001[clears throat] >> Thank you. Thank you all very much. I got to say with the full house it's very I have a second. Second. Second by Mr. Hill. Any further discussion? If not, all those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Those opposed? So, we do have an approved agenda now. So, the first thing on our recommendation is one good thing. All right. You want me to chair? Yes, sir. Can I grab this one? All right. You don't need one good thing. All right. So, good evening everyone. One of my favorite things that we've now started doing at the beginning of our board meetings is recognizing what we call one good thing. It's something that gets recognized that may not get otherwise seen or happen. The things that just happen behind the scenes to make
002uh great things happen. And tonight, uh we're going to recognize Peter Curran. And Heather Curran, I'd like you all to come on up. Give them a round of applause everyone. >> [applause] >> All right. On March 13th, uh we had an unexpected snow. And uh it caught everyone off guard and our and our community I think certainly us here at school. And uh the lady 1 degree the day before, it's snow. Somehow there's no snow the next day. Uh the roads, it's the it's the cars, it's the parking lots. And we didn't have to stay in our in school that day. And we got caught on on on video and I have pictures of these two people that went out in the parking lot and uh to clean all the staff and student cars there
003in the end of the day. And so, when they left, they went out to do it. And this may seem like a small thing, but it's a big thing to your culture. And these two, Curran and Curran, went out to the parking lot during that time and cleaned all the student cars and all the staff cars. And when they came out of that building, they could focus on what they needed to focus on which is the traffic and the road safety. And to you all, uh I've not just seen that one good thing. I've seen you do many great things uh each and every day at Louisa County High School uh to take care of your students and all the staff. So, tonight I'm as thankful and glad to be able to stand before this
004audience and our school board to say, "Thank you for making our school and our school division a better place because of who you are and what you do every single day. So, thank you. >> [applause] [applause] >> We're glad for the board to come up and we're going to get you ready. We're going to take a picture with our one good thing sign. Come on right in the middle. >> [clears throat] >> Thank you. It's a nice sign. All right. Here we go. Take your photo again. One, two, three. Thank you. One more time. >> [applause] >> Thank you all again. So, our second Yep. Sorry. Yes, sir. We're going to recognize a couple more individuals here in the room. It's some pretty exciting stuff. So, tonight we're going to recognize our 2026 Spelling Bee
005runner-up and Spelling Bee champion. First of all, our Spelling Bee runner-up, Dylan. Come on up, Dylan. >> [applause] >> So, Dylan is a fifth grader at Thomas Jefferson and Mr. Chair. So, on behalf of the school board, we have the resolution for you. And there's a lot of whereases. So, we know all the whereases. Uh but as a fifth grade student at at TJ, you were one of more than 1,700 students competing to be the top speller. Uh you were one of the 30 spellers to earn a spot in the Spelling Bee. You demonstrated composure, skill, and determination through the 2026 public school Spelling Bee. So, well done. Uh you received a tremendous level of unwavering support and encouragement from your family. You correctly spelled words that I can't such as syringe, irrevocable, and contumacious.
006He competed for 72 minutes for 80 rounds with many more. And so, your achievement brings us immense pride to us uh and to your fellow Patriots at TJ. So, uh now you will serve as Louisa County Public Schools' official alternate speller in the 2026 Richmond Raceway Spelling Bee. So, be it resolved by the Louisa County School Board that we recognize Mr. Dylan Hurley as the first runner-up of the 2026 Louisa County Public Schools' Spelling Bee and commend you for your tremendous success. >> [applause] >> And now, now we're going to recognize our 2026 Spelling Bee champion, Boston Apple from Louisa County Public School, fifth grader Aiden West. >> [applause] >> Mr. Chair. So, it is my pleasure to present to you this resolution from the school board. Um and again, I'll skip all the whereases.
