RPS School Board Work Session - June 2, 2025

001here. Mr. Ricard here, Mr. Farooq here. Mr. Hedgepath here. Mr. Rizzy here. Dr. Harris Muhammed present. Mr. Burke here. Mr. Jafari here. Mr. Fernandez here. Aborn. Now we'll move forward with our pledge of allegiance and moment of silence. Um, Mr. Faru, could you lead us in the pledge of allegiance? I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. and now we'll have our translation services announcement. Good evening and welcome on behalf of the language justice team. We do have interpretation available into Spanish both in person and through Zoom. If you need interpretation, please uh see us at the table in the back. And please remember to speak uh slowly and clearly. I will

002now make the same announcement in Spanish. Gracias. Thank you. Before we adopt the agenda, I believe that there is an amendment. Thank you, Madam Chair. I move that the school board of the city of Richmond amend the agenda to add item 4.08. Discuss the format for public comment when the number of registered speakers would exceed the amount of time otherwise allotted for public comment and adopt the agenda as amended. Second. It's been moved by Mr. Perl and seconded by Mr. Hedgepath. Madame Clerk. Mr. Persal. Yes. Mr. Card. Yes. Mr. Farooq. Yes. Mr. Hedgepath. Yes. Mr. Rizzy. Yes. Dr. Harris Muhammed. Yes. M. Burke. Yes. Mr. Javari. Yes. Miss. Fernandez. Yes. Motion passes. Thank you. Moving right along to point uh 2.01. Receive an update on goal eight attendance. Uh Mr. Thank you, Madam Chair. I

003am thrilled to call up our fine folks from the office of engagement and also to welcome back Danielle. Welcome back. Good evening. Thank you. Um, thank you, school board chair Fernandez, school board members, and superintendent cameras. We are always excited to be here and share our good work. And yes, shout out to our chief being back. We are super excited to have Dr. Greenville back in the office. Um, super super excited. So, we're here to talk a little bit about attendance. I have Charles Paige with me, our director of family engagement. All right, so headline y'all, we are down chronic absenteeism 4.15%. Super super super excited to see our continue to trend down. Something I want to point out here, we're at day 162. This is the most recent data for this particular presentation, so

004it doesn't capture the last few days of of school. Um but something that I think is really cool here. So last year as you can see um on day 162 we were at 23.65 on at the end of last school year we actually ended at 22.3 which is really really cool and I want I want to point out that was without fit. It's super important to know that that was without flexible instruction. So that's super cool um to know that. So awesome job um from our team um in the work that's being done across the division, but you can see where we fall with flexible instruction time um as a uh a strategy to help us get our numbers. So we're super excited about what we're um here. This is just a slide about our

005subgroups. Again, in this particular presentation, we did not include fit here. Um but you can see where we ended at day 62 across these subgroups. What's super cool here is our students with disabilities and the trend that we're seeing here. Um, great numbers, great movement, and also our black students, right? We are seeing some some movement here. So, we're again super excited. It's working the things that we're doing. Um, I know everyone wants us if we could flip a switch or wave a wand, we would love to do it, but we know it takes time and we're just super excited that over the years we're seeing a trend with our data going in. So, we're just excited about that. I'm going to turn it over to Mr. Paige. Thank you. And I'll be jumping into

006our cluster data. So, for cluster one, um, two of the schools that I would love to highlight would one be Marsh, um, who seen significant decreases of over 10% in their chronic absenteeism rate this year. What's even better about that decrease, and I know it's not shown here, and we'll make sure to provide you guys with the data, but as far as flexible instruction time, they were almost able to increase it another 10% which is amazing. Um the other school that I would like to highlight on this list is definitely Fairfield who also even though we do see some increases they also did show some great gains when they started employing flexible instruction time. I know that that's not the way that we want to see decreases in chronic absenteeism. But when it comes to

007flexible instruction time you see the greatest impact when you're targeting the right students. And that's what we saw at Henry Marsh as well as so next is cluster number two. The school that I would like to highlight on this one would one be Swansboro. I just want to note that they are a smaller population school. So that increase that you're seeing um is only a few students opposed to some of our schools that have larger populations. So that impact was not as high as in some of our schools with higher enrollment. Um, another school that I would love to also highlight on this list, um, would be Oakrove, who is a 200 day school who's also showing some decreases in their overall numbers. Um, as well as when we look into flexible instruction time, those

008numbers continue decrease. So, for cluster three, the schools that I do want to highlight would be one MK in River City specifically. They hit the ground running this year. You see that by their numbers. Um, and then where you're seeing an increase in bushall. One thing that did happen this year is um we had one of our family liaison who had to go out on leave for a short period of time as well as transitions in the front office which kind of impacted their number. And then finally for cluster number four um the school that I definitely want to hire highlight is John Marshall. Um, John Marshall has one of the highest decreases in chronic absenteeism this school year, which is amazing. Um, you look at their flexible instruction time, they were also targeting the

009right students. And then even with their graduation rate being 100%, it's a real testament to the turn of or the shift in the culture that has been created in that. Um, so super excited about that movement as well. And then when it comes to uh Franklin military and open, it's kind of very similar, small enrollment. um but still very comfortable uh with how small they'll be. And then as far as the summer of 2025, we just want to let you guys know some of the things that we're looking to do. Um so one thing that we are going to be focusing heavy on is the professional development of our family liaison. Um sorry I skipped one. I'm going to start off with summer support. Uh so for summer support we're going to be supporting summer

010school as well as OST programs. We are switching to, and Daryl's going to speak about this in a second, we're switching to a regional model. And one of our goals is to have all of our teams be the regional advocates for their communities. So, they should be the experts. They should know about the programs, the opportunities um to increase access for their region specifically. Well, he already hit the regional model stuff, but I will share about so our uh development. So every Thursday we're going to pull our team together, make sure they get professional development around these strategies and things that we want to do this year. We have a lot that we want to do around engagement and attendance. So we're excited to do that um with our team. Also engagement packets this summer.

011So something we've we've been working with school leaders in the past about you know developing your engagement strategy across the year. U we're going to really lean on our family liaison and our coordinators to really help build that. We have lots of ideas that we'll spin off of open house leveraging fit title one PFB funds but we want to make sure we're we're we're doing all we can and there's no blanket one thing that we can do. So we want to really um incorporate some campaigns and make this a strong effort around this issue and something that I hold very dear to my heart. I love uh fellowships very much that has created a lot of access for me. So this summer we will have about from like five to seven fellows um which is

012a really exciting opportunity. We will have fellows from UVA as well as an intern that we had last year that we were able to provide another opportunity uh to as well. And then we also have one to two um RPS alum that might also be joining us as well. So super excited for that collaboration this summer. They're going to be supporting us with a lot of u building out the systems that we have created this year and really starting to systematize them um so that we can hit the ground running even faster than we did this year. Thank you all as well. Mr. Farooq, Miss Ricard, Miss Rizzy. Thank you. I have a two-part question. One is what are some from your experiences, what are some of the useful things when it comes to community

013engagement um not just from parents but perhaps other institutions or organizations or people in the area around the school? and two, do you mind commenting a little bit about some of the increases we saw in absenteeism, especially um at Mlenny and Henderson? Thank you. Um so I just want to make sure I'm answering questions properly. You want to know about the increases from Mlenny and Henderson and then as well as how do we engage the community essentially for authentic community collaboration? Gotcha. I think the biggest thing that I think about when I think about community collaboration is increased access to opportunities. So whether that's OST programs, whether that's mental health services, all of those different industries, um I think that that is where the collaboration makes life a lot easier. We always look at things

014from the lens of removing barriers and that's pretty much how we like to create our partnerships. We identify barriers that our families are having um and we look to remove those barriers to the best of our and then in regards to a school like MLenny where they were seeing some increases there was a lot that could have impacted our increases for this year especially considering all of the different things that ended up happening whether that was u the water crisis the weather a lot of irregularities in the overall school year and I really think that that is a bigger impact u across the board where you're seeing a lot of those in some of the schools where you're seeing u increases you'll see that those are walking communities like a Fairfield uh so I I

015would kind of just think about the nature of this year was just very different for us um which might have impacted our chronic rates at summer ask a clarifying question you said that um the water crisis and um weather could have been reasons, but that doesn't count against students. So, can you elaborate on what you mean by that? So, as far as like you say count against students, what do you mean terms of like if we cancel schools then it wouldn't be counted as an absenteeism for students? Correct. Um correct. So, if we canceled schools, yes. However, we see that whenever there is a half day or an interruption to like regularly scheduled um schooling, then the days that come before well, excuse me, particularly right after it, we tend to see a drop in

016in um in attendance. So, if there's any disruption to the reg the the our best weeks are the weeks that are regular Monday through Friday, no half days, no holidays, no um interruptions. And so particularly for walking communities where you have you see mlenny they have a large population that come from a community that I am blanking on the name of but I know it I promise. Um they you would see an uptick particularly on days after um weather is bad and then also we had a disruption to our school schedule. So usually the days following interrupted schooling does have an impact on chronic absenteeism. Thank you for clarifying. And the only other point that I wanted to add to that is we were returning back from winter break where we're already seeing decreased 88

017average daily attendance. So with that interruption and then trying to get everyone back in speed back to speed another week later I think that that also created some of the instability. Micard. Thank you Madam Chair. Um I appreciate that. um honey and Henderson. I guess when I was looking at this data yesterday, I was looking at district two schools and they struggled this year. Um so Dogwood had a 12% they went from 9.6 chronic absenteeism to 21%. Carver went from 44 to 50%. Richmond success did come down a lot, but it's still high. went from 86 to 61, which is phenomenal. That's 25%. And Fox also increased by a very small margin. And what I just want to add about Fox is with the new school opening, it's going to be a flip in communities

018who can walk. So right now, if a student in Randolph misses the if a student in Randolph wakes up, they can walk to school. If they miss the bus, how are they going to get to school next year? Um, so I think in general just concerned about those schools and I didn't know if there was a further explanation um or maybe what strategies even that we can help communicate to those schools as well or support you. Um, so I could start off with Dogwood. Dogwood is a school that we did notice the slippage especially year-over-year. One thing that we're looking to do in this upcoming school year, and you'll hear it with most of the schools that you mentioned, we're going to be changing our approach at those schools as well. So, I know that

019at Dogwood, we as we're moving to our new regional model, Dogwood will be one of our hubspaces, which means that we'll have engagement personnel in that building regularly as well. Um, another thing that has been in the works is I know that they've been working with NextB about incorporating more OST programs. I've had a lot of conversations with them talking through how we can best support the school and figure out how we can paint the whole picture of the student. So, what does their attendance look like? How does that impact their grades? Like, is their OST program that they're participating in impacting how they're engaging in the school building? So, we're going to be doing a few cool things with Dogwood to see and identify some of those causes that might have caused this increase

020over this past year. And I can speak to Carver Uh Carver, the community has seen a significant amount of violence this year and we know that impacts our families, especially those with young children, little children, elementary school. Um and we know unfortunately some families or children may have seen some of these things actually happen. Um and those things there it's a web and there's a trickle effect and there's a lot that goes on with that as we try to just let families know that we're a safe space that we care. We still bring bring your child, right? But a lot of, you know, if you're walking or however you get to school could be an impact as well. And there's a a significant amount of turnover there um with key players at Harvard. Um it's

021we've seen it. We would love to retain people, you know, every year. We have good folks that come there. Um but that is also uh I would say part of the issue there. And then also in terms of solutions for Carver, we've been in close collaboration with the V um ECU's office of engagement um meeting on a bi-weekly basis with them pl we're planning and um to figure out what we can do something bring back things along lines of Carver promise which was something that worked um phenomenally and years ago and so seeing what we can do to ramp that up with the office of um community engagement. We also will be having a family leaison. At the time, Carver um the person who was working with Carver was split between multiple schools. They will

022have a dedicated family liaison five days a week in their building in response um to make sure that we're really trying to to bring them in. Richmond Success Academy. Thank you for acknowledging that it is a it is a significant decrease. However, we are not satisfied in any way, shape, or form as it relates to Richmond Success Academy. It is still much too high. Um and so we have been working in collaboration with um principal Chetum as well as um the individual who will be overseeing Richmond Success Academy. And so we're going to have um one person who's looking at our non-traditional schools um and really digging deep there. Um so that will be that's kind of the the area that we're working with because we've made great strides. We want to continue to make

