001[Music] Good evening everyone. At this time, I would like to call the Lynchburg City School Board meeting to order. Tonight, we do have um a board member who is going to participate um via electronic participation. I'm recommending that the school board approve the electronic participation for school board member Miss Lowry due to extenduating circumstances associated with employment, military or family emergency and identifies with specificity the nature of the personal matter in policy BDD. Motion second Mr. Baron yes Mr. Alen yes Dr. Gupta yes Mr. Connor yes Mr. Depal yes Mr. Gillio yes Dr. Farmer. Yes. Mr. Poe, yes. Motion carries. Thank you. At this time, I would like for everyone to participate in the pledge of allegiance. I aliance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it
002stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Thank you. Um board members, you've all had an opportunity to review the agenda. Are there any questions or discussion about the agenda? Okay. If not, I'd entertain a motion. Motion second. Mr. Baron. Yes. Mr. Alen? Yes. Dr. Gupta? Yes. Mrs. Lori? Yes. Mr. Connor? Yes. Mr. Mr. Paul, yes. Mr. Gillio, yes. Dr. Farmer, yes. Mr. Poe, yes. Motion carries 9 to zero. Thank you. At this time, we will begin the school board reorganization. I'm recommending that the school board elect a chair of the school board for the 2025 2022 school year in accordance with section 22.1-76 of the code of Virginia. Um, at this time, I'd like to see if there are any nominations for school board chair. I'd like to nominate Dr.
0032 Gupta. Okay. Dr. Gupta, do you accept that nomination? Do you really want me to? I do. Okay. Are there any other nominations? Okay. Boring. None. Miss Lauri, did you have something to say? I support that nomination. Okay. Okay. Thank you. So if there are no other nominations, Miss Day is going to take a vote. Mr. Baron, yes. Mr. Alen, yes. Mr. Connor, yes. Mrs. Lori, yes. Mr. Depal, abstain. Mr. Gillio, no. Dr. Farmer, yes. Mr. Poe, yes. Motion carries. I carry I work for my own, too. Yes, sir. All right. Well, thank you. Congratulations, Dr. Gupta, and turn this meeting over to you, sir. Miss Lowry voted. Yes, sir. So, we let her just like the Bible says, go to the big seat to the chair. Give me Thank you. So that's your phone.
004Thank you. That was quick. Thank you, Dr. Mij. Thank you for your confidence and thank you for not for your confidence. But I'll work the same way I did last year with one single focus and the focus is to take care of the young child in school irrespective of individual beliefs. We are here to only make policies and she's here to implement them in school district um without any biases. Our goal is to raise the academic standards and that will be my mission this year and hope you'll all work with me as a team uh to make it a reality. Having said that, item number two is the school board vice chair election. Is there nomination for vice chair Connor? Mr. Connor, do you accept that? Yes, I would accept it. Other nominations for wast
005Dr. Farmer, do you accept that nomination? Yes. All right. Other nominations. Madame Clerk, would you please call the role? Mr. Baron, who will be your top candidate? Mr. Connor. Mr. Alen, who will be your top candidate? Mr. Connor. Mrs. Lori, who will be your top candidate? Mr. Connor. Dr. Gupta, who will be your um top candidate? Mr. Connor. Mr. Depal, who would be your top candidate? Mr. Connor. Mr. Julio, who would be your top candidate? Dr. Farmer. Miss Farmer. Dr. Connor. Mr. Poe. Uh, Dr. Farmer is my buddy, but we're going to go with uh Dr. Conor. She said, "I don't quip you." Motion carries. Thank you, Mr. Connor. You can swap the seats, sir. Okay. I'm getting good at this. Okay. Congratulate. Oh, my 15-second statement is I'm looking forward to a great great