007So, as you mentioned, you're a fifth grade student at Boston Apple, one of more than 1,700 students competing as the top speller. You were one of 30 to compete uh in the Spelling Bee. You um received tremendous level of support and encouragement from your family especially especially his mother, Ashley Smith. And whereas um you spelled the words correctly, perceptible, hydrophobia, and cilantro. So, I don't think I could do it on auto correct though. Um so, congratulations. Uh you secured the title um by spelling the championship word Medusa after again 72 minutes and over 80 rounds. Um your achievement also brings a immense amount of pride to all the fellow Foxes at Boston Apple. And now you will represent Louisa County Public Schools in the 2026 Richmond Race Raceway Regional Spelling Bee on March 24th. So,
008be it resolved by the Louisa County School Board that we recognize Mr. Aiden West as the grand champion of the 2026 Louisa County Public Schools' Spelling Bee and commend you for your tremendous success. >> [applause] >> All right. Congratulations. Come on in. Let me have the sign again. We're going to go a little more to the right. Get your smile on. Take your photo again. One, two, Awesome. All right. Let's uh take it and get a picture. All right. >> [applause] >> One more time. >> [applause] >> Congratulations. All right. Thank you all. Thank you all for being here tonight. Yes. >> [snorts] >> Very proud. You know what? I would beat me. Thank you. All right. So, that is our recognition. So, on to our presentations. So, school construction project updates. Good evening, gentlemen.
009Good evening. I'm glad [clears throat] you wore different color shirts so we can differentiate. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Almost like twins. Uh so, I'm excited to show you the progress uh on the school building. It's from a different perspective. It's all uh most of it's all drone shots actually. Um and so, here what you're looking at is uh Little Lions area. So, this is uh called the A section of the building. It's up close uh towards the highway. And so, you can see the um high school classroom and then the Little Lions area where the preschool uh kids will be. Uh so, they're currently working on getting the block work up to roof height there. Uh the rest of the building, uh sections B and C, they're um they actually have all the steel up. You'll
010see here in a minute. So, we're getting the the block work up here so we can um begin to set that steel um I think uh late April. Uh and this kind of this is moving uh west uh this direction. And so, what you're looking at there is the the office uh and the restrooms. And then it begins the the little wide area. And now looking forward in the in the image, you begin to see on the left side, top side of the image, is the culinary arts space. So, that bit would be the classroom and the kitchen area. Then on the right side, that big open space is the two It's going to be two rooms, meeting spaces. They can be opened up into one larger room. This is just another close-up of of
011those spaces there. So, now as we're moving down the building towards the south, you can see the steel work. If you were out here for the last couple of weeks, you saw the crane sitting out here. They were very busy for a little over a week and a half getting all the steel set in place. The one thing I do want to point out is as you look in this image, if you look through the steel that you see on on top, and you see the It looks like a white rectangular kind of space under that. That's more steel, and what that is that is an area that's typically a classroom space below it, but it's a mezzanine area where there's going to be storage and changing rooms up there. So, that's already So, that's
012in place, and they'll pour concrete on that here in the next couple of weeks or so. So, just kind of moving down the building, so again just you get to see both the high side and the low side of the building. All of the the steel work for the roof is is in place. And if you see the the long silver strips that you see there, that's actually the sheathing that they'll begin to put down to fully start covering the roof itself. And this is moving down again towards the high high school side. So, again that whole B and C section, they completed all of the steel work for that. And if you look and it's not really easy to see in this picture, but if you look past the building there, in between the
013building and the road, you see those two columns that are kind of sticking up there. Those are the forms for the bridge that's going to go across that. So, while we're on spring break next week, they'll begin to do the same thing on the other side to begin to prep that, to get that ready. And then this summer, they'll actually get the steel structure of the bridge in place. >> [clears throat] >> Good evening. So, we have currently spent $11,018,240.96 for the CTE project. That represents 28.05% of our budget, and we have completed 38.3% of the project. So, we are on time and under budget. Two change orders that are recorded for you in your paperwork. And I added the middle school addition information just to keep you up to date to where we are
014at this point. And in your packets, there are three payments to RRMM for this month. That concludes my portion subject to your questions. Any questions? The only question I had was with the CTE, when would When would we have the roof? So, they will start putting the membrane down. So, the next days, they'll begin to put the metal down on top of the steel. And then I think around April 22nd is when they'll be on site to start putting the membrane down. And that'll take about a month and a half, 2 months So, the 22nd sounds like a long time away, but it's 3 weeks. It's a lot of steel It's a lot of work just getting it up. That's a lot of work. And at that point, the building's going to be dried in.