023great strides for those students that are present. um with Fox. That's something that I stopped by before I went on maternity leave and had a chat with Principal Jacobs about. Um we did shift some personnel there um to to find someone that we think that would be really suitable for for their community. Um so we have been in collaboration um and had discussions about what we can do thinking about once we are not within walking distance of the Randolph community, how can we make sure that this small increase does not turn into a drastic increase but rather we see a decrease next year. So we're we're on it. I promise. Thank you all so much for your care of these schools. Thank you Miss Rizzy and then Mr. Edge. Thank you Madam Chair. Uh yeah,

024I um had the same question about Dogwood. Um so thank you for helping with that one. Um and when you talk about VCU's Department of Engagement, I mean I work pretty closely with them full-time. And one thing I've been asking them, um and I will bring it up again, especially with service learning classes at VCU, is that the students who go into our schools receive um adequate training. Um I think in the past they've just signed up for service learning and they've just gone in and that's not always been effective. So I I definitely on both ends are going to be working with that. Okay. Um and then I just want to know more about the regional model. Um you didn't really go into depth about what that is and what you hope to see

025as a result of it. Yeah, excited to do that. So, this past school year, our our liaison were not they were kind of spread around. Like you may have a school on the south side, but then you might have a school all the way on the east end or north. It just didn't work um as far as stretching how we're stretching them like to drive all across town, etc. And it's just it could be a little more difficult to really be an expert in that particular region when you're just bouncing around, right? So we wanted some continuity and we thought our teams would be a lot stronger and be able to really deliver the services that are required. If you are if you own a region you know so if you are in the east

026end that is where you are does not mean that you won't be pulled or we may need you for you know um other things but you will be the expert in that particular region. So if you have eastn schools, you will be in the east. You should know all the schools, right? Know all the supports in that area, etc. Um so that's why we were doing it. We just felt like this would be a easier for our team to manage, but also we would be able to to deliver um better quality services to our families. To give a specific example to roll off of that, we had one family leazison who was supporting JB Fischer, River City, and Mary Mford. those are wildly different communities. And so when we were looking at um you know

027strategizing um when I came in and we looked at the map, we just really decided that it would make sense for our folks to be cultural experts, to know the community partners, to know all of um the families, be able to follow students from elementary school to middle school to high school um and not necessarily have um you know disconnectedness in terms of the services that they were offering. And so this is a way for them to be able to collaborate. It would allow our principles to collaborate even more. You know, you have the principal for Carver that's going to work with the principal at Albert Hill who's going to be working with the principal at TJ because we have a through line in terms of our team members supporting them. And so we really

028just wanted to make sure that our folks were um given all of the tools necessary to really be cultural experts um and kind of be the you know boots on the ground sort of team rather than ziplining across the city. Um our city is amazing. It is wildly different. Um and so we wanted to really allow our folks to dig deep um in the work that they were doing in the in the specific regions that they have. I just want to add one more point to that specifically about the southside because we broke it up into two very intentionally. So we have five regions. It's going to be north, south, well north, east, west, west, northeast, and north. Just wanted to south, sorry, southeast and south. It's okay. It's Monday. Mr. Hedgepath and then Miss

029Burke. And then Mr. Jafar. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you very much for the the report. The you know high level view of it is really good news. So appreciate that. Um I have two questions. One that relates back to Miss Ricards about buses. Um Yugenot High School in particular. I know I've spoken to administration. I've witnessed it myself of the unreliability of buses sometimes with arrivals. Um I wonder is there a correlation with the days that our a number of our kiddos are absent? um with the say um you if we have an issue with the bus uh that day um you know if that has been checked into and if not if that could be something that we we do um at this time I'm not quite sure if there is a direct

030correlation but that is something that we can look into and follow up on. Thank you. And then my my other question is about the fit. If uh if we were to add the flexible time to the Hugenot score and to some of those that are um in the red right now, would that move them to the green? What does that look like? Yes, it would. Um so we um will make sure we have a another presentation that we weren't able because we didn't have the data in time for the presentation upload. Um so I will make sure that you get that information in your inbox before the end of today. Thank you and welcome back. Thank you, Miss Burke. Thank you, Madam Chair. Um, my question is I like the idea of not traveling all

031over the city being the expert, which I think you all do well no matter where you are. My concern is just as you stated as well, Southside may be totally different than the west end, the east end totally different than the north side, but we're on the same side of the river. oftentimes there are services being offered in other areas. Let's say the east end has something that maybe the north side needs but the north side doesn't know anything about it. So my question is when you have your your meetings or your professional development sessions when is there an opportunity to share okay um this family doesn't have any water this is who I call this just something to that extent I'm asking for another reason. So, is there an opportunity to find out? Do

032you have a list of what services are in place? And if there's something that we haven't talked about because I'm only in the east end, I can't hear what's going on across the river. So, are there any opportunities for that discussion? Um, at the end of the day, we're one band, one sound, um, Miss Burke. And so the way that our um regional model will work is while we do have regional teams, our coordinators are always in collaboration and then every other week we have an all um family and community engagement team meeting where all of the regions will be coming together to serve uh in terms of information sharing and um knowledge sharing. But also I want to highlight our block which is something that um our office has been working on and I'm

033just going to let Charles talk about it a little bit. Um, so we are in the process. We do have a list, but we are in the process of making sure that it is thorough, it is correct. You can, um, and he'll talk to you about how you can go online and see a click on a school and see all of the services and community organizations by school, not just by region, that are available to support those schools. I can do that as well. So our block is through TNTP which uh it's essentially I think the best way of explaining it is like a Google map and you're able to click on a school but schools are called collections. So you're able to build out collections for schools of community resources. So when you click

034into that collection which could be a broad rock you click into broad rock and you see all of the resources that are in their location and that can be far that can be wide and then that is also a collaborative space for families to also engage in it as well. So we're working through like the QR code so that families can scan talk about the resources that they're seeing and the best part about this application um is that they do all the vetting. So it's not just like people are just putting stuff on there. they're being reviewed. They're making sure that all of the content is there. So, if we were to do like a food refrigerator that was at one location, but it's not active anymore, there's going to be a way of doing

035like reoccurring checkpoints to make sure that that information is still relevant as well. But it's not really uh when we're talking about the access to resources and the one band ones down, if an if a resource isn't in one area, we should be able to identify it in another area. but the closest resource to that and our principles have received training on our block so we will they're they're well aware and we're hoping to launch it very soon forward to seeing that I would love to see that real time as well Mr. Jar thank you madam chair want thank thank thank you guys for the updates overall numbers continue to speak to the improvement that I work with. My question kind of around the family I do get the opportunity to talk with Mr. Allen

036over the south side and I did hear you reference the impact there in absence of one of the family liaison had on driving the numbers up. But I was kind of curious, you know, what happens in those instances. Uh is there somebody else that can handle that case load? What are the numbers that are assigned to them? Uh are they capped? How do we arrive at how many people each one of those family leaison is assigned to manage? So we take a team approach u most times. So he is part of a team with Nilda. So Nilda is the coordinator there. So what she does, she meets with her team every week and discusses that was Mr. Holmes. Mr. Holmes was out. So she would talk about his case load especially around any plans that

037needed to be done in the system, any other type of coverage for his SAS meetings, etc. Whether she's filling in herself or she's having another liaison step in. Yes, it can spread people a bit thin because they already have their own assignments, but they do a pretty good job with the team approach and spreading it out. So, if she has five people and let's say he has kind of 25 plans that need to be done, she will just divide that up equally amongst the team and then they just continue to talk and work and triage together. So, it's been we get the job done, but that's typically the approach. I just want to note that they worked really diligently and I feel like if they hadn't taken that team approach, we might have seen a

038much higher chronic absenteeism rate um at that school. So, we're it's we're working on it, but he's back. We've got a new model. We we shouldn't have that as as an issue for next year hopefully. Yes. So, um there is no round number. Um the way that we kind of look at it is no one in the district unfortunately has equal workloads. So a teacher teaching you know second grade at Mumford does not have the same workload as a teacher teaching second grade I don't know where over B Shepard right um and so what we try to do is in terms of managing loads is we try to pair um schools especially under this new regional model where maybe one person may have a lighter load at one school we're looking to pair them with

039a heavier load at another school to balance it out so no one is ending up with two schools which may have um very low naturally occurring chronic absenteeism rates. Um so there's no actual number or round number, but what ends up happening is we try to communicate. we have our regular team meetings if someone is feeling overloaded and that's why we have those teams that they're able to spread the work out to other individuals who may be ahead um in in an attempt to make sure that we're supporting each other and no one person is too far drowned in in terms of assignments. I just like to say um job well done. see the percentages going down. Um that shows a commitment not only of your team but of our staff and our students and

040our families. They they want to come to school. That's what that says. And so thank you all for your commitment and um your hard work. I have no doubt that you guys will bring it down even further this time next year. And um excited to hear about um how you all are reimagining ways of doing things. It's just um great job. Thank you. Oh, but acronyms, please. No acronyms in your presentation. Thank you. All right, moving right along. Budget items 3.01 receive for first read final fiscal year 2026 operating and CIP budgets. Thank you, Madam Chair. CIP is capital improvement plan. Note that moving on, I am thrilled to bring forward to you our final proposal for the budget for next school year. I'm going to jump to the key takeaways. Uh, obviously we did

041not get all the money that we were hoping for this year. Nowhere even near that. Nonetheless, this final proposal does fully fund all of our collective bargaining agreements with an additional investment of $16.5 million, which includes a 3% raise for all of our teachers. And I think this board should be very proud of that. Um, this was something that was very important to all of us and that we have managed to do. It does also increase some investments in some of our key priorities and dreams for RPS. Not as many as we would like. We simply just did not have the funds. But we were able to increase our focus on literacy and graduation and the unique needs of our multilingual learners with the addition of 55 LEAP teachers, formerly known as ESL teachers. I

042do want to note due to the great work of Dr. Blackwell and the recruitment team, 42 of those 55 are now filled already. So, um, kudos kudos to them. That's pretty extraordinary. To, uh, make all of this happen, we also had to identify reductions. And so, we've identified about 13.7 million in reductions, and I'll share more about that in a minute. Uh and we anticipate some lean years ahead given likely reduced income tax in the Commonwealth of Virginia due to some decisions that are being made at the federal level and that's going to have direct impacts on us. Not to mention other activities going on at the federal level as well. And so our continued and concerted advocacy at the local, state, and federal levels will be absolutely critical going into this next fiscal year.

043I also want to remind the board that property tax revenue will be held at the city uh held constant and since the biggest driver of the increase in the city's revenue is property taxes and thus the biggest source of revenue increase for us is property taxes. that that will directly impact us as well. So, um just preparing everybody for a lean FY27. That being said, let's try to wrap up FY26. I want to uh jump to slide eight, if you will, Matthew. Thank you. I just want to remind everybody what this 16.5 million uh that we've allocated for collective bargaining is going towards. We already talked about the 3% for licensed personnel, which is everybody on teacher contracts, but there are other raises here as well. 1% for facilities, 2 and a half% for care

044and safety. Also, in a separate line item, uh we are increasing care and safety minimum. Uh starting salary to $44,000, which uh is going to help us retain folks. Uh we have as we've discussed been losing folks to the counties. Um 11% for support staff that's uh largely our instructional assistants. Uh the step increase for everybody. Um we've preserved the 3% for principles APS directors etc. Office associates 9% uh for most of them 11% for family liaison we were just talking about and 6% for transportation personnel as well. So, there are a lot of very significant raises in there for staff, uh, not just teachers, and I want to make sure everybody remembers that. I do want to jump down to the reductions on slide 14. And the the one that obviously garnered the most

045discussion our last time around was the vacancies. And so, uh, I'm going to go to slide 15 and walk you through a little bit of background for how we got to those vacancies. Every year, we go through a staff allocation process where we determine based on the state's standards of quality and our own business rules, programmatic changes, how many teachers every building needs, how many counselors, etc. Um we have in the past done that in the September October time frame uh once we know exactly how many kids we have in the building. uh we've gotten better at our projections for the upcoming year and so we are now doing that process in the spring which is a significant improvement for students and staff and families because this way teachers and kids don't get attached to

046each other in August and September and then we have to make changes and I'm sure you've all experienced that either as a parent yourself a teacher yourself or as a board member when you receive those emails and calls from families who are distraught that their child is losing their teacher. Uh so that has been a a great shift. Um I do want to note we at RPS have internal business rules that are more generous that is better for students than the state's SOQ business rules. One example, the state's SOQ's say that K through three classrooms can have no more than 24 students, but at RPS we say they can have no more than 19. that is more expensive, right? Because we have a lower class ratio, but that's important for instruction. Once we've applied all

047these business rules, then we know which school we need to move staff to, which we need to move from. We begin by moving vacant positions first. Then when we have exhausted all of those, we ask for volunteers. Once we have exhausted all those, then we do some administrative transfers. Again, we're letting folks know now rather than the fall so that they can prepare accordingly. I do want to note of all of the changes that have to happen. About twothirds happen through vacancies or volunteers uh which is fantastic uh because that means few actual humans have to move schools. Once we've done all of that, there is typically a few additional positions that we have remaining that we can then put out to schools on top of our own business rules to add even more support.