006school year and I really believe we're going to do some great things as far as raising our academics across the board and dealing with the achievement gap. We're going to make that a big priority this year. So, I'm looking forward to working with our new superintendent and each and every one of you. Thank you. Uh, next one is 2526 appointment of the school board clerk and deputy clerk. Uh, Miss Day will be the clerk and the deputy clerk will be uh Jill. Miss Jill, same as Is there a motion to approve that motion? Second, Mr. Depal. All in all in favor say I. I. I. I. Excellent. Thank you, Miss Day. What you do day in day out, ma'am. Uh you're she's as I said before she's one of those who always picks up your
007phone. If she doesn't she'll call you right back. Communication skills we need to learn from her. Uh excellent. Thank you very much. Thanks sir. 2526 appointment of the agent and deputy agent. Dr. Yes. Um I am recommending Sonia Jamies for chief um chief financial officer as a agent for the school board and Barbara Ripka I apologize. assistance finance director for the deputy agent for the school board. Is there a motion to approve that motion? Second. Mr. Connor, Mr. Depal, any discussion? Would you please call the role? Mr. Baron, yes. Mr. Alen, yes. Mrs. Lori, yes. Yes. Mr. Connor, yes. Dr. Gupta, yes. Mr. Depal, yes. Mr. Galileo, yes. Dr. Farmer, yes. Mr. Poe, yes. Motion carries. Thank you. Next one is the appointment of designy of the division superintendent. Dr. Yes. I am recommending Dr.
008Jennifer Davis um as the designate of division for the division superintendent for the 2526 academic year. Motion to approve. Motion. Mr. Connor. Second. Mr. Depal. Any discussion? Would you please call the role? Mr. Baron? Yes. Mr. Alen? Yes. Mrs. Li? Yes. Yes, Mr. Connor. Yes, Dr. Gupta. Yes, Mr. Depal. Yes, Mr. Gillio. Yes, Dr. Farmer. Yes, Mr. Poe. Yes. Motion carries. Thank you. The next one is dates, meeting time, location, and of the school board meeting. Miss Day, I'll give it to you the floor. Well, in front of you all have the dates. If at any time that something needs to change or if there's a a conflict, please let us know as soon as possible and we can try to rework the date. But those dates are in front of you and I have
009a copy for each one of you and once they are approved, I will put them on your calendar. And the next meeting on the calendar is on July 22nd. This it should be July 22nd. Yes. Yeah. That's for the work session. The next work session is on July 22nd. Is there a motion to approve the calendar? Motion. Um, I'll come back to discussion when there is second. Is there a second to approve? Second. M. Now go ahead with the discussion. Just making sure the Tuesday July 15th is going to be July 22nd. Yes sir. Okay. uh change what we have done is uh we have several new board members who are on a training and the training is on 22nd and we have a retreat that day. So we try to consolidate things so you
010don't have to take out from work for a longer time. Uh so that 2015 was moved to 22nd for that reason because this calendar was presented before we had new appointments. Yeah. So to looking into everybody's interest uh 22nd was optimal for u division employees because we have brand new superintendent brand new deputy superendent it gives some some time to adjust to the environment taking care of district is more important so the moving the meeting one week later was the most appropriate uh decision to do madam clair would you please call the role Mr. Baron yes Mr. Alen yes Mrs. Lori yes Mr. Connor yes Dr. Gupta yes Mr. Depal yes Mr. Gillio yes Dr. Farmer yes Mr. Poe yes motion carries now before I go to next item I just want to make a
011statement everything is okay hopefully the policy BCEG allows board chair to appoint a ad hoc committee and I'm going to use that power today because as Mr. Connor mentioned and several of you have mentioned academic achievement is a a big problem in our division. We know problem exist but it's time to find solution right Dr. Farmer. Yes. No more we know problem. So please but we it's time to focus and work together as a as a community to find solutions. So uh with um what I'm going to do is use the policy BCEG to appoint that ad hoc committee and Mrs. Lowry, I hope you okay. I'm going to appoint Miss Lowry to be the chair of that ad hoc committee and I'm putting Dr. Farmer on that ad hoc committee. I have not talked
