school board was limiting people to 30 minutes now there's no time limit so there's more there's more um time for folks to participate now that said the school board also has to conduct its business and the reason why the 30 minute was put into place so that you all can get onto your business so that's why there was some you know there you know obviously we can't always always have what we
123want there's a compromise and so that for those who want to speak on the today's agenda can provide their input the school board gets on with their business and then um the rest of the time as late as they want um folks can address the board about anything and i want to pay you back on what um attorney pack said i can recall there was an incident when i was on the board a few years back my first time and um we had something on the agenda an action and it had to be acted on that particular night not after 12 midnight but prior to that and uh if we had gone over that then we would have just lost that action completely which we were going to be getting funding for it and it
124just happened to have been on the uh school board agenda for that night something that came in late and we had to act on it immediately but if our meeting had extended and we didn't get a chance to get to that then we would have lost the funding so this is why it's important that any school board actions that we have that we do it within a certain time period so it will not go over until the next day i just want clarification at the end of the um agenda items the citizen can speak as long as he or she wants to know it's still a four minute that's what that's what you're saying that okay good good good clarification yes yes you you do not get to speak for for that's what it sounds
125like they could talk as long as for four minutes but as many people thank you and sign up to speak and once you can only speak once thank you at the monthly board meetings and that's in the policy as well okay good good i just want that clarification i remember something happened in congress or or somewhere where they read storybooks things for 24 hours just to kind of have prior to of this uh we had it was 30 day a lot of 30 minutes well citizens unless the war chair took upon herself special timing when you have a lot of people and we had a situation a couple of months ago but that we ran out of the 30 minutes and we had more people that wanted to continue and there was a conflict there
126so this is why we revisit this so everybody will have an opportunity okay thank you okay okay this is an action item we're going to pass tonight we need a motion madam chair i would like to make a motion that we um add policy b d d h b d d h dash e and k d and k d e and approve those policies as presented the updates as far as uh public citizens public um communications with the comments comments comments yeah sucking that okay we have a motion it has been second note please [Applause] motion carried next on the agenda is board member requests or comments sure so um i was just going to give you guys an update on some of the great things i've been having at smithfield just because i feel
127like it's always kind of lost in like what's happening within the schools so both windsor and smithfield had their academic jacket ceremonies um i think there was maybe 100 students at smithfield which was really good to see our winter sports have started and both our football team made it to playoffs and our cross-country team some students made it to states so they should be competing soon smithfield celebrated veterans day today by wearing red white and blue so like it was a spirit day i guess um and then we had two players from the field hockey team make it on to the second um all region team so that's like our coach nominated them and they were chosen so that's like all of like bay rivers district or like class 4a region um and i think
128that's it oh and there's very positive feedback about the extra two days off everyone loved that from the students students and teachers i heard great things about it they were very excited did you have anything to say okay mr cunningham did you want to anything no i don't have anything okay i'm okay we actually gave you all those days off of course the teachers needed the time to catch up planning and things but as well we wanted the students to engage in learning as well at home this is opportunity to catch up on those assignments that the teachers have told you that you needed to catch up on something you really don't have excuses now because you have 48 hours to do it that's right man so let the students know get with the teachers
129and take these things home while they're on thanksgiving break and give them a chance to catch up mr vine okay well with that our meeting is adjourned