015So. That's awesome. Yeah. It's our top out. So, I did want to Any other questions on that? I just wanted to mention I appreciate you the pre-emptive answer of on time and on budget. So, thank you for that. So, at the last board meeting, I brought to your attention the Battle Run high voltage transmission line. I know there are several you know, meetings and stuff with the county, and you had the board had um um made a motion to write a letter, but beyond that, I don't really have any other updates. I haven't heard any of any changes. But I just wanted to bring it back up, and and let you know I really don't know much of anything new from this point. Yeah, if I could add to that, as a reminder at the
016last meeting, the school board asked for Chairman Strickland and I to write a letter on behalf of the board to um Valley Link to state opposition to the transmission lines coming close to our schools, number one. And that we were disappointed to see the pathway to be so close to our schools. And two, to ask for a meeting with the chairman and I just to go over and talk through our concerns as far as having them so close to the school. So, I just to update you on that, we did have Miss Chair Vice Chair Profit and I attended the community meeting on the 12th of March in which we delivered the letter there to many of their employees and so forth, which did prompt a call to us early the next week. And then
017we set up a time, and the chairman and I did meet via Zoom with them. I would say to you that I was disappointed in that meeting from the standpoint of I really don't think they were um gave us any new answers or anything we haven't already heard in the public. Or I was also disappointed that I did not hear that so they themselves are concerned certainly as we are about having these transmission lines come so close to schools or school property. So, I just wanted to relay that to you all that that has happened, and wanted to make sure you were aware of that that meeting and the and the conversation that they had. And I just wanted to add during that conversation that you know, we tried to have an open dialogue with
018them. That we've have asked for um you know trying to get a better understanding of why they thought it was a good idea to build these lines close to to not just this the school here, but up to um closer to to our other schools as well. And I don't again, I don't think we got clear answers. I don't think we got any more information than what's been presented in the public hearing. And I was a little disappointed cuz I was hoping that you know, as we as the school board, and you all asked us to do this. We're We're one community here in Louisa. And we all look out for each other. And so our responsibility is to look out for the students in Louisa County Public Schools. I thought this was really did
019a phenomenal job talking about our concern for the safety and welfare of our our students. But I'm not sure that it was well received. And I too was uh disappointed and and somewhat frustrated with that conversation. So, any questions at all? Yeah. Well, I mean sounds like they basically you checked the box, they met with you, and you're done. You know. You know, if you study the history of how we got here where they want to run transmission lines through Louisa, it's pretty frustrating. I mean, it basically comes of poor decisions made down in Richmond by both Republicans and Democrats. You had it Governor Northam in 2020 pass this where these power companies almost had to go to solar and wind. And don't get me wrong, solar and wind is good, you know, clean energy.
020But sometimes the wind doesn't blow, and sometimes the sun doesn't shine. And then when Governor Youngkin came in, he pushed these deadlines out. He should have phased them in based on the electrical grid. And the problem is now they do not have what they need. And to build a power station of the Northern Virginia type they needed probably take at least 10 years if you got it approved at all. So, that quick solution is this transmission line through Louisa and a lot of the other counties here. They think that power line, I think they think you can have it up and running in 3 years. And uh basically Louisa is for the greater good, we're just collateral damage. I don't know if they care about at all the damage they'd be doing to this county.