012to you. Hope it's okay with you. That's fine. And then I was planning to put community members uh Mr. McCain who has been very active in achievement gap and has been a vocal advocate of that. And Miss Kimberly Dyke, right, uh she's been an active advocate. And then Mr. Carlos who is a school representative and um I'm missing one name. What was it? Oh day Dr. Day Dr. Day is a as a community member as of starting today. Uh he understands all the policies of the school system and uh he's been kind. I've talked to him. He said he will not take any leadership role. Uh but he'll he'll be happy to work. And then the last but not least will be a superintendent or superintendent designate. Okay. So total of will be seven members
013and each one will have voting rights. And this doesn't require a board approval since it's an ad hoc committee. The charge is to come up with solutions in next 60 days. 60 days. Why? And you say why 60 days? Because we got strategic plan. We'll move in action in couple of months when Dr. is. So we would like to incorporate this suggestions into our strategic plan. So the point I'm making is this is not just a checkbox or a band-aid. This is a real solutions. We are looking as a board at that time. I'll need your help to incorporate those solutions into our strategic plan so these kids can go where they need to go and must go academically. Uh Miss Lowry, you okay, ma'am, with the chairing this task force or this? Yeah. Would
014you like to make a comment? I know you are the best because as she and I talked most of these problems exist at the elementary level and there's nobody better than Mrs. Lowry who understands elementary education on this board right and maybe I can say across district there may be would you like to make a comment just looking forward to working with everyone and helping these children because it all starts before school they ever come to school so yes working together we appreciate everything you do and I think this will be a landmark thing for the school district if you are able to put it together uh with the help of the community uh you know because that community voice is very important this will be a collective solution we need to find that's true
015something we cannot just talk we can implement that's right that's right so I I hope we'll have everybody's support although this doesn't require a vote uh but um I'm sorry sir what was the name of ad hoc committee ad hoc committee on uh achievement gap achievement gap reducing achievement gap eliminating the achieve Yeah, you can smmith it. I miss Dr. Day, but he's replacing him. But 60 days coming up with a solution. Uh there's no heavy duty charter for that. It's very simple, straightforward. Uh let's find solutions. I think Miss Maddie put it in her headlines last time. It's time for solutions. And I think she was u perfectly on dot. This is the time to find solutions. And I hope as community we can work together irrespective of where we come from where we
016are going the child should be the sole focus and this committee and task force uh I know uh there'll be criticism why not this person or that person to me I got to look into the community and say who will bring things back and then we can all put our heads together. We have a retreat coming up later on and hopefully we'll have a preliminary report by that time. So during retreat maybe this will be one of the topics for our discussion. Okay. Thank you. Next one is consent agenda. Is there a motion to approve the consent agenda? Motion Mr. Connor. Second. Second. Uh Mr. um Mike I Baron. Baron. Mr. Baron. Uh any discussion on consent agenda? Madame Cler would you please call the Mr. Baron? Yes. Mr. Alen. Yes, Mrs. Li. Yes, Mr.