048Uh this year that was 24 teacher positions uh and three instructional assistant positions. These are vacant positions. In a typical budget year, as as I noted, we would then assign those out to schools to add even more support where it is needed. This year, we are proposing to eliminate them as a budget savings. Of course, we would love to maintain these, but in order for us to present to you a balanced budget, uh this is what we had to propose. We also had a few non-school-based vacancies on slide 17, uh, which you have listed there, which produces a savings of just over $800,000. I do want to note this auditor position that's listed here is not our senior auditor position. That one remains. This is the junior position that has been vacant for uh, 14

049months. Uh, and the primary body of work that was assigned to this position was the student activity fund audits that has been contracted out to Cherry Becker. Uh, and so both given uh the length of the vacancy and that the work has been contracted out um that is why we thought it'd be appropriate at this time to put that forward. I also want to note the crossing guard. We are not in any way diminishing our crossing guard presence. Bit of history. Several years ago, we inherited crossing guard positions from RPD, the police department. These were full-time crossing guard positions. As those uh folks have retired, we have converted the funding into the stipens that we now pay school staff. As a result, we've gone from about 10 crossing guards to about 150 crossing guards. Uh

050so this is just the final uh retirement that we are um aging out and proposing to to eliminate. Um we've also uploaded a document that has answers to the other questions that were asked. Um and I am happy to take any additional questions the board may have at this time. Thank you, Miss RZY. Miss RZY, excuse me, and then Mr. Hitchbath. Um thank you, Madam Chair. I you know I still want to express um concern with eliminating the junior auditor position. Um you know we worked really hard to get that position reinstated. Um you know there have been some issues in the auditing department since um the reason that employee was doing school um activity funds was not completely clear. that was not their primary duty. And I do think that it's important to have

051a very robust auditing department because it's a vital role and it's something that we need. Um I can't imagine downsizing auditing at this point. Um especially because of some of the gaps we've experienced in recent times. So I just want to just express that I'm very uncomfortable with that one cut. Mr. Hedgepath. Thank you, Madam Chair. Um, Mr. Cameress, were the the 16.5 million that is um included for the CBAs, did that include uh benefits as well or is that just salary? It's inclusive of the full cost. Okay. I'm wondering I'd had some feedback from folks about uh the clarity there and like what the cost of the actual CBA would be since like this benefits are not part of our our collective bargaining agreement. Is that generally right but we don't we don't include

052benefits as part of the the negotiation right that's separate. I think um it could be included but it was not part of this the last rounds that we went through. Okay. It's part of the two topics but the cost of the increased like we that's how we match benefits the cost of benefits to the cost of salary. So that's why they're lumped together like that. Is is it possible to have them as two different um numbers even if they're like beside each other just for clarity as far as this is the cost of the salary and then this is the cost of the benefits if they're not part of the CBA. Yes. As a rule of thumb uh benefits are typically about a third if not more in some cases of the overall cost. Okay.

053Madam Chair, I have one more followup, different topic. Um, for the U K3 average for the is it 19 pupils, is that the absolute max or is that the average? because I'm pretty sure that uh some of my schools have more than 19 students in their classroom in kindergarten where um I would ask uh the team to respond to any specifics on that. I would say there are likely a few cases where that is the case given uh like if you have a school where there are let's say 25 uh first graders and we would not be able to afford two classes of 12 and 13 and so yes there would be an excess but we try extremely hard to get that down to 19 everywhere we can. I'm just pretty sure that Southampton has

054a couple of those at least. I do appreciate that. Thank you, Dr. Harris Muhammad. And then Mr. Farooq. Thank you. I would like to revisit my former statement. I recommend that we review our collective bargaining processes, outcomes, and financial responsibility because in 2020 um one when we began discussing the collective bargaining, creating a resolution um one of the things that I don't recall us doing um was obtaining a 5 to 10 year financial outlook of what that would be. Um, at that time it was relieving our teachers of some extra duties and not being able to access their full period of a lunch schedule. Those were the discussions that we were having during the preparation of the resolution for the collective bargaining. it was some other things but also um the point of ensuring that

055we are supporting our classroom teachers when we have when they have to be pulled to cover a class what does that look like and so I think even at the rate that we may be paying them now I can't remember what that rate is but I just would like for us to review that process um holistically what is it going to cost us in 2027 2028 fiscal year. What could it potentially cost us in 2930 school year? Because the federal impact that we're having now, we're not going to see that impact right now. We're going to see that impact financially and how it impacts our classrooms the next three to five years. So then the second thing um is Mr. Camerons, do we have an ant anticipated date to receive any updates from the outside

056firm that has picked up the junior auditor task? And if those and if we have received an update, I apologize. Just let me know where I could go find that on board or do. Thank you. I'm I am not certain of the answer to that, but I will get it for you. And on the first point you made, Dr. Harris Muhammad, I think is an excellent one. I do want to note this coming school year, this coming fiscal year is the last year of our first contract with teachers and other licensed personnel, which means next fiscal year. FY27 would be the first year of a new contract. We will have to grapple with the very real fiscal reality that we are facing as we enter into those negotiations which frankly will be challenging as of

057course everybody on the stasis wants to give as much as we possibly can to our educators. I think we are going to confront some very real limitations on our ability to do so as we enter into those negotiations. follow up and to your point I think it would be healthy for us to begin navigating how we're going to have those convers or the administration will have those conversations so we can port so we can support those conversations because it is going to be devastating I foresee financially it's going to be different and then also um because the close out is getting ready to happen for the school year I am certain that and I know you're going to look into it I'm certain that the student activity funds have already been audited or should be

058closing that auditing process June June the 30th. So I appreciate that. Thank you Mr. Farooq. Thank you Madam Chair. I welcome a discussion of how we continue to manage our resources which could be shrinking. Just to continue the conversation briefly about collective bargaining. I'm sure that no one knows the constraints that public aiation, excuse me, public education has been under better than our staff who have to deal with it day in and day out, not just in the classroom, but in central office, you know, in the buses, in after school activities. So, I'm sure that our staff who are involved in collective bargaining are acutely aware of the financial constraints and I I for one think it's been helpful for me to have collective bargaining partners where we can always check in and say, you

059know, what are you hearing? What's the feedback you're getting? And I think we also have a lot of growing to do. It's still a relatively new process for all of us. So, just wanted to make a few of those points. Thank you, Madam Chair. Mr. Peral. Thank you, Madam Chair. Uh, two questions and I'll pause in between for response. Um, thank you, Mr. Cameras, for the budget. Could somebody elaborate on page 18 under other revenue, we have a $3 million historic tax credit. Is that actual revenue that we're seeing? When I see something along the lines of a credit, I don't think actual revenue, but is that actual revenue? And since it's reported in the description as a single year, and I'm assuming this would be coming from the city, that represents a third of

060of the bump that we got this year. So, first, yes, it is actual revenue. It's a credit to the entity that buys it against their tax liability. Uh, but we realize it um as a revenue source. In short, because the renovation of Fox is a historic property, we were allocated uh credits and then we sell those credits to another entity and we receive the revenue from that. It is a one-time source. Uh it's not from the city, but it is a one-time source, meaning that we will experience next year as a loss of $3 million. That is that is where we are at this at this moment in time. Very concerning. Thank you for that. Uh my other question uh page 75 under the financial section and we had quite a bump in the finance

061area for clerical $439,000 to $860,000 a $421,000 jump 95% jump um is there some context around that one I would ask Miss Braga to come up and speak to if she can or Miss Chain but we may need time to review and get you that information. She's here. She's just looking it up. If you don't mind if we could give her a minute and we'll come back to that. Absolutely. Page 75. Thank you, Mr. Card. Thank you, Madam Chair. Um, Superintendent, I thank you for the answers to the questions that you included. Um, I just wanted to point out to our colleagues that, um, $8.4 million that is funded this year is in one-time funds. And so that is things for instance that um helped cover and safety associates costs included um maintaining all our

062seal partners onetoone nursing services. So that is money we're kind of robbing Peter to pay Paul so to speak. Not really but we're we're not going to have it next year and that's concerning because that's a large amount of money. It is kicking the can down the road. Most definitely. Um, but we really felt that it was paramount to not experience any layoffs this year and meet our collective bargaining commitments and make some of the investments that frankly we just know we need to continue the forward progress that we've had. Uh and so yes, it it does defer that liability till next year. Um but uh you know, I would not have brought that forward to you if I didn't think it was the best possible route forward at this time. Miss Rizzy. Thank you,

063Madam Chair. And this question is prompted by the question that Mr. Pival just asked. Um, and I know that these are funds, they're one-time funds. They're not um, you know, something that we can rely on for multiple years, but isn't it possible that we'll get a pretty good source of revenue from um, the tech center once we start construction on that through historic text? That is certainly a possibility, though we would not realize the revenue from that until the completion of the project. So, we're probably talking FY28 or 29. Any other questions, colleagues? Mr. Pival, just as a follow and superintendent cameras, I'm happy to take the answer to that question by email. Thank you. All right. I'm just reminding everyone that this is the first read, so an opportunity for us to share feedback,

064ask questions. Mr. Camers, I do want to note the vote is expected tomorrow because we must have a budget by June 30th. I do also want to lift up Miss Rizz's concern about the auditor position and just would love guidance from the board one way or the other. I don't know if that is a widely shared view or not. You don't need to. Um well, actually, you do need to tell me tonight because I got to make an adjustment and um I just wanted to make sure we honored that um that concern. Yeah, something I was going to raise. Um but as I was saying, this is our opportunity to really give feedback, ask questions because we are scheduled to vote on this tomorrow. Uh so, Dr. Mr. Harris Muhammad and then Mr. Farooq. So

065if we have already contracted the task out then I wouldn't see this is for me. I wouldn't see the purpose of maintaining that budget excuse me that position in this fiscal line item for the upcoming school year. I think discussions could be I'll that's okay. I'll further your thought when it's my turn. Mr. Farooq. Thank you, Madam Chair. Um, quick question. We have many RPS staff that are looking at the budget and excited about some of the increases in compensation. So, I have gotten a few questions about when people look through the document, they're looking at, you know, where's the 3% increase for licensed personnel and they're looking in different places. And so, I often get questions of why is this number like this? Why is that number like that? So, I emailed Mr. Cameas

066this question because it's kind of long, but I'll just quickly mention it that the 3% raise for licensed personnel is roughly 8 million. But on different pages, like on page 26, you see it there under personnel services. But on page 27 for instructional staff, you only see about 1.6 million. On page 29, the chart shows about 7.4 million for instruction. So, um, any explanation from staff? It doesn't have to be today, but tomorrow that can explain for the public why does this number look different in different places? Thank you. Absolutely, Mr. Hitchb. I would all like to also Thank you, Madam Chair. By the way, um, Miss or Dr. Harris Muhammad brought up a good point about the contracted services. Is that service contracted for this fiscal year or the following fiscal for for our

067FY26? And if if it's not contracted for FY26, then I would be in support of Miss Rizzy's uh uh point and keeping the junior auditor position. uh if if the if the the services are contracted for FY26 then I think that that's an appropriate avenue as well uh just so this work is being done one way or another. Thank you. It is budgeted for next year. Yes, Miss Rizzie. Thank you Madam Chair. I want to come back to that you know school activity fund should not have been the sole job of any one auditor. In fact, there were problems with the fact um that this took too long and that it took too much time away from our auditors. It was contracted out because our chief auditor needed help and asked because he was a

068team of one. He needed help and had it contracted out. So, it was a necessity for that one minute one person. Um by far that should not be any one auditor's soul job. There's a lot of work to be done in the auditing department and a lot of work more work than for two people. So I don't want this to look like school activity funds is a sole responsibility of a that's all that any one auditor is responsible for. It's a very small part. And so um I just want to clarify that. Any thoughts to that Mr. Cameron's comments? I I think that's accurate. Um the student activity fund should be a small part of any one individual's work. I think in the past it had become the primary uh responsibility and I I can't