021I mean, to other counties. So, I'm in for this fight. We got to fight it. I know it's going to be an uphill fight, but these things, you know, we can't get pushed around by people up in Northern Virginia. I appreciate those comments. Anybody else have any concerns? Mr. Cameron, I'm admittedly opposed to any power line near any of our schools. I'm and I'm on record with that right there that I'm [snorts] adamantly opposed to any of them near any of our schools. They don't have a place um anywhere near any of our school properties. So um and we'll of course say anything else. Any other comments folks have? Well, I think we'll fight it tooth and nail cuz we do not want it near our schools. Nobody in the area wants this. So, we
022just have to fight as hard as we can to get it moved. Yeah. And and I would suggest to to you all I think maybe the next step is um to work on a resolution. And so, if if it's the board's pleasure then we can ask the administration um to write a resolution um for us to review um to to voice our strong opposition to this being close to schools here in town. I'll make a motion to make it. All right. I'll make a motion to request that the administration drafts a formal resolution expressing the board's strong opposition to the Valley Link project to be presented to the board for review. Second. Got a second and a third. So, I think Mr. Hill got the second in first. Um any other discussion? Um I think
023this is something we feel strongly enough on. I'm going to ask the clerk if you don't mind doing a roll call. Yes, sir. Chairman Strickland. So, I adamantly oppose so I will vote yes. Vice Chair Prophet. Definitely yes. We're fighting Mr. Harris. Yes. Mr. Sneed. Definitely yes. If they do this at all, people will make poor decisions and we're going to have to pay the price. Miss Holton. Yes, and I strongly agree. Mr. Runnels. As I said earlier, I'm adamantly opposed to any power line near any of our schools. So, yes. Mr. Hill. Absolutely yes. Thank you. So, thank you for that motion. Thank you for the resolution and Dr. Goodson administration work on that and we'll present it back to the board. Yes, sir. Any anything else you all have? Nope, I think we're
024good. All right. Thank you very much for that update. So, on to the consent agenda. I make a motion to approve the consent agenda as presented. And we have a second? So, we have a second. Any further discussion? So, I have my my standard I've got to do a little bit of discussion. So, which is one of those. I do have my standard question for for administration and finance that um all um Amazon and P-card purchases have been reviewed and approved. Yes, sir. All right. So, there will not be any other questions. All those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Those opposed? On to action items. I make a motion to approve the resolution for the budget supplement to release funds for public schools for multiple capital projects in the amount of $305,000. And
025we have a second for that? Second. We have a second from Mr. Hill. So, as So, as you can see um there uh this is the request we often make each year prior as we get to this time of the year for uh appropriations to come a little bit early so we can take care of some of these projects before July 1 as we enter in in school and enter into our summer. Um these are capital outlay equipment replacements. We can get that in and make sure we can uh uh receive the equipment and put it in for carpeting and flooring as well as some uh parking repairs, asphalt repairs, um some complex repairs, and then uh some classroom furniture. So, just wanted to uh it's total $305,000 would be the request to be taken
026out of long-term capital reserves. Any questions? The amount of comment is it's um like we've done in previous years. Is this it? Yes, this is a request just like in previous years. So, if there be no questions all those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Those opposed? Motion carries. I make a motion to adopt the 2026-2027 local career education plan pending approval. So, um so, I appreciate the motion uh but we haven't had the presentation from that yet. Yeah. So, I know you're ready. So, uh since we we got the the the cart in front of the the horse a little bit if if um I was going to say do we want to um do you want to give us an update on that? And so so we have the motion. Do we
027have a second? Second. So, we have a second from Mr. Runnels. So, as part of the discussion Obviously, you don't have to give your presentation. >> [laughter] >> Good evening. It's that annual time of year to submit our annual Perkins plan. You'll see it in your packet. Um the only two things that are not in the packet are two data points regarding student demographic data that comes from um our accountability office as well as two financial report um two financial sections. But the timing of this we want to get it in front of you because we'll submit it before April 30th cuz it's already done. And then it's [clears throat] due to DOE April 30th. So, we want to get it into this early meeting tonight without those two remaining data points and if we
028need to um finish up the plan in May. But if you if you have any questions or you'd like move it to action, that would be fine as well. But sounds like they already they already already did. And I already have a motion on that. So, any different any changes from last year's plan? Nope, no difference. Um we um this year we also do our comprehensive local needs assessment. So, this plan was presented last night with that needs assessment to our CTE advisory committee. We had a meeting here. And then timing of it report it to you tonight and then we'll submit it to DOE April. Um the only thing that we did have a change from last year we went down in funding. So, probably about uh federal dollars in Perkins may be down
029about eight grand this year. I've got a question. Yes, sir. For the beautiful new building local building is different the program student expanded approach? Uh from the budget's concern? Yeah. Uh potentially for for local and state dollars but actually not federal dollars due to it's our it's based on our index. Yeah. Good question. So, it sounds like if if I was asked for the clarification on the motion it was to approve pending review? Pending review. Pending review so that would give sufficient time to complete the documentation necessary. Um are there any other questions the board has? So, Mr. Chairman, if we could get a motion to move it to action. Before we Yeah, so um we had a second. I was looking to see Already had it in action. We did. So, so they did.