017Connor. Yes, Dr. Gupta. Yes, Mr. Depal. Yes, Mr. Gillio. Yes, Dr. Farmer. Yes, Mr. Poe. Yes. Motion carries. Thank you. Uh, next one is superintendent comment. Dr. welcome to Lynchburg City Schools. Thank you. Thank you. Glad you're here. Glad to be here. And we know you can make the changes we need, positive changes. Yes. Take this district where it needs to go. So, the floor is all yours. All right. Thank you. Well, good evening again, everyone. I am um so excited to be here today. It's always interesting and a wonderful uh treat when you start your first day and you have a board meeting on the first night. So, I I think that's a good thing. But I um it's just really been a wonderful day. I've had an opportunity to meet a lot of
018the staff uh not only at this building, but transportation and maintenance. I didn't quite make it to the special ed uh group over at Glass, but just kind of making my way around. So, tonight I really just want to give you a brief overview. You know, we talked um new members here and then uh returning members, but I talked a lot about the entry plan during the the interview process. I think that was the first question I got. What was I planning to do? So, I want to just give you a brief overview, but when we come back later in July for that meeting, we'll go through the full full plan. Um so I want to talk a little bit about why the plan matters. Um for me this is um the entry plan begins
019a new chapter for LCS. And my goal is just to build strong relationships. I want to make sure that I'm transparent and clear um that I mean what I say, say what I mean and mean what I say and focus on what matters most. And like you all just shared tonight, student success. Um so over the next several months, my plan is to listen, to learn. and I've gotten a lot of good information even over this last month before being here physically and then being here today. Um, just to learn from the people the history of the school division because you have to know where you've been and where we currently are and then look at our strengths that we have and then if there are any opportunities for growth. So, I want to give
020you a little bit of the highlight. I know I came in on May 20th as far as being appointed by the board um and wasn't physically here until today, but I've had a lot of transition time with everyone. I've met with a lot of the staff over the month of June. I didn't want to come in here cold on day one and and get started. So before officially beginning, um I held several transition meetings with the then interim superintendent. We discussed the various phases of the facilities plan because there was a lot happening there. um he discussed a lot of the fiscal year 26 budget recommendations with me and I had an opportunity to to um talk to Miss Jamie's uh as well just revisiting the organizational chart looking at some of the structures there
021roles and uh communication protocols that are currently in place and I'll have an opportunity to sit down with Dr. Davis tomorrow. We've have a lot of time blocked out so that we can kind of look through how we want to um work with the team to get some things structured. um definitely participate in a lot of the early personnel and staffing conversations. I know I got a lot of questions of there aren't all these people, did you know? Did you know? I'm like yes, yes, but I wasn't physically here to take that level of action, but yes, that communication was there. Um I had an opportunity to meet with the the outgoing deputy superintendent of instruction. I think it's always important to know what the history was and you know what her role was. I
022think she had been here for a number of years. Um and literally probably an hour later had an opportunity to meet with Dr. Davis and just to see her vision and and you know where she wants to take things as well. Um just begin planning on board trans transition meetings with division staff. I've had an opportunity to connect with a few board members. I am going to be asking for an opportunity to meet with each of you individually. Um I know you're collective as a board as a unit, but you all have your individual um platform and things that you'd like to see happen. So I want to be able to talk to each of you oneonone. Um and then I received a lot of um communication from various internal stakeholders, business, law enforcement, collegiate,
023community stakeholders. Um there were a ton of people re reaching out and I worked with my assistant today so we can start getting people scheduled and we can have those um meetings. Uh one thing that was unique, uh this when we prepared this, this hadn't happened yet, but I had an opportunity to speak um at Diamond Hill Baptist Church on Sunday and speak to the youth there for their youth achievement day. So that was a real treat um to talk about their you know talk about where they are with planted growing and glowing and uh helping those students move forward. So it it's really been um a great process. So when you see my entry plan a little bit later it's a two-phaseed approach and you'll we'll go in depth uh later in July. But