069speak to exactly why that was but um it it had taken quite some time. Uh I think Mr. Rzzy is correct. There's certainly plenty of work to go around. I'm just reflecting on the the time it's been vacant, the time it's going to take to fill it, not wanting to remove the $100,000 that we have budgeted for the SAF student activity fund um audit from the budget in the event that we don't have somebody in this role in time to conduct that audit. And so uh again I this is not a um all else being equal I would think we should keep this position. We were trying to to make do with with very limited uh resources and so on balance given how long it's been vacant um this was something that we thought would

070be appropriate. Thank you Mr. Cameras. I I um I share some of those concerns with my colleagues, but I also understand that um we are short on time and there's a lot of um budgetary expenses that are being realigned and so um this particular line item is $125,000 and if we don't see or have a purview into um someone in the near future. I think it would be best for us since we already have something in place for this up and cominging fiscal year to move forward with removing it as a lineup. Should we vote on it? In terms of uh I just want to get a pulse check from the board members on which way or another you guys are leaning because that would if the majority would like to then you're going to

071have to adjust. So, I just want to get a pulse check of, you know, who all is in agreement with um removing it and who all is in agreement with keeping it. Before that, Miss I think Miss Burke has a comment or question. Thank you, Madam Chair. I just want to make sure that I'm clear on um just want to hear it restated per se and then I'll share why if I may. So we're would you repeat exactly what is in the on the table right now? Yes. What I would like to do um is get a pulse check of um all of my colleagues position on removing this particular um audit as a line item. One of our colleagues has raised concerns about wanting to keep it in and I don't want to ignore

072that. So, we've had conversation around it and so I want to get a basic understanding of who is in support of keeping this line item um for the removal from the budget or who would like for it to remain in the budget because what that's going to do is require for the administration to find another $125,000 to cut somewhere else and then they'll need to do that by tomorrow. May I follow up? Yes. Um, and the reason I'm I'm just reflecting because I've been on the board since 2017. We've now had a solid that department has not really been solid because we enhanced that when at one time there were four or five people in that department, but um another administration decided wasn't necessary. And that's we really haven't caught up. you know, once you

073get behind, it's hard to get caught up. So, what I'm trying to get clear on is right now you stated that we have contracted someone out to do what needs to be done, right? So, the we just whether it's somebody that's has contracted out or whether the person is in place, we must get that department straight. We should we we must get it straight. If it means we need to hire someone, then we just need to find $125,000 someplace. I mean, at the end of the day, because we're that that department, we're not strict. You can't continue to to work for my not my opinion, that's a fact. You can't continue to work if you don't know what you have just as we're going through this budget right now. So, either we have that person

074in place or we have that contracted company, but that's going to stay one or the other. That's only for this up and cominging fiscal year. That's what my question is. That's what I wanted to be clear on. So, this decision right now is whether to hire a person. Um, financially, it's about the same thing then, right? The contract is $100,000 and the position pays $125,000. The same amount. Close. Not the same. You said 100 and then 125. Yes, ma'am. Well, then we hire somebody for 100. We can't change that. Okay, I'm ready to vote and I'm going to vote in favor of hiring someone in that position because we we must we must. I'm in agreement with what Mrs. Rizzy stated as well only because of knowing the history and we don't want to go

075backwards. So whether it's a company or whether it's it's some I really think a person needs to be in place and student activity funds is not an easy task to complete. I mean, I've been in many of them and had to find a dime. Okay. Seriously, a lot of headaches that weren't necessary, but we always found it. Well, she found it. So, there it's a lot. We really need more than two people. Thank you, Miss Burke, Mr. Perl, Mr. Jafari, and then Miss Rizzy. Uh, thank you, Madam Chair. Just on this subject, one of the reasons for my question about the increase in the clerical line item in the finance department, that increase, not the budget, the increase is $421,000. That's three and a half junior auditors. So the last year's line item for clerical

076was 439. This year it's 860. So a little clarity on that bump up might help with this decision- making. We might be able to find that 125. Mr. Cameron, I know Miss Bragg and Miss Chang are looking through it right now. We'll move forward until hopefully they'll be back before we close this item. Mr. Jafari. Thank you, Madam Chair. trying to just be clear. It says auditor, but right now what we're talking about is the junior auditor position. Uh the current status right now auditor looking to hire for that position. Correct. Uh for the senior auditor position. Yes, sir. Um I don't know that it is posted just yet. I think there was and I guess my question is I think as some of my colleagues have pointed out the condition of the department and

077the real need for what that department does in terms of performance duties. Safe to assume then that those duties are going somebody monitoring call in able to take calls and make sure that promptly look into concerns that are raised. Yes, we have that line going. You're talking about the call-in line if you have a concern. Yes. That's being picked up by another employee right now and handed out to the appropriate personnel. Constant monitor. Yes, sir. Okay. Uh one and one additional I had one additional trying to still like wrap my head around. One of my colleagues indicated in his statements about robbing Peter to pay Paul. I'm not going to belabor this. I'm quite sure we got a number of situations where we're going to be looking at doing just that. But as I sit

078here and I look at the the manager early childhood education position, months cost I assume is the annual cost there. But I look over there and I see that it's by adding additional capacity to the preschool. Can you describe for me what what did you add the capacity to? Yes, sir. Each preschool now has an instructional dean that helps with coaching of teachers and assists the principal with the administration of the school. They have largely uh provided the leadership and support that this position once did. And so in looking at the budget felt this was not critical to maintain. That's why we brought it forward. And just one followup there, you added a dean position. How many deans did you add? Does it equate to what was defraed in 143,000? It's more than that, but

079those were added in prior fiscal years. Yes. They were already allotted for prior. Yes, sir. Thank you. Thank you, Miss Rizzie. Thank you, Madam Chair. I don't think I have 30 seconds. Okay, checks and balances is what I want to say. And then I also think there's a problem when employees are handling the tip line instead of auditing department. That's a conflict. As far as I'm concerned, the cameras would like to comment. We we unfortunately just don't have any employees in the auditing department right now. So, we're doing the best that we can. I'm happy to change course if the board would like me to do so. Mr. Hitchback. Thank you, Madam Chair. What Miss Burke said uh resonated with me. The need for catchup um and the context of four auditors before is uh

080up to to the one auditor today with some contracted work as well. Um, I think also about the lean years that are coming forward that we've talked about. Um, and it would be important for us to have a better picture of of what we're working with and where we can be more efficient when we have less to go around. So, I I would support the leaving the junior auditor position in the budget, not cutting it. Thank you. Before you um share, Dr. Harris Muhammed, I just want I want a quick follow followup question to that to his point. [Music] So, if we were to maintain this line item for the junior audit position, the person who's being contracted out will remain in place until they're hired. How would that work? Or but we just have

081a gap until we hire someone to bring them aboard. I'm concerned about that. I would I would want to maintain the contract as we just don't know when we would be able to hire. There's currently nobody in the audit office. So, I think the board is likely going to prioritize hiring the senior auditor who would then prioritize hiring the junior auditor. And so, um, I just think it's important to maintain the contract in case that process takes several months. I wouldn't want us to be in a position where we had to hastily take care of that once the board hired another position. So, the contract would be indefinitely or would we have a contract for 12 months and then a line item open for $100,000? Should we have a audit in place? I'm just trying

082to understand how that would work once we find, let's just say we find an auditor, junior auditor in September of this year. How will we then offset the contracted uh auditor that we're utilizing? Will we maintain them as well for the remaining 12 months? I'm just want to understand what that would look like. I would have to review the terms of the contract to know what we would need to do to be relieved of our obligation. Harris Muhammed, before I talk, I just want to make sure I have some time. No, ma'am. But your colleagues can send you time if they would like. Anyone else have thoughts? Mr. Peral, thank you, Madam Chair. Just for clarity to answer your question, I can shed a little bit of light. Typically, the external auditors are hired to

083complete an audit. So that would be for the activities fund, which is required that we do annually. So regardless of when it is delivered, it would likely be until that audit is complete. So essentially, we'll be paying for two sing junior auditors. At the moment that the junior auditor is hired, the new junior auditor, the the the description that we have listed out, correct? At the moment that that junior hire junior auditor is hired, the other junior auditor will still remain in place to support. So for clarity, we have a list of audits to be conducted. Right. So any auditor that we hire, senior auditor, junior auditor otherwise is free to tackle any of those audits that we have identified as a priority. The activities fund is a required audit that we have to do.

084We are now contracted to have someone do that. They will they will work until that audit is complete. So um if and when we hire auditors one, two or otherwise um they likely I would anticipate not work on the activities fund audit because that has been contracted but would then move to other priorities that we have already identified. Right? So word play, pardon me, not two junior auditors. We'll have a contracted uh auditor to do the work fulfilled for the student activity fund. And then once we hire the junior auditor, that will be payroll that will be paid out to that particular auditor as well for this up and coming year. If you keep it in the budget. Yes, that's correct. Got it. So then we'll be allotting for 200 depending on the contract. Yes.

085Depending on the contract. All you basically I just need to know from the board if you want to keep this position in or not. If you want to keep it in, I'll find 125,000 somewhere else tonight. Bring it back to you. So I just need to know which way. Thank you. So that being said, let's just do, you know, get a pulse check on where we are with this is not an actual vote of the budget folks who are watching just to get an understanding of this particular line item whether or not we will proceed with removing the junior auditor off of um the proposed budget or we'll request for Mr. cameras to keep the junior auditor role on um the budget and make other adjustments to reflect the $125. Okay. No, we don't need

086a motion. This is just a post check. Yeah, this um yay or nay. Mr. Miss Ricard, apologies. Yay is keep the junior auditor. Yay. Nay. Yay. Kind of need some clarity on that. If I need some clarity check. Yeah. I I think I'm going to abstain on this. Yeah. I'm going to say nay. Yay. Yay. Keep the vote. Keep the um Yeah. So, as it stands, um Naz Win. Yeah. Thank you. Very robust discussion. We appreciate it. Okay. Moving right along to board business 4.01 received for first read RPS RPD or memorandum of understanding. Good evening school board members and superintendent cameras. This evening I'm joined at the podium uh by John Beasley, the RPS director of care and safety. Um tonight we'll be pres presenting first read of the RPD RPSOU memorandum of understanding.

087And prior to us getting started, I need to give a shout out to Chief Rick Edwards as well as all of our precinct captains and Captain Dan Mitten because they are not in our schools on a daily basis, but their support is extremely felt across this division. And anytime we pick up the phone and ask them for something, they are always willing to help us. It's never a no. It's always a yes or we'll see what we can do. We also want to give a shout out to our school-based SRO sergeants, Sergeant Stacy Rogers and Sergeant Travis Thomas Thompson. They uh are our besties when it comes to handling situations in and out of our schools. Um and their partnership is phenomenal. Um, and then lastly, we'd like to give a shout out to our

088school-based SRO's who are in most of our middle and high schools. We could not do this work without them. So, I just wanted to make sure we take a moment to shout them out. As we begin to talk a little bit about um the the contents that are in ourou, I do want to remind the board that this is just the first read. And so if you have any follow-up questions or comments or things that we should consider as a part of the final version of thisou, we're happy to still collect that information from you. I'll let Mr. Beasley talk about some of the things that we have added as a part of theou. Good evening everyone. So first off, we're here to do theou. It's required by the state. Anytime you have SRO in

089your schools, every two years you have to re relook at yourou uh we have to put it out to the public to get feedback. Um that was done at the beginning of April. We've gotten there some responses from the public about what they'd like to see in ourou. It's been sent to our attorneys as well as the city attorneys for review. We've taken all their recommendations and I put them together today in a final document and sent back to make sure we didn't miss anything. Um, I would like to touch on the feedback we got. We did get some people, of course, that do not want police officers in school. They just don't feel it's right into the other end of the spectrum where they're the best thing ever. They're glad they're there. Um, we'll

090point out if you feel like you shouldn't have police officers in schools, we have two full-time SRO and actually a part-time SRO that are some of our high school team coaches, head coaches. Um, were they coaches when they came in SRO? No. They came into the schools. They fit so well. They became football coaches, basketball coaches, and soccer coaches. Um, so I'd like to point that out. There is this connection that they do make with the kids. Um, what else do I want to talk about. One thing we did get back in the feedback, you know, with the um, immigration stuff that we put in policies. Um, we wanted to make sure that was in our and that was a lot of the feedback we got to make sure the police department do not get