030Um did that. So, if we can um if it's with the board's approval table the motion that we have on the on the table for now um and go ahead to um the 10.02 um which is the I'm sorry the the 10.05 which was the information items. And so, if we have a motion to move that to from 10.05 to action and that's 9.02 is that what we're looking at here? So, if we have a motion for that? I'll second. I make a motion to move it to action. Okay. So, just to clarify we're moving 10.05 to to 9.02. And we I think I heard a second. Seconded by Mr. Hill. So, um any discussion on that? If not, all those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Those opposed? We are moved to action.
031So, now we can take the table motion of approving the local career technical education plan contingent on the the additional data being We had that discussion. So, I'll ask if there's any other discussion before we call for the vote. If there be none, all those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Those opposed? We got this. Appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you. You worked hard. Yes, sir. Sometimes you got to go around the barn to get to it. All right. So, um I guess our only informational items um is first reading of the VSBA school board policies. Good evening, Dr. Floyd. Good evening. So, um I will be very brief. Um so, February um the policies are really just language clean up. Um and so, there's no new policies and no um information that will
032impact us significantly. So, I don't really have any policies to share. Mr. Chairman, I don't have any questions. So, yeah. Go ahead and say Nope, I think we're good. Good morning. We get these things and you know, it's like 42 here. Yeah. I don't know we get I never paid attention. Do we get one time a year or twice? So, February is where they do kind of the clean up of of older policies and do the revisions and language clean up and ensure it aligns with code. And then in May we'll get the policy updates from the next session. So, those are the ones that will impact us for next year. So, if you didn't have enough fun with these there's more coming in a couple months. Just being that we've been operating a school
033for a long time. In fact, they're all rules to be set right there. So, when when the code's updated then they have to line up the policies with the codes and change the language and wording. So, there's a whole team of people there. Yeah. This is Yeah, it really sounds like a neat thing to have up at the curriculum retreat. I got other things I want to take up with him first. And so, and this is you know instead of us having to develop these all on our own, we have the VSBA assistant giving us these guidance so we can I know it's just amazing. You see them as often as we see them now. Yeah. You think once a year maybe about 10 would be covered. So I want to claim new mileage on
034So, I've read through them and I feel like most of them were just cleanups. It doesn't look like there's any additional budget implication. >> No, sir. No. >> No original, no additional staffing. >> [clears throat] >> There was some reporting, but it looks like it was just an addition to current reporting. >> Correct. Correct. Yeah. Okay. So, we don't need to have this approved tonight? No. So, you can hold back. Okay. You want to put it off? Yeah. But thank you for the update. If folks do look over and have any questions, please follow up with Dr. Poling between now and next week. Thank you, sir. All right. So, our next one is our LCPS special education inclusive practice action plan update. Can you give me that update? >> Good evening. I did give you
035an infographic at your table. So, if you want to look at that, there are 10 items on this action plan and I certainly can, but won't unless you have questions, illustrate each one of those items on that plan. What I'd like to spend the valuable time doing is explain to you how the plan is developed. I want to give kudos to our principals and their teams. This plan is developed by each one of the schools. So, they have a general education teacher, a special education teacher, a local building administrator, and also a special education coordinator that sits on their teams. Three years ago, time flies. Three years ago I came to you and talked about our inclusive practices action plan at that time. It's required by the state that we develop one. And what the
036if you look at the top, there are ratings for each one of them. There are three different ratings. What is a challenge for developing this plan is that you submit this self-assessment to the state. And you can only do it based on the one self-assessment. So, you take all six of our schools, combine all those ratings together to develop what our where where we fall in that action step. So, I say that kudos to the teams that developed this. They were very critical, self-critical, which is to make sure that we are inclusive of all our students with disabilities as we move forward. You can see the different 10 items that we look at and where we fall. We have some things that we are continuing to work on. There are some asterisk stars on those