024that first phase July through September really is observing, listening and learning. I have to learn what's going on and being able to do that. I have to pay attention and I have to listen to everyone. So visiting the schools, the classrooms, um like I said, uh if you all grant that, meeting individually with me, the board members, administrators and staff, really attending community events, listening to families, listen to students, um because we're here to serve kids and families. So I want to make sure that that I'm hearing that voice, reviewing the data on student achievement operations and programs. And then phase two, um analyze, plan, report, and lead October through December. just sharing those observations and insights that I've been able to gather with you all in the community looking at um key areas of
025priorities and where we can align um begin the strategic planning with the staff and um Miss Jamie has been instrumental in that we were just looking at different proposals and she's found a way where we could um and I'll explain that later in July but where we could connect with a contract that's currently existing contract that should be able to help us with getting the strategic plan underway because I know that's a huge priority and then defining ing next steps for long-term progress. So, the key focus areas are student learning and success, board superintendent partnership, leadership development and support, operational efficiency and structure, and then community engagement and communication. And so, what's next? I really look forward to connecting with the school division, connecting with you all as a board. Um, of course, I had
026July 1st, first school board meeting, public remarks. Um there is a meet and greet at Heritage High School on July 17th from 4:00 to 6:00 p.m. And um Austin and Communications has been absolutely wonderful. And so he's uh he and his team are working on getting that plan and getting that information out to you all. Uh work session mid to late July just um presenting our entire the entire plan to the board. You heard Dr. Gupta mention about the board retreat and then providing a staff overview and and planning session. and then late um also securing a consultant for strategic plan mid July and then late August proposed work session with the board and I believe that's changed now to about September uh with the board for to have training collaborative strategic planning process so
027that we can look at that community feedback and phase one observations because I did have an opportunity to look at the feedback that you all received when you were doing the superintendent search um and I just reading through that and that would be a part of the observations and information that I bring back. And so ultimately just staying connected. I've had a lot of community members reach out um a lot of our internal public um staff reach out and with the board just staying connected so that we can um continue to move this forward. So thank you. Just want to give you a brief overview of where we are. Would you be okay yielding a few minutes to Dr. Davis? Oh yes. Dr. Davis, would you like to say? Thank you for allowing me a
028few minutes. I'll take about 15 seconds. Um, I just want to say welcome to all of our new board members. Welcome to uh Dr. Mette as our new superintendent. We're extremely excited and I I just want to say thank you all for the opportunity. I promise you that we are going to continue I'd say hit the ground running, but we've already been running full speed. but we're going to continue to do the work uh because we're in the we're in the business of of children and we're going to do the very best we can for them every single day. So, thank you all so very much for the opportunity and I'm very excited and I I for one wholeheartedly I agree with you and I have full confidence that you'll do an top-notch job in
029making that a reality. And Miss Jamus u may I yield her too because I don't want to leave her alone. Oh, no. Miss Jamus, you want to say anything? You manage the money. You're the most important person. Well, I don't know about that, but I just echo um the statement of the very wise women who came before me. Thank you for the opportunity. I am very excited to get the new board members in orientation and teach them about the 10,000 plus uh account codes that we have just as I did you, Mr. Connor. So, I'm looking forward to to meeting with you, going over our processes. Um, the finance department has been in a transitional phase. We have moved into a new era and how we do things and we are ahead of our audit.
030We are ahead of getting the budget out. I'm already working on developing the new beautiful budget book that I will have to into your hands soon hopefully. and I'm just very excited about what this new year is going to hold for us. Thank you. One item missing in the agenda was board comments. If it's okay with you, we did not amend the agenda. The chief of HR is here. Do you want the chief of HR is here? Did you want her to Please, if anybody you like to u bring them over. I'm sorry. I didn't want to leave her out. Miss Shepard to come over. If you wanted to share anything, I didn't want to leave you out. I saw you sitting there. Appreciate the opportunity. You can come up to the podium if you
031don't mind. that the camera can capture you. Thank you. I didn't want to leave her out. Mike and the camera will be able to capture. I just want to say welcome to the new board members. I look forward to working with Dr. Majette and certainly Dr. Davis and continuing all the great things that we're doing for our kids because that's why we're here. Thank you. Thank you. May we appreciate everything you do for the school district. And I don't want to leave. Since we are in motion to attorneys, you're sitting there quietly. She's our lawyer at hand. Very uh capable has done you people who have been system. You know how helpful she has been always available. We appreciate everything you do. Attorneys for Lynburg City Schools and beyond next door. You have very involved