091involved in that and that has been added by the added into the and agreed upon by both sides. See what's next on the next slide. Next I'm getting kicked out. you are getting kicked out, but for good reason. I do want to make the public aware that as of 2020, the general assembly made it mandatory for us to review ourus every two years. The time frame pri prior to that was every 5 years. There's a lot of things that can happen in five years. There's a lot of things that can happen in two years. And so we we love the idea of reviewing it to make it fit our needs. I do want to go back to the slide that shares what's new and I believe that's slide eight. With the exception of the information

092on ICE, these are things that we're already doing with our SRO's. We just wanted to make sure that we modified it within ourou. It's great partnership, especially with the support on threat assessments and having professional learning with our culture and climate team. those things are currently happening. We just wanted to make sure that we solidified it in within ourou. Um, also for matters that require law enforcement investigations, we want to make sure that our students have their privacy and we're contacting their families if we do have to question them. Those are things that are already happening. We just wanted to make sure that it was solidified within ourou. And then the last piece, um, unfortunately, and we haven't had very many incidences where we've had to use mechanical restraints, but should we have to use

093a mechanical restraint or should a student be restrained by one of our CSAs, typically the administrators will call, but a lot of time there's other nuances that's associated with it. And so we would like for our team to handle it so that we can talk to the parents. a lot of time they ask to review video that's associated with it because it may lead to something regarding discipline and we just want to make sure that we're able to add that additional context. So those are all the changes and with that we'll take any questions. Mr. Faru, thank you Madam Chair. Do we know how many of the threat assessments that that happen involve students with disabilities? We do have that information but not on us tonight but we can certainly add that as part of

094the board follow-up questions for this week. Okay. Followup. Madam chair, the reason I ask is that I know that it said that SRO's don't get involved in routine discipline unless someone is in physical danger. And the reality is, especially for some of our students with disabilities, that can happen often. I mean, if you have a 16-year-old kid with a disability and he might just get upset, he might be a big kid, right? And so, him having a meltdown could seriously and I I have I have seen that people who don't have the proper training to deal with that escalate to where the person with a disability gets injured. And so, that's just where my concern is coming from and would appreciate any information you have for that. Thank you. certainly will give you that information,

095but I do want to share with you that the large majority of our students with disability are other health impairment for ADHD um as well as specific learning disability which relates to deficits in academics. So, some of them do have behavioral issues and that is included as a part of their IEP. However, that is not the sole thing that we're seeing with threat assessments. Just wanted to put that out to you, Mr. Jafari. Uh, I was just curious, um, how many and what levels of our schools don't have SRO? All of our SRO's serve students at middle and high schools. There shortages with the SRO teams as well. um there's nationwide shortages and with police departments as well as educators and so um we share but they're primarily well they are in our middle and

096high schools there's three middle schools currently that don't have them thank you John unfortunately it is something we're very dependent on the police department for and we're grateful for what we get you know as well as I do they're short this time and they have resources that they need in certain spots. We have 11 I believe I will tell you 12 years ago when I was in charge of them I had 11. Um it's not gaining but it's not losing either. I won't ask the question here or get the answer or want the answer here but you can just email which school just send it. Thanks Mr. Cameras. And if I may, Madam Chair, um just to follow up, I do want to clarify, if not for the board, for the public that SRO's are

097funded entirely by RPD. So, we don't have uh not only are they funded, but assigned and and such by RPD. So, um if we were to want more, um it would be up to RPD to provide them. And as was shared, they are facing a shortage of sworn officers as it is. And so when we have acute needs, as Sparks share, RPD is always wonderful about being creative with us and helping us for um times and events such as graduation that are of um uh high security concerns. Uh and so for example, last week at graduation, we there were several dozen RPD officers that were assisting both uniform and in plain clothes uh that folks will never know about. And so they do flex as as needed, but at the end of the day, uh

098it really comes down to what their budget can absorb as well. Micard, thank you. Um Mr. Beasley, I appreciated your comment about SRO's who become coaches um because I feel like that really creates such a wonderful environment between the students and the SRO's. I noticed in theou there's um a point that I've never seen before that we provide SRO's with a platform for morning announcements. And I didn't know if that's ever been used, what the thought behind that was. It's been in theirou. It's just something that stayed in there. Um they do have that opportunity if they want. It's like the um classes there available to teach when we have that opportunity that we'd like to to be able to do. So it's in here to be able to do it. And I just like

099to share um just a thank you um for the work that you all have done. Obviously this at a better time off the heels of graduation where we saw firsthand the partnership between RPD and RPS. Um, and I I don't know about y'all, but I felt safe. Um, and um, it just speaks volumes to the commitment that you all have as an administration and I I know the support of RPD as well. I know that personally um that um it's a partnership that we look forward to moving forward and I agree with um a two-year um um review because things do happen from year to year. So, it does help us to readjust as needed. So, that's all I wanted to share. Thank you. Thank you. Uh, next up we have received an update on

100options for Clark Springs Elementary School. Good evening, Chair Fernandez, Vice Chair First of all, um, school board and Superintendent Camas. Um, I was just reminiscing a few minutes ago because um, we are here to talk about what's next with Clark Springs, which means um, we're ready to return to handover. And so I am so excited about that. Um, you know, from I was thinking of standing on the sidewalk watching everything that was happening a few years ago to now being back to um, the school which is beautiful. I have not had a chance to go inside as of yet, but um um um Principal Jacobs when I visited her last week on the last day at Clark Springs, she talked about how the teachers went in and they just said how beautiful it was and

101how excited they are about returning. So, I just wanted to give a second to that because it is just wonderful to be full circle back into the building. And um just wanted to take some time before we jumped into um what we're going to do with Clark Springs to recognize that because there is a lot of effort um that has gone in that. Um um Principal Jacobs has done an amazing job when you talk about leading leading through something that was very difficult and all the changes we had to go through with you know going to the going to virtual then to the church and then to Clark Springs. I'd like to shout out um Dana Fox who did an amazing amazing job getting Clark Springs ready. John Balasa who has done a wonderful job

102making sure the building is ready, the teachers, the parents, the community, the students, the support. Um I just want to say thank you to everyone who um had a hand and we are so excited about um the ribbon cutting which will be August 6. Um so it's already on your calendars. we make sure it's there. But for the public, it is August 6th from 5:30 to 7:00. So, please come and join the ribbon cutting and just celebrate with us. So, now Clark Springs. Um, so we have some initial recommendations, some options for consideration for Clark Springs. Um, the first option I'm going to talk about and then my colleague is going to come and talk about the other options and then we'll come back for questions. Um, we are looking um for making some final

103recommendations um based on your input by the end of the year. Um, I will tell you we still need time as we're transitioning from Clark Springs um to the new building. Um, we're still waiting on the occupancy certificate on my other job in in charge of school construction. I have learned that. So, we're still waiting on that and to get the furniture um inside. And so, we cannot move all of the materials out of the Clark Springs building until um right at the end of July. So, it's going to make anything happening very quickly um because of that. Um we're going to need some time to um go through the building, make sure everything is updated, um what needs to be done, all of those pieces. So, that's why we need um that time to

104do that. But we can start considering the options. As most of you know, before we repaired Clark Springs in order for Fox to go in there, it served as a flex space. So, we would if there were um difficulties at a school, we would have the school to go in um and be able to have a day or a small amount of time in there for the school. We also had training in um there as well as some other things. Um and so that's how we use the space. And so that is our first recommendation that we could have it as a flex space, put offices, some um offices in there and also um allow us to have it for professional development kind of a swing space. So that is the first option which was

105kind of what we were doing before except we didn't have permanent offices in there. So that is one option we um would like you all to consider and my colleague is going to come to talk about the others. Thank you, Dr. Wiggins. I'm pinch hitting for Chief Jefferson tonight for a couple of these, but I'm happy to do so. So, option B is Open High School. Open High School is being recommended for the Clark Spring building for several reasons. Number one, just like many of uh our schools that are currently occupied by our students, it's over a century old. Uh they also don't have a cafeteria nor a gymnasium uh nor a large auditorium for performances. Um, additionally for CTE, career and technical education, they lack a lot of spaces to be able to have

106multiple offerings. And so, Open High School has been proposed as a possible solution to make sure that we're able to expand our offerings for the students who attend Open High School. That's option B. If I may, Chief Parks, um, they they don't just not have a large auditorium. They don't have an auditorium at all. Um so they convene in the hallway. Um there is and again I'm not making any uh recommendation tonight about how we should move forward. I think these all have merits and we'll talk about what happens next. I do want to note um if open were to move to Clark Springs, there's also the opportunity to expand its enrollment because there would be more space. So more opportunities for kids uh if they wanted to go there. Just wanted to clarify. Thank

107you. Great point, Superintendent Cameron. Option C is Richmond Success Academy to Clark Springs. So, we've done a lot of work over the last few years and really elevating our non-traditional programs. Uh, all of our ALE ed program is currently what we're calling them, but we're going to change that name in nomenclature because when you think about all ed, you think of negative um behavior. And so, this is a non-traditional program. So, we're talking about Konganis and Thrive and all of those programs. Now, because they fall under RSA as a school, all of our non-traditional programs being in one building. Um, with them being in one building, there are a lot of advantages because right now in isolation of the programs, we often struggle to find teachers in those programs. not necessarily the ones that are

108after school, but think about the traditional RSA students and some of the challenges we've had with having credentialed teachers. So, pulling all of our resources and having all of those programs under one building would be very beneficial for the staff and the leadership at RSA. And so, that is option C. Option D, which I hope there'll be a lot of flavor for, we want to create a student and family engagement center. Um, we really do see our needs changing across the division, particularly as some of the things are happening at the national level and the federal level. um we want to make sure that we have a space that where we can serve our needs and we can serve them all in one place instead of doing them sporadically throughout the division. So, we're proposing

109having our center for families in transition, our culture and climate team, as well as our nutrition team over in that building. With the nutrition um team, we'll be having a full-size pantry over there so that we can serve the needs of our families. Health services, the immunization, sports physicals, the vision and hearing and dental screening. Those are things that we do now, but there are several students that we miss for a multitude of reasons. And so that would be a space where they could actually come by appointment and receive those services. We have tons of community partners that currently provide those services. And so the cost of those services would be very minimal because these are things that we're already doing in the division. We're just bringing it into one hub space. If I could

110add, Chief Parks, a point you have made often is that many of our students and families need more than one of these services, and so having them all housed in the same place affords an opportunity for families to get more of their needs met more quickly and immediately. Thank you. I do want to apologize that option E is misnamed. Um it is a potential public private partnership uh that would produce age in place senior affordable senior housing other affordable housing recreation spaces and small businesses along with a new state-of-the-art school. Um I do want to note that this is something that has been uh put forward as a possible idea. Um though we are very far from uh concrete financing details and so um though the the rendering is is quite lovely. I don't want

111to give the impression that there is um a deal ready to be struck but but we have received some interest in this and so wanted uh to make sure that I provided for you all of the opportunities. Thank you, Superintendent Cameron. So with that, those are some initial considerations for the Clark Park Spring space. We do have some key considerations that are on slide nine. Uh we want to make sure that we get some feedback from our community stakeholders. That's super important to us and we also want to make sure that we are meeting the needs of our students, our staff and our families. Certainly budget will play a large part into this. Um, as well as any updates that have to be done to the building, particularly if we move towards an RSA or

112an open high school because it's currently slated for elementary school students. So, we would have to do some things with the plumbing as well. there's some HVAC concerns and so those are things that would have to take place but the facilities condition assessment which is available for public review and on our website has some of the other nut nuts and bolts that we have to consider within that building. Um and then as we begin the administration welcomes the board's articulation of any other considerations for the the space. And if I may madam chair that's Mr. Cameron. Thank you. I just wanted to reiterate I know Dr. Rian said the goal is to give you a recommendation by the end of the year. We meant calendar year, so the end of 2025. Uh because there's a

113lot of work that's going to have to happen for us to provide you with the details of the costs and timelines and pros and cons and do community and stakeholder feedback. Um so we are not I want to be clear putting forward a recommendation about any of these tonight. It's more to put it on your radar screen and begin the conversation. If there is an option that we presented that there's consensus the board strongly is against, that would be helpful. We can take that off the list. Um, and if there are other options that board members have considered or your constituents have shared, getting those now would be helpful so that we can do the work to uh price out what those would uh cost and be able to bring all that back to you