037items on those action plan. And there's some other action steps that we want to take. So, part of that is what the schools will continue doing in their school improvement plans next year. And then 3 years from now, we'll come back and talk about this again, but wait until then. We'll do this mid-year and at the end of each year to look at where we fall with inclusive practices. But, any questions on that? Dr. Alpert, I do have something to say. Of all the kudos we get, and we get a lot, I will tell you that the people who are most passionate are special um needs children and they rave about how good our programs are. Thank you. >> So, kudos to you and the team and the principals that are out there because um
038they're you know, y'all y'all are doing the work. And uh it's always nice to hear from our um from our parents how well we're doing. Well, thank you very much. Thank you. Yeah. Thank you. And thank you for the graphic that you sent me. Yeah, that's very Help me folks. Um so, on to um 10.03, our journey to greatness update number 10. We're in the double digits. All right. You ready to walk? Ready. Ready. Excited to share a few updates regarding our journey to greatness. All right. The TV up front stopped working, but I'll try to back up a little bit so I can just follow along. Uh we'll start with human resources. Dr. Poling and his team interviewed candidates for the 2026-2027 uh school year. Uh he has plenty of uh 12, I believe,
039teaching positions opened and they went to Liberty University, Longwood University, Christopher Newport University, and Longwood University in order to find some qualified teachers. Dr. Poling also shared that many of the potential candidates will be coming to our team LCPS job fair later in April. So, very excited about that. Transitioning over to instruction, Ms. Gray planned and hosted the division-wide 24 math competition. I know a few of you were there. We had over 100 students compete, but the team over at Jouett earned first place. But, it was a great job by all of our competitors who competed. Also with instruction, the instructional team recognized teachers for engaging 5 C's lessons. We went to Trevilians to recognize PE teachers at our Blanchard and also talented and gifted teacher Barbie Miller at Moss Nuckles. Ms. Spade planned and
040hosted our family movie night, which was an excellent event. We had over 1,200 people come out to watch Stuart Little after reading the book as a community. And it's something that I know that our community really does enjoy. And Ms. Spade and her Title 1 team deserve all the kudos for putting on a great event. Mr. Budner is always looking for opportunities for our students. Recently, he hosted Bond Secures and a representative to talk about nursing opportunities for our students. And he also attended an Amazon presentation discussing data center and career opportunities. So, thank you, Mr. Budner, for that. And this is pretty amazing. Mr. Bowens worked in collaboration with our middle school and high school library teams and they actually 3D printed a wheelchair for an LCPS student. It actually took a fun fact,
041453 hours to print that wheelchair. So, very amazing, great job, and great work. Mickey and his team are all around Louisa County. Recently, they replaced a basketball net at Moss Nuckles. They installed a new motor in the air handler at the high school and they installed a new washer and dryer in the nursing lab. And I need some help with mine as well, Mr. Wallace, if you don't mind. Mr. Childress and his team are always getting it done as well. Recently, they cleaned switch boards around the school division. They received new Chromebooks for the 2026-2027 school year. And they attended a national cybersecurity conference. You know how important that is nowadays. So, thank you, tech team. Ms. Harmon is always creative. Recently, the nutrition department celebrated National School Breakfast Week. So, a lot of our
042elementary students had fun and dressed up and celebrated our breakfast across the school division. And Andrew's always on point. Recently, he created content for the VESBA spring forum housed here at LCPS. And he also secured media coverage for highlighting our automotive tech program at the high school with the Washington Post and the Today show. So, thank you, Andrew, for your hard work. And last but certainly not least, Dr. Alpert presented on trauma resilience at the Virginia School Nutrition Association conference. And she also held her special education parent advisory meeting. So, thank you, Dr. Alpert. Any questions at all about our journey to greatness? Any questions for the board? A lot of great things going on. Yes, sir. Thank you all. Thank you very much. You can step back. And on to our school safety task
043force update. Good evening, sir. Good evening, everyone. It's a pleasure to be here. It's a pleasure to see you. You can step back if you like. You don't have to drag it around. It's just a a short update. Um I'm going to talk a little bit about the SROs, as always, just to keep you appraised of the progress of where we are. Uh and talk a little bit about AI in education and then a little bit about GAI and safety. So, I'll turn it over to He is pretty old school in the big scheme of things. But, I want you to know that I used AI to create that slide. On the downside, I couldn't use the same template for the rest of the slides, but I'm working on it. I'm on the the way.