032in the courts system. One item missing was the board comment. If it's okay with you, can I deviate and do the board comments although it was not part of the regular agenda after superintendent comment? Is that good? I'll go start with Mr. Paul. Uh do you have any comments sir? Uh thank you. Thank you. Uh I want to you know thank uh Lynchburg City Council for the uh appointments and I'm very looking forward to working with each and one of the uh board members. Um you know I have children in the school so if any of them misbehave make sure you tighten up on them. Uh but um but I'm definitely looking forward to the task at hand. Um it's nice to meet you. Um Miss U Majette, I'm here to support and uh I
033just look forward to rolling up my sleeves and getting work done. Thank you. Thank you, sir. Thank you, Dr. Farmer. I'm excited. I'm ready to serve God first and the children and their parents. Yes, ma'am. And this community, we have a lot of work to do. We have a lot of healing to do. And if we take a step back and move forward together, we can accomplish so much more if we just move together. Okay? And I'm ready. Boots on the ground. Always ready. I am boots on the ground. Always ready. Mr. Jim, welcome board members. looking forward to working with you. I'm excited for you in your level of growth. When you take on responsibility, you will grow. And so that's what this opportunity is going to give to you. You have a lot
034of reading to do, a lot of thinking to do. And I think you contribute a lot if you just apply your experience to what can be done in our school system. I'd also uh just challenge you to extend yourself and try to make a make the impact. As we say to the kids, there are no bad questions. So feel free to ask before, during, or after a meeting, before, during, after certain topics uh with the occasional interruption. Not too often hopefully, but be willing to make that impact that you need to make because that's the only way things will change is if you make the difference on purpose. Thank you for your service. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Deborah. Uh to the new board members, welcome. Look forward to working with you. I want to
035say that this was as far as voting goes, this is an anomaly. You will not normally see as many a full uh agreeance to concepts, so don't try not to get used to it. Understand that we're going to be working in uh probably having different opinions. And as far as Miss Jammies goes, uh people like her and I are uh normally excited about finance. Uh this is you're going to glaze over on most of the stuff, but we will walk you through it as best we can. Uh getting excited about finance has always been something people were surprised about with me. So there's a lot to do. The learning curve is going to be great, but you're going to be able to do fine. Uh you come with an amazing level and array of talents.
036So I wish you the best. And as uh Mr. Jalo said, um we're here and it's all about open communication as best as you can do it. and I look forward to working with you. Thank you. Have a great day. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Carter. Yes. I'd just like to first of all welcome the new board members and um I remember a year ago I was sitting in that seat and I was kind of just spinning like, okay, what do I do now? And did I really intend to do this? But after the first year, I'll tell you, it has been so rewarding. And just look forward to. I'm g be honest with you. Some of the things that you want, you're going to have to fight for because there's going to be difference
037of opinion. There's going to be resistance. Um there's going to be things that just aren't we aren't ready or prepared. So, let's be ready to work together. I like what you said. If we work together, then we can overcome a lot of things. I am so excited about our new superintendent and I look so forward. Um I was hard on her in the interview. Oh, you was? Yes, I was. Yes, I mean, you know, cuz it was so important that we got the right one. And and um and I wasn't the only one that was difficult, Mr. Depal and Mr. Um, but every question that we thought would be a challenge, she answered with such fluidity and confidence that like, okay, wait a minute, I didn't expect that. So, I look really forward and I
038got a feeling that this is going to be a banner um, next five years. Look forward, like I say, working with some of you gentlemen are already been assigned to some committees that I'm a part of and just be ready to roll your sleeves up and get the work done for the children. This is Lowry. Yes. Again, I echo welcome new members. Um my role here as an educator, I still I'm a certified teacher still till 2031. So I still tutor kids in the SUL system. But um but yeah, it's it's going to be a challenge, but it's a welcome challenge. This seat I feel is the Lord's seat and he put me here for a reason. And I mean to answer him completely and fully and doing his will and that's for these kids