114later this fall. Thank you. Mr. Hedgepath, Miss Rizzy. Thank you, Superintendent Camas. Thank you, Madam Chair. Hey there, Dr. Wiggins. Um, I'm wondering um for option A um before Fox was there, how often did we use it as a flex base? Do you do do you recall? And maybe that's just something that we can learn um you know, in the process. Yes, I do know from time to time we used it. It was not weekly or even every couple of weeks. So, it was on occasion we use that flex space. So, we would want to use it on more of a regular basis now, not just um at, you know, a couple of times a month at the most or something like that. um while the all of the work and the money has been

115put into the building, we'd like to take it forward and actually intentionally utilize the space. Though I want to be clear, we are not putting forth a recommendation saying A is what we want to do. If we were to go that path, we would use it more intentionally. Just wanted to reiterate that, Miss Rizzy. and then Miss Burke. Thank you, Madam Chair. Um I want to speak on because this is in my district. Um the final option with the rendering and it is gorgeous um is the brainchild of our um city council person in addition to other community members that um have contributed to putting this proposal together. And it does include a wellness center. Um but yes, it's a very ambitious project um that will require funding. Um the city I believe is willing

116to definitely collaborate and help fund this if it should, you know, come to fruition. Um the building does require and these are the kinds of things we discuss in the um facilities and vacant property committee. Um there are several items on this agenda that you know I think could also be on our agenda. Um the the other options I think are are definitely viable, but that building does require quite a bit of work. It needs a whole new HVAC system and I think we need to think about that and how much that's going to cost and then balance that against what our needs are. Miss Burke. Thank you, Madam Chair. When we do get to the point of making a decision, this is a very hard decision to make and I remember having my first

117job was at Clock Springs for about six years and it was one of the best schools because of its design. It just everybody had a big open space in the middle. It just it just worked well. So, I'm glad. It was really upsetting to me personally when it was closed, but I'm glad that we we were able to have this space. My concern is um whatever we do, I just want us to use the space whether just not have it closed down because if you're not there, you're not going to take care of it and it's going to end up being a place to create storage and junk. Not intentionally, but that happens. So whatever happens, I'm just thinking everything listed is great. Open high school is it is the what? Number three school in

118the country. Oh no, number three school in the state. I think it's 161. Number 161 in the country. 100% graduation rate. And it's stated they could have more than 100 students there. So that's that's great. Why not have that opportunity for them? But then the wellness center sounds great, too. So I don't know what we're going to do but I don't know how many acres that's about what six acres we think about in terms of okay I'd like to know that maybe from the vacant property committee we can provide because yeah because that also the idea about expanding with that um plan to have a school a new school and um housing as well. That's that's they all sound great. The main thing is where do we get the money? So, and we don't want

119to wait too long, otherwise we'll be right back where we are. Thank you, Dr. Harris Muhammed. Thank you. I know we're not being asked to make a decision tonight, but as a parent whose daughter attended Open High and knowing the condition of Open High School. Um, for me, I would like to see one or two groups in that building. All of the ideas are great. either students. I think o the students at OPA had deserve a building where they can have some consistency in terms of temperature. I know a lot of our older buildings struggle with that. I understand that. But until you are in that building where open high is now frequently and I frequent that building a lot when my daughter was in high school, not much has changed. In addition to that,

120I do not like having our staff, our adults in working out of a elementary school where the entire elementary school is built for elementary students. The restrooms, the office, all of these different things. And I know money was put into Nora Elementary School for the academic office and others to work out of. And you all have done an amazing job. Uh my children went to Noral as well. Um you all have done an amazing job with with the design the interior of that building. It's it's beautiful, but that building was designed for little people, not for big people. And so I've always been concerned about that. I think adults need to work in adult spaces. Um and then if that's the case, that leaves us with noral. will probably come back with the same or

121similar conversation, but the ideas are great that have been presented. But for me, and I don't think I'm going to change much on this because of what I know, what I've experienced as a parent, as a stakeholder, um, as well as being in AV Noral many times, particularly with Head Start because that's why meetings are held and to watch the adults from the policy committee have to sit uncomfortably in a child's space deeply concerned and not just the policy committee, but the staff as well. So that's where I am. Um, thank you so much Dr. Wiggins and the team for putting this together. It it gives us many opportunities to discuss and I'm excited about that. If it was only one, then I would be concerned. So I know we have time and Mr. Cameron,

122thank you so much for bringing this now because community feedback is going to be crit uh critical to this process. Thank you, Miss Ricard. Thank you, Madam Chair. Um, I have two questions. The first is, have we ever done a public private enterprise before in RPS's history? Um, not since I have been at RPS. I think the closest we've come is the historic tax credits with Fox. Um, as I understand it, there have been some um some less than positive experiences in the past. that doesn't mean that this couldn't be done much better going forward. And so I do think it's it's worth us exploring and getting additional detail for the board to consider. Um that was going to be my second comment. actually at the VSBA law conference they had on Friday, there was

123a presentation on public private enterprise agreements and um two from Norfolk came down and presented about their Mory Street building and it looks like things have to be lined up very particularly or else things can run ary or just get um or fail. And so if if that's a route the board would be interested in, I would love more education about that. Thank you, Miss Rizzy. Miss Rizzy. Thank you, Madam Chair. And I have um information that we plan to share with the board um the next meeting. I have a chart with all the properties. And that one property is 5.88. One minute. Clark Springs is 5.8. Yes. Um, Mr. Pible, then I have my own thoughts. Thank you, Madam Chair. I'm going to follow up Mr. Card's comment. So, I'm I'm putting on my

124think outside the box hat, and I know we don't have answers to this, but um this option E that doesn't even have an official title. Um the lovely rendering, I'm thinking to myself and wondering, is this sort of the equivalent of a mixeduse commercial space? Tying this to the dire budget conversations that we've been having, is this an opportunity or is it even possible for us to somehow generate revenue streams from school properties? Mr. Cameras. Uh, thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you, Mr. PL. I have begun the process of looking into if there is a way for a school system to be an equity partner in a development. I don't believe there is but I'm exploring that because I do think either directly or indirectly that meaning we surplus a property but with certain expectations

125on the back end it would certainly uh be advantageous to us to consider that not just for this property but for many others that Mr. HP. Um, thank you, Madam Chair. Just a couple other other comments. One was that in addition to the Randolph neighborhood, I I wonder if u in our engagement, we're also looking at uh Jackson Ward and we're looking at Oregon Hill because, you know, uh there's implications too of those buildings then becoming vacant. And I apologize if someone mentioned that before. Um but I just think that that would be u something to be very considerate of. Uh and the other thing is that I know um code RVA has also expressed interest um unofficially uh for uh space um and um you know looking to um stay in the city of

126Richmond rather than going out to the counties and you know they're um you don't know if that's be considered an option at all either. Um, I'd like to share a few thoughts. So, I really appreciate it's really I mean, this is what it's all about, right? Just just trying to reimagine spaces that we already have in our possession because um the time is going to come where Richmond is probably going to be landlocked. I mean, I hate to say it, but it's it's the truth. Um, I I really appreciate the options that were brought before you, but if I had to kind of weigh in in my early stages, which is what you all are asking, just kind of get our thoughts. Um, my least favorite idea is the swing space and flex space, uh,

127just because I don't think it really occupies the space and utilizes it as as well as it could be utilized. Um, I do love the idea of transitioning open high school to um, Clark Springs. Um to my colleagueu's point, they do deserve a school that is um updated and um modern century like um and it would offer more options for um students across the city that would be interested in in applying which I think is a awesome opportunity. I also love the option C um transitioning our SA to Clark Springs. I think, you know, when I think about um, you know, the word I have a lot is reimagining, but reimagining what RSA could be. Um, bringing them from out of that environment to a a up-to-date space, collaboration with the different teachers. I just

128think it it could really create some great opportunities for our not just our students, but our staff. They really deserve that uh opportunity. and the collaboration with having all of the different groups together I think would be very beneficial. Um I do love the option D as well student and um family wellness and engagement. So I think we do need a hub if nothing else. We need a hub where it's a one-stop shop for all families to go to for help um because everything is like all is disconnected and disjointed at this point. Um, and then last but not least, I have seen um firsthand what um the power of a public private partnership can do. Um, and if we could find a way to incentivize it and and and really bring some um, you

129know, funding back to RPS schools, I think it would be very innovative and a step ahead above the rest um, not just from our perspective in in this city, but all across the country. Those are my thoughts. Thank you, Miss Rizzie. Uh, thank you, Madam Chair. First of all, I just want to say, you know, Open High School is a lovely building. It is beautiful building. Um, but they have outgrown it. So, I don't, you know, you know, I don't I don't want to um disparrage that space because it is it's gorgeous. It's old, but it's a beautiful building. Um, and then I'm want to ask Mr. cameras. Aren't we considering public private um partnerships with the Morris Street property? Yes, that's on the table as well. Absolutely. Miss Burke. Thank you, Madam Chair. Just

130one last thought. So, we don't have to discuss it tonight, but I will ask when we do get to the point of voting. One minute. In the event that um or open to be an option, what would happen with with that building? Would that be used for something else or would we sell it or would it be a condo or it it could be any of the above? That would be the next conversation to have. Um yes, it could be another school. It it could be surplus with um the understanding that um you know the funds would come back to RPS. It could be um turned into some other space. So I think that would be the next question. Thank you so much. Thank you. Okay. Before we move forward to our next item for

131um I think it's 4.03, we have to go back and do another vote. And this is on me for um whether or not we want to remove the line item for the junior auditor because it was a tie vote because at the time vice um vice chair pal abstained and so my apologies for that but I just want to make sure that we get that right. Okay. So, we're just going to do another vote and in and perhaps include Vice Chair Perl's. No pressure. All right. So, this is just a pulse check. Again, this is not an actual vote. We just want to give direction to the administration one way or another. Okay. Miss Ricard, yay. Mr. Farooq, nay. Mr. Hedgepat. Yay. Mr. PL as a way of explanation. Since since time has passed and

132we have not gotten an answer as to how we have a 95% increase in the finance clerical line, I think there is ample room. I think the the funds would be better served in an audit position. I'm voting yay. Okay. Thank you, Mr. Pible. Mine is nay. Miss Rizzy, by way of explanation, I want people to understand that Cherry Beckert actually does our external audit. They have to every year. We are not just paying them for our um student activity fund audit, right? So, we're going to pay them either way, right, Mr. Cameras? Well, we pay them separately for external. The hundred,000 is for the SAF audit. That's a lot of money for a student activity fund audit. Um, yeah, that's crazy amount of money. I I don't know who agreed to that. Um, I'm

133Dr. Harris Mohammed. By way of not having an explanation, nay. Miss Burke. Yes. Mr. Jafari. No, he's not. Well, he could be. Yay or nay, sir? I'm a neighbor. Okay, Miss Madame Clerk, we have five to four, right? Oh, yeah. I already said Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I voted. I I voted no. Mr. Draw my voting. Oh my gosh. Would you like to change it to a yay? Yes. Okay. Either way, the yays have it. And so, at this point, we will request that the administration add that light item back into the budget and revisit another course of action to offset the cost. Yes, ma'am. Thank you, Dr. Harris Muhammad. I I just want us to be clear. I respect the the the vote first of all, but we need to be clear that we're going

134to have to define we're going to have to outline what this individual is going to do. And so I think we need to begin thinking about that because it's not just student activity funds. That's correct. It's other funds. It's it's the entire academic um it's athletic funds that sometimes our building administrators um move around and you know Yes. gather around. There is some not and not they do it intentionally. It's the it's the education of it all. Yes. Um, and so we just want to make sure that we identify because this person um that that you all that we're supporting to keep in or the position that we're keeping in the budget before they begin working, they have to understand the level understood of the magnitude. So I just wanted to share that. Thank you.