044We have to start start somewhere, right? Yeah, absolutely. So, here's another AI slide. And the pictures are real. Everything else is manipulated. Um we're still working very hard to find that seventh SRO. And let me tell you, Sergeant Harris could send and use that individual. As the school division expands and the activities expand, that seventh person is like really critical. And the sheriff's office work force is just really tough to fill that to fill that spot. We have over the summer, maybe we'll get lucky and snag [clears throat] a really talented individual. Now, the next safe school task force meeting, as you saw on the first slide, is on the 2nd of April. And we know that AI is really kind of the new frontier, if you will. Space is gone in the big scheme
045of things. I know we're still going in there, but AI is a new frontier, also. And AI is not new to the school but it's important for the safe school task force members who may not all be totally aware of it. I'm giving two briefings. One, what we're doing in AI in education, and that's Mr. Bowens over there. He is that expert. And then the other side of the coin is what is everybody else using it for to exploit our children? So, there's always a positive and negative side to almost everything. And you probably know better than than I do. You know that Mr. Bowens has been working extremely hard since then with the team collaboratively since what, December of '22 or so. And he's done amazing things. They've put the school division on the
046map probably here in the Commonwealth of Virginia. And he not just introduced something that would would come back later and be a challenge, but thought his way through the entire thing. The guidance, the guardrails, everything that we needed to make this a very positive experience for our teachers and our students. So, I can't say enough good things. And to hear the total brief, you got to come to the safe school task force to hear all the details of how that's happened. And of course, he's made it a reality. Here's some of the things that our teachers, our students, and folks get to use on a regular basis. Now, the flip side of the coin, we're bringing in another expert Lieutenant Love, I think, who everybody knows here. Used to be the head of the Internet
047Crimes Against Children Task Force. But since those early days of the Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force, it's a whole ballgame out there where people are using the same AI technology, in this case generative AI, which is just really technology to create new images, videos, audio, and text based on prompts. And sounds very positive, and it is, but if you use it in nefarious ways, it can be very dangerous. It can be somewhat easy to exploit not only adults, but but our children. That's who we're most concerned about in this particular case. And here's some ways that Sergeant Detective Love is going to talk about. All very important. And so, as part of that, since it's probably so new and so important to us to at least consider these things, we're thinking that once we
048talk about this with the safe school task force, they they may be interested in forming a subcommittee to make sure that we're doing all we can to inform parents, make sure our students are properly aware, and so on. To make sure all the Ts are crossed and the Is are are dotted. So, it's going to be a great time at the safe school task force. Lots of good information coming out. And important stuff that each and every one of us needs to know about here in the 21st century. Any questions or comments that I can answer? I appreciate you you ending with the covered bridge. You like that? I do like that. So, you know, what it's the spring time, but do it. It's also um sort of getting us to get to new territory.