039to learn, to grow, work with our business partners, work with other um community members to push forward to see what we can do to help children so that everybody from parents to teachers that administration, everybody feels valued. So, yep, I'm here. If you have questions or anything, please feel free to ask. I'm pretty much an open book. So, and again, welcome everybody to Tim and welcome to Superintendent We appreciate you. Thank you, Mrs. Larry. Thank you. Want to say we're glad that we are able to come and be part of this wonderful body and I hope that we will be able to accomplish some good things together. uh good part of my life of serve as a pastor working with adults and of course spent some time during the summer with kids. But it's a
040nicer opportunity here to be able to hone in on a more direct level working with kids on an academic level. And I'm hoping that as we work together as a team, we'll be able to accomplish a lot of things together. As we always say, the kids are the most important individuals in the world and these are the ones that are transitioning to make us and take us to the next level. So, I hope that we can pour into them with all the energy that we have to be able to make sure that they're going to succeed and be successful as we move into the next generation. So, I'm here to learn. This is the new thing and we're going to try to get in here and glean from some of you guys that have been
041here for a while. and I hope to be able to pick up some things along the way and see if we can push the cart down the road a little further. So, thank you very much for welcoming us. Thank you, Mr. Be. It's an honor to be here. Uh I love what I'm hearing. The key word I keep hearing is listen and learn. And that's what I'm here to do. I'm with you on that one. And so, uh I have a lot to learn and I think I've just spoken to enough of you to know I think I have some people that I can learn from that have a lot to offer. uh this community. And so I'm excited about that opportunity. I have four boys in a school system all the way from high
042school all the way down to elementary. And uh but I'm here for every student, not just my students, not just the ones I like, not just the ones I know, not just the ones that are in my my home, but every student. And so I I'm excited to come to the table to fight for them. Thank you. And last but not least is mine. Uh I welcome you all with open heart. I think uh council has made the right decision and uh and I think we are ready to work together to make this district a better place. Uh with Dr. in that seat um you really impressed and you know I'm not going to mention that on camera uh what happened in a close session uh but uh some of you were there and you
043are impressive and I think it's it's real impressive. if it's not fake impressive. So, you mean what you mean and you have a team here of uh personnel throughout the school district who are willing and able to do it. And you got now they put parents in there who can help you out and provide you real feedback. But I'm not here to fight. So, I'm going to here to work together to make a change in that. We changed a lot of discipline policies last year and this year we got to make sure the enforcement is consistent and I mean underline consistent across the school district and when a school board makes a policy school board expects an implementation of that policy across the school district. That's how we'll bring the discipline. Once we bring discipline
044academic environment will be there for kids to learn and when kids learn they will flourish. Mrs. says now I hope you're shaking your head ma'am and telling me yes that that's the way to do it and we are we are not in business of being goofy because that's we are role model for these kids so if you do goofy things here that kids watch it and they'll replicate that then how can I expect kids to be disciplined in the school system but to me um discipline is very important because that's the crux of the root cause of the problem which will raise help teachers to do their job which is to teach states. So the enforcement of those policies will be on you but the board will be has uh your back and we will
045fully support you in doing what needs to be done to lift those academic standards. Thank you. We need to go back to that be the top 100 high school in the United States we used to be. We need to take this so scores beyond 50% to neighboring school district is about 70%. We got to raise that standard. There's no excuses. as um one of your principles says no excuses. Uh I'm not going to name that. You know what I'm talking about. So we got to have no excuses to raise those standards. And I think that's an expectation. I'm sh seeing shaking heads, right? So it means it's an expectation across the board and that's the will of the board. Okay. But we appreciate you everything you do and u we look forward to working with
046you. Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you. Next one is the uh uh close session. There's a notice for closed meeting. Um let me see if I can read it. Uh the school board chair recommends school board approve a motion to convene in closed meeting to discuss the following as permitted by Virginia Code 2.2-3711A1. Discussion of assignment, appointment, promotion, performance, demotion, salary, discipline or resignation of the superintendent and specific administrative positions. Is there a motion to go into close session? Motion. Second. Uh, Mr. Con, Mr. Depal, Madam Clerk, would you please call the role? Mr. Baron, yes. Mr. Alen, yes. Mrs. Lowry. Mr. Lowry? Yes. Yes. Mr. Connor? Yes. Dr. Gupta. Yes. Mr. Depal. Yes. Mr. Jal. Yes. Dr. Farmer. Yes. Mr. Poe. Yes. Motion carries 9 to zero. Thank you. In close session.
047We'll go upstairs and we'll come back. Yes. [Music]