135Thank you so much. not to belver the point but um Miss Miss Rizzy and and Miss Burke and then we'll we'll move quickly to our next item. Thank you. Thank you, Madam Chair. I just want to note and you all can go to board docs to find it. There is a whole audit plan um that includes many audits that have not been done for years. And so two people will have plenty of work to do catching up on those audits. And then we also have a very detailed job description for the um junior auditor and so they will know what to do. Miss Berg, thank you. Mrs. Rizzy um pretty much addressed what I wanted to state as well regarding the job description that we already have for the senior auditor. That's well done and

136we all had a chance to have input in that. So, I'm sure the same level for sure of of um just not professionalism, but also our role in making sure we do what we should do in just keeping that communication and collaboration and monitoring in place. So, I'm ready to move forward. I'm very pleased with the yay and nay. Sure you are. Thank you all so much for your patience and my apologies for the snafu there. All right, let's move right along to um 4.03. received for review a resolution to transfer Abner Clay Park. Yep. All right, Madam Chair, there's a resolution along with some accompanying documents for the board's consideration. Uh we're we're uh hoping for action on this tomorrow evening. Um the board may recall back in the fall uh facility staff I

137think Fox brought this forward as uh for action for approval uh of the board to move forward with having the survey conducted and having the deed prepared. Uh and so the city has done that. So what you have now is the deed uh the plat commitment and then the resolution. So believe it's on the agenda for tomorrow action. I am not a facilities person but I'm happy to answer any legal questions. Any questions? Thank you. 4.04 is next. discuss renaming of Armstrong High School Richmond. We we always have we always have a good know that can go anywhere in this city. Oh yeah. So can I I love our brevity. This is great. Good evening. How are you? That's fine. Okay. Okay. Good evening, Madame Chair, other board members, superintendent cameras. This evening, there was

138a request to bring to the board by the Kennedy Alumni Association to consider renaming Armstrong High School, the Armstrong Kennedy High School. So in the in the PowerPoint in the presentation I listed uh context the request is is in board policy 6-2.9 if the board decides to move forward with the request of renaming Armstrong High School. Then you see the next steps there. Uh if this was a consideration of the board, we would have to have public hearings, surveys for the families, staff, um students, which would all start in the fall. And typically the cost, as I collaborated with Mr. Stanley, he shared that that's around a $75,000 price tag when you're looking at replacing or renaming as pertains to signage, uniforms, things of that nature. Also, in the presentation, I listed for you all

139just a history of Armstrong High School, just a snippet, which has a long history dating back to 1865. also a snippet of Kennedy High School and how this merger initiated and how the split also came about. So right now the request is at the pleasure of the board if you want if you want the administration to look at move into looking at renaming Armstrong High School based on the Kennedy Alumni Association. Miss Berg, Mr. Jafari, Miss Rizzy. Thank you Madame Chair. This was brought up I think just before co one time before we had the opportunity to address that and many of the um Kennedy persons and Armstrong persons did come before the board to speak um and I've received a message that there's something else that Kennedy has also the alumni of whom I

140love they're great persons to be with in Armstrong as well and Armstrong Kennedy um there's also a request that you didn't have at this time. By the by by the way, your report is excellent. Thank you for sharing the history and all. I I would like to see that our students understand the history there as well moving forward. But there's been another request that's been brought to my attention that um not to just just as you have listed not to change um the mascot, the colors, the school's name. The other request is just to have their name printed somewhere on the building. So I don't know whether that would be considered as a name change on the building or the marquee out front. I would really like to have the opportunity to have um those

141persons at some point to come back to us to see how exactly what they want because at first it was then when they found out how much it cost um that was a so thank you for having this information out on board board docs as well. When they found out how much it cost it's like we don't want to take that money away from the students. So some teachers have shared that as well as um former students. So, um I don't know what the process would be, Dr. Bell, if we were either tomorrow night's meeting or for public information or have some type of before getting to the point of doing a survey and all and finding out exactly what they were suggesting because it has changed in the hours since we we you originally

142wrote this up. So, I don't know timewise how that would work. Mr. Cameron, thank you, Madam Chair. I don't think we'd be able to prepare that for tomorrow, but certainly at our July meeting, we could be in touch with some members of the Kennedy Alumni Association to come and um speak to what they're hoping to achieve or what the range of options they might be open to achieving from renaming to something short of renaming. um either a very visible commemorative sign, plaque, something of that nature, so that the Kennedy name is not forgotten. Um but that's short of officially changing it in the VDOE database and everything else that we use. So we could certainly reach out to them and and invite them to come at the July meeting. Follow up, Madam Chair, Miss Burke.

143So we would need the Armstrong persons as well as the Kennedy persons as well as the Armstrong Kennedy persons because I think this also right now when you go in the building is the history of Armstrong. They have one um you know better than I do Dr. Well, you were the principal there. Two. Oh, excuse me. It's wrong. It's okay. Two display cases there. So, it's it's the fear of losing what has been in place as well. So, I know at one time you were talking about a um a museum or something to that extent. Yeah. The art hallway revamping the art hallway where right now there there's no glass on the shelves. So using that area as a museum for Kennedy. However, what we did when I was principal there, the space on the

144first floor and then there's a space by the library that commemorates Kennedy because there's a lot of paraphernalia, a lot of history that is in those areas already almost looking just like because it has a glass. So almost similar to what we were talking about on the art hallway. Sure. So, my suggestion would be to invite them all, but maybe we need to go to Armstrong and take a tour as well if we could invite them. I know we're cleaning up the building. Is that a possibility that we could walk through there as well in time? Thank you, Miss Burke. Okay, we could certainly set up a time for any board members that would like to to visit and take a look. Absolutely. Sure. Yeah, we we would just have to find a time that

145works for the school. So, we can certainly look into that. Mr. Jafari and then Miss Rzen. Thank you, Madam Chair. Uh for the record, I am for the restoring of the name, putting the name adjacent to it alongside Armstrong. And what I've done, I didn't just come here dry uh for the for the purposes of my colleagues and the public. Um, I played against people that went to Kennedy and I'm a a student, former athlete and student of course of Richmond public schools and what I see happening and what happened in that instance is reflective of what happened to us at Maggie Walker. They basically closed the school and along with it they basically shuttered all of our memories and those who went there and those who helped to build that legacy had to just

146take their lumps and walk away. And so we still are in that predicament. Now I've talked to uh those who graduated from the school, both schools. My daughter graduated from Kennedy and I contacted her in DC this morning and she's on she's on par with it. But to my colleague's point, um there'll be a time when everybody will be able to come because those that have talked to, I've indicated to them that I don't just want their responses to me. I want them to appear and come down here. And when we have the public hearings on it, that's really what this is about. This is about hearing what they want, not just what we want. Um, and I and I can sit here and talk about all of the the Pep Taylor and all of

147the uh Larry Willfords who came out of of Kennedy and I just I think that they deserve to have uh that name always carried on because of what Kennedy meant to the city. Now, one other point and I'll be finished with that. Uh we talked about when they were building the Maggie Walker statue, they talked about it would cost $100,000 to remove that tree from that triangle. The trees gone. They found the money. The statue's there. Find the money and do the right thing. Thank you, M. Jafari. Um Miss Rizzy, and then Dr. Harris Muhammad. Uh thank you, Madam Chair. So, um Dr. Bell, I don't see a whole lot of history here on Kennedy. My father attended Armstrong. I know plenty about Armstrong. Um, and the Freeman Bureau was um, set up post reconstruction,

148right? So, was at some point Armstrong an all-white school? Not to my recollection. 1865, right? It was the school for Africanameans in Richmond. As far as what I know, I don't recall Go ahead. Yes. I mean, it was the normal school. Yeah, it was the normal school. So, it must have changed over afterwards. I have something at home, but it was the normal school. And that's where the where the RAZ pro not RAZ, where is it? Richmond is Academy on Lee Street. That is not the original school. There's one before that one. We saw it on the um billboard in Armstrong where they have the history on the big screen of which I love. So can we just do a followup um to the full board with more information about Kenny? Yeah, I still had

149um and my time is up. Um so I don't see much on Kennedy. Kennedy was also Kennedy is a was a black school. All right. And so both of them started off as black schools. Okay. I just I wanted to get that because I didn't see the history of Kennedy here. Um so then they were combined post integration were was arms. No. Yes. It was in the 80s. I remember that because Yeah. It was them and then Jefferson Hugan not with Yes, I remember. Okay. The complex. Uhhuh. Yeah. uh you know I just wanted to clarify that and you know I it it would be helpful to understand the full history and then understand why um the community or or at least members of the community are interested in changing it. Thank you Dr. Harris

150Muhammed. Thank you so much um for bringing this report. Miss Burke, thank you for sharing the information. And I remember a year or two ago um you brought this forward or some some discussion. So I just wanted to share Yes, ma'am. I just want to share a couple of things. I was a mathematics teacher at Kennedy during the process of closing of the Armstrong on 31st Street and the merger to into the Kennedy building. And I remember two things. How the adults felt and how the students felt. And I believe that we have a governance team that really thinks about how people feel. And I am prayful that this process um is going to put it. We're gonna listen very intentively because being a math teacher during that time, I remember students saying, "What was

151the purpose of the hearings when we completed surveys for the merger of both names and at that time to understand the depthness of what was going on in the east end of the city of Richmond, you had to be in it. And so I am pleading with us that we one listen, we receive the feedback and we honor the feedback because what happened that feedback in 2004 was not honored. And I know that because I was a math teacher on Kool-Aid building and the students resoundedly they they overwhelmingly said one minute we should keep both histories together because they matter. And they did that I believe being a math teacher at that time they did that because of the state of the east end and and just the stuff that was going on which is

152still excuse me which is still happening sometimes now. So, I just plead with the board that when we begin this process that um we're very mindful of what we are hearing and and what they are um voting or what they decide to do through service, whatever the process is, but I do not want a repeat of 200. That was very hurtful. Thank you. Thank you. Yep. Thank you all. All right. Um colleagues, just want to remind you that is uh 8:23. Quite a bit to go. Again, it's the time is 8:23. We have quite a bit to go. So, we could um continue moving forward. Um 4.05 discuss July 2025 for meeting dates. Um yes, Madam Chair. We uh per our schedule have two meetings currently scheduled for July. One on July 7th, Monday, and

153one on July 8th, Tuesday. There has been some discussion about potentially uh going to one meeting in July, um likely July 7th. and that is for the board's consideration. I would like to also add that historically, it's my understanding that in July we typically only have board meeting, one board meeting. Um, as the school year um closes, there's not as much um on the agenda and so certainly something that I'm hopeful that my colleagues are open to, but would love to hear your thoughts and and and give any qu ask any questions you may have. Dr. Harris Muhammed. Thank you, Miss Fernandez. Yes, ma'am. That has been the case. But I want I would like to take this moment to remind us that was before we were on a traditional calendar. And what I mean

154by that is when we started school and when we got out of school because our calendar has changed and we have now a 200 day, we have several 200 day schools. The business of the board um we we have to think about how we handle that business. However you all decide, that's how you all decide. But I just want to put out there we have to take into consideration we are starting earlier um than we have in the past. Um so we had that time in August to discuss what September would look like or whatever business. Um we also have to take in account with us addressing a new accountability system. We don't know what's going to come out between now and July that we have to address. I believe some things are coming out,

155but however you all vote, if we have one meeting or two meetings, um I think because of the heavy lift that we have and I know I'm I can't believe I'm saying this, but I think we should have two meetings. However, um you know, we just thinking about trying to pack that information in one meeting and then also what would help us is maybe we should have um Miss Burke may remember this, Miss Renie may may remember this, but we will have a calendar of what we needed to address each month. Okay, great. So we look at that and and see what is coming up and not just back to school but you have new legislation that normally comes out in July. That's not a heavy lift but just I just wanted to bring that

156to our forefront. Any other thoughts? Thank you Dr. Harris M. Mr. Hitchbath. Thank you Madam Chair. Uh I know that we have a quite a long running list of of uh requests for agenda items uh that the uh vice chair is so dutifully keeping uh for us. Thank you. Um so I'm just wondering you know what the logist I'm I'm I'm not necessarily opposed to moving to to one meeting. I just think that that we we do have a lot to do. And my other question is what would that look like since normally we have one where we're working through uh items and then the next one is where we're voting. So just as a newbie on the block. Uh that's my question. Mr. Cameras. Thank you Madam Chair. Uh Mr. Hedgepath. It would be

157work session. It would be basically everything from both meetings in one. a meeting. Palooa Doc, sorry, Miss Burke. Thank you, Madame Chair. Um, earlier I was in favor of not having a meeting in July at all because we've never had one. At some point, we need a break. However, thinking in terms of all that's before us, and I do like the idea of getting out of here before midnight, I would I'm in favor of two meetings. I'm in favor of two meetings, keeping it as it is. I don't want to to that extent. However, if it means that we come back the next day fresh because we've had a good night's sleep rather than being here extensively, um um I can live with the two. I mean, what else do I have to do on