049Yes, sir. I thought that was a nice segue. Yep, and I do appreciate I'll go ahead. I was going to say, what if you could make the presentation available to the school board members and others? Presentation Dr. Worl Partin's presentation? Yes. Not yours, but the one that that's coming up. Oh, you're talking about the AI at safe school task force. Yes, right. >> We'll work with Mr. Straley and make it available to whoever would like to hear it. Wonderful. Yes, sir. Yep, and Mr. Runion and Mr. Propst will be there on Thursday at the meeting in person as well as many other members here in the audience, but I look forward to seeing you then. Thank you. Thank you. All right. So, on on the public comment And so, we before is now looking for
050folks who want to speak. So, 3 minutes as an individual, 5 as a group. Um And I know And if we don't have anyone, I would like to just say this week is um staff appreciation week here at um Team LCPS. And I just want to say uh first of all, thank you all for um your support of our staff appreciation uh and your support of our staff as a whole. Um but I want to take this moment to also um to say thank you to our entire staff. And we truly believe in team. We believe in our team concept. And every member of this team uh plays a vitally important role in making sure that we can get out there and help our students lead the way. And [snorts] uh I just want to
051say publicly thank you to every one of those members um what they do. I love this week as we get to appreciate our staff in a in a fun way this week. And hopefully we hopefully we appreciate them every single day, but this week we we sort of map out as as a week we do that. And then also um that leads us into the next week of spring break. So, I'm really proud of the team, the work they're doing. I'm hoping our team can get some rest and relaxation next week. When we come back, our spring break is like shot out of a cannon, and we'll be right to the end of the year with graduation coming up quickly on May 15th. So, um but I just want to say to our members in
052the audience and our staff, thank you for the great work you do. And to all of those um out um in our schools that may not be here tonight, um thank you. We're really grateful. And thank you all for your support of our staff. Makes a difference, and we appreciate that support every day. So, thank you. Well, like you said, we're all part of a team. So, um if I think I can speak for the board that we're all proud to be part of this state because of the work that we do. We all do day in and day out. Just never ceases to amaze me, I'll say. Um Cool fun fact, we were on the Today show this morning. So, uh that's not a cool fun fact you can say every day that your
053school division was on the Today show. So, uh Al Roker talking about your school division. Yeah, Al Al Al Roker was having a conversation about Louisa County High School. That's pretty awesome. So, uh but the great work that's you know, one example of the great work that's happening in uh just really grateful to everyone. Just saying, you know, we do not take you guys for granted. We do appreciate all the hours that you put in, beyond normal hours. I think you don't have normal hours today. We do appreciate everything you do. And we see the relentless pursuit that it it it makes a difference. So, thank you all for I might get called a communist for saying that, but I But it is relentless pursuit of you all's part of this. Um makes us proud.
054So, I think that was our public comment. Um Thank you for that. Yeah, thanks. what your resident was, but I don't see anyone, so we will close public comment. Um so, under reports, Mr. Harris, any questions you had on the reports? I carefully examined them, and they're not worthy of review. All right. Well, thank you for that. And I um the only thing I wanted to mention was um you know, I watch the facilities report closely because it with facilities, it's not a problem till it is. And so, to see all the closed work orders, thank the team again for staying on top of that. It makes a difference. So, um that being said, we have upcoming meetings. So, um next one is May 5th. Um and there's there's a policy workshop um before then
055April 28th. So, please let Ms. Campbell know if you're interested in that. Um Like Mr. Straley said, um we're going to be coming out of a cannon. So, we've got the Educator of the Year ceremony May 6th. Um we've got a retiree dinner on May 20th. And there is a VSBA law conference on June 5th if folks are interested. So, uh if there's no other Yes, sir. >> Just strictly got one thing to say. I want to thank everyone when Lynn and I were out of the country on our recent adventure. I want to say thank you all for your prayers. Thank you, staff, for all the nice things that you guys sent us. We really appreciate that. It was so kind. Um it was a bit of an adventure, but you know, thank you
056so much for the kindness that you guys all gave for us. We really appreciate it. Glad Glad you you made it back. I'm very happy to be back. Yeah, and I think we take a lot for granted. So, um anything else? We have a motion to adjourn? Mhm. Second? Second. Um any further discussion? If not, all >> All right. All