158a Monday and Tuesday night? Thank you, Miss Burke. I'll I'll third that motion as well. Okay. Uh any other thoughts? Okay. I mean, do we want to do we want to sit on it and and come back tomorrow um and consider to give a few Yeah. So, let's let's sit on it and um process what our colleagues have shared. Um you know, I'm I'm okay either way. If we have one, I think that we could do it, but um we do have a lot that's on the the agenda. and we have a lot to do this year and so um whatever the will of the board is I'm I'm I'm happy to support it. Miss Rizzy. Thank you, Madam Chair. Yeah. Um I mean I would be in favor of a hybrid one meeting in

159July. [Music] Um because I think we can do it and then you know I don't know that there would be a guarantee that if we do two we'll be out of here before 10 or 11 o'clock on that first meeting. um you know I yeah um it's it's a it's a hard goal to meet so you know just for me I would prefer one um hybrid meeting in July since we have never even I mean prior to now we didn't meet in July so thank yeah so we'll every you know considering everyone's thoughts we'll come back tomorrow with a fresh set of perspective and and we can vote then. Okay, thank you. All right, moving right along. We do not have any um Okay, we do 4.06 received for first rate policy committee recommendations. We

160don't have any. Yeah, that's all. I did say that. And we also do not have any contracts over No, we got a lot. We do. We have We have many. We have many um over, but I will not take up your time going through all of them. I would ask the board uh to review them if you have not already. And please reach out if you have any questions or concerns and we will happily address those uh so that you can vote on them at the July meeting, whether it's one or two. All right. And so we encourage you if you don't have any questions now certainly email those ahead of time and conversations as needed. Mr. Faru regarding the I think it's five ponds that is the electronic textbook company. Do we know if

161when we purchase materials from them, are we allowed to keep it in perpetuity or is there something in their contract that allows them to like take it back? Because I know that is a provision now in some in the purchase of some electronic materials where the corporations um that Thank you. I'm gonna ask Miss Bell, our director of curriculum and instruction to take that one. Good evening. Um so each year we do have an opportunity to renew our contract with Five Ponds Press. We have had um them for a couple years now. Um and our contracts have been over 100,000 um fiscal year 23 and 24. Um, primarily we uh purchased Five Ponds Press uh digital resources for both students and for teachers to support K5 history. We did also add K5 science la this

162academic school year. Um it was prrated so it was a little bit less. Going into next school year, it will be the full price for both history and for science um for digital licenses for uh both teachers and students. Um but we do do just a year-to-year annual contract. Um and uh it is a sole source um uh resource for us and we have gone through the proper process through procurement and they have approved um our process and have um ensured that we have followed the proper process for that. um and they do update their resources along with um our VDOE um SOS as well. And so we want to make sure that those digital licenses are renewed annually to ensure that we are staying on top of the resources. So our scholars are afforded

163the uh most recent and most accurate resources possible for them and that we're monitoring the updates that VIPON's Press does to ensure that proper alignment. Yes, Mr. Peru. So, ju just for me as a as an old person who did not have digital materials growing up and used a physical textbook, when we purchased the license, it means that our students have access to these materials digitally, whether it's a tablet or computer or the Smartboard. And let's say we buy it one year, but we don't renew it. Do we still have access to the digital materials we bought the previous year? We won't have access to those digital resources. The um contract is just for one year for those digital resources for both teachers and students. But we also have print resources to support those digital

164resources that are accessible to both our students and our teachers. Okay. All right. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you. Right ahead. Thank you, Madam Chair. Um so my question is um with this curriculum um I know at one time we had discussions about how the curriculum we were using was not necessarily so aligned and so that this this I think came as a response to that to make sure we had alignment with Virginia SOS. Are we still needing to carry both curricula? Um, you know, I mean, I think that's my question. And then, do we have any data to reflect the impact of this contract? Great questions. Thank you for that, school board member Rizzie. Um, so we do use what we call uh RPS, comprehensive curriculum for science instruction, but also for math and

165for English. Um as you recall a couple years ago before we instituted the curriculum task force we had discussions about English math and science uh and we had adopted the amplify curriculum and there was a lot of feedback around the alignment there and so we have done a lot of work to ensure that uh the resources that we provide to our students um are in proper alignment with Virginia SOS uh and we did do that particularly in science to align with our 2018 standards and the science engineering practices or the leaves that we call them. Uh and so Five Ponds Press does provide us with those um resources that are adequately aligned with our uh Virginia standards of learning. That coupled with um the additional resources, some we do still pull from Amplify that are

166in proper alignments. Um it certainly isn't um full-fledged Amplify as it was previously. Uh we wanted to make sure that we were very responsive to the feedback that we were receiving from our teachers, from our teacher leaders, from our principles, etc. to ensure that what we were providing to our scholars was of um the most um uh high quality that we could provide to our scholars and we do that review annually. We do have data to support kind of the alignment of resources and the increase in our science scores as a result of um the work that we have done to ensure that the resources that we're providing to our students is aligned properly with our standards of learning. And so I'm assuming given that we are also paying for amplify. So we're not paying

167for amplify any longer. So what we are utilizing are the resources that we had previously purchased and we have um review those resources to just um abstract the the resources that we need that align properly. So we're not paying additional funds um for additional resources to amplify. We do use our RPS uh comprehensive curriculum for science. Miss Ricard, I had a question on a different um first contract for the tutorial services. Thank you. Um, so I noticed that um they're both for online and in person and um I didn't know what's our history of using online tutorial service providers and have we found them effective for our students just because they are virtual. Hi, how are you? Um I am Sydney Gunter um from academic programs and supports. Um and your question was about online

168service providers versus in person. So um three of the providers we chose are in person. Three are online. So we want to give schools an option. Um we previously um have done during co we did a virtual tutoring pilot with our RPS teachers that was really successful you know as a response to COVID with students at home. Um but just this past year we did a pilot with um Edget Tutor and that is an online tutoring platform with one of our elementary schools JL Francis. We also have used Ignite tutoring through our RPS all-in tutoring um as well too. And so we've had fairly good um responses about the online tutoring platforms. It's sort of a new adventure for us um because we've had a lot of on online tutoring companies pop up um since

169COVID I think as a response to that. Um, Edget Tutor actually uses one of the platforms that is in our um, RFP that we've chosen, Lera. Um, JL Francis has had positive responses to using that platform. Um, and so we we are still learning and exploring the online tutoring. I think it gives us a lot more flexibility and options, especially for our high school students. Some of these platforms offer um ondemand anytime tutoring for multiple subjects. And so they also offer um SAT tutoring and prep um and just a a variety of tutoring options that you can't always get within person during the school day tutoring if that makes sense. Um so we we want to give schools several options. Thank you. There are another any other questions about um contracts. We did the amended

170item 4.08 to discuss the format for open um public comment. Um, as it stands right now, we are finding ourselves from month to month um with a number of pre-registered uh open comment um persons that would like to speak at our board meetings. And this has caused the situation where those that have come to visit that were perhaps like to share for open comment um that are in the audience it's it's been limiting their ability to do so. Um we wanted to bring the discussion to my fellow colleagues tonight as we have had an increase in pre-registered um numbers month over month. I believe we're at 18 as it stands. for tomorrow. Yes. Um and so we really need to come together to try to find a more um solidified approach as to how we're

171going to address this moving forward. I think we owe it to um the public to have something that is more um solidified and set in stone. Um and we certainly wanted to bring it to um discussion prior to tomorrow's board meeting just out of fairness to those who traveled downtown and city hall and and may want to have conversations. So I just want to open the floor to your thoughts. Um you know we did decide last last month feels like just yesterday um that we would have um everyone who pre-registered the give them the ability to speak but in our last board meeting we condensed the amount of time for each speaker. Um, I do believe that at some point we need to bring this before our policy council to have something set in stone,

172but as we move forward in the next up and coming months, um, just want to see what the will is of the board moving forward, how we want to approach this, um, scenario. So, I'll open it up, Mr. Farooq. Thank you, Madam Chair. This year we changed the way we do our meetings and we did reduce the time available for public comment because originally every one of our meetings had public comment. I thought that was appropriate. So I am hesitant to further reduce speaking time for public comment. I think we should find other places for people to give public comment whether it's at our committees or other things. I do have one suggestion which is in the interest of making sure that all of our voices are heard perhaps some sort of policy where if

173a person speaks two meetings in a row in public comment then they can't speak at the third but they can speak again they have to have a month break something like that. Thank you Madam Chair. Thank you Miss Rizzie. Thank you Madam Chair. I feel like we've been through this a few times. Um uh you know I certainly am in favor of registered speakers um having the opportunity to speak. I know in the past what we've done is say something like okay we may reduce the time and then have public comment go no more than an hour which is double what we normally would have. Um and so however we decide to do this I I just want to you know actually state that I I am in agreement that people who sign up in

174advance ought to have chance. Mr. Hedgeh. Um, thank you, Madam Chair. I I support civic engagement and I think it's really important for those that want to share to have the opportunity to do so. and and that's why last time I supported cutting the time so that way we did have opportunity for everybody to speak even though that's not ideal. Um I I would support us having public comment at both of our meetings each month. I know that that would take more time. Um, but I think that that would give those that choose to come one night or the other um the opportunity to to share and weigh in uh to what we're what we're speaking about. Um I also agree with my colleague Mr. Farooq that u if if the public would like to

175come to our committee meetings um and if they would like to to to listen to share uh that we maybe have um you know abbreviated time for that to uh for them there u I know that they could they could always come to the meeting but maybe to uh to carve out a little bit of time for that and maybe they won't take advantage of it but to have that opportunity there if if somebody would like it. Thank you. Dr. Harris Muhammed. Thank you. Um, Miss Fernandez, obviously made a note, something to take to the policy committee. So, a couple of things that I want to remind us if if I may is that um when this board joined together, the superintendent brought us a means of because many many of us um were no

176longer candidates, but during our candidacy talked about the length, the structure, the governance of our meetings. So, the superintendent brought to us several samples of how to move forward with our meetings. And so one of those samples included what we've adopted. The work session does not include public comment which is really a diagram that many local governing bodies have moved to. Okay. So I am not saying that we should or we shouldn't. I am just asking for and I believe in in engagement as well. Absolutely. But if we change the structure of how we serve the public because we have individuals that are not okay with the rules coming from the governance team, then we're going to have to adjust and pivot on everything that we do and put out in the public as a

177governance team because someone doesn't feel well about it. And so before we jump into how we address and change public comment, that is going to impact I'm I'm telling you right now, it's going to impact how we move forward as a governance team. And every time something is pushed from the governance team because at the end of the day, the majority of our time should be talking about student outcomes. And so if we pivot on things that people don't like and we need to know one minute then that's going to come back on us in the future. I just want to bring us back to why we supported the superintendent in changing the meeting structure and that did not include public comment during a work session. And so it sounds like to me the work

178needs to come from us. How do we utilize our work session, which I think that with a large school division, we're going to have some long meetings because we're addressing a lot of things in our division. So, I just wanted to share that. I support the public. I hope they know that. Um but I just want us to take us back to why we move towards this type of structure that we currently have right now. Thank you Dr. Harris Muhammed, Mr. Jafari. Thanks Madam Chair. um come down on the side of basically encouraging engagement and what that would what that would mean and what I gathered when I was running and and what my constituents led me to believe there's a perception increasing so that there's a effort of foot to basically shut their voice.

179I just want us to be careful about doing anything that would encroach on that or contribute to that perception in the community that we're going to do something anything here that would prevent them from talking. If we have to have a longer meeting, I think that comes with deter we have to listen to what people have to say. I'm not saying that we should always continue with no limits whatsoever, but I I do come down on the side of encouraging people and making making sure that the public know that we encourage them to come in here and talk. We will hear and we will listen to them. So So that's where I stand with that. And uh I don't think we should do anything to diminish the time or anything that would encroach on their

180feelings welcome to come here and talk. I just want to be clear that this is in no way about censorship whatsoever. This is about governance. And so just just for perspective, we have um 18 people that have signed up for tomorrow. Um that'll be 58 minutes. Okay, 58 minutes for public comment just for those that are pre-registered. And so when we're asking for feedback, this is about how can we make an effective consensus um to allow public comment um but also continue to do um governance and and and and go through the items as we can. Um there's been a a lot of concerns around time frame and we've we continue to work dilig diligently to reduce the time um that we have in each board meeting. So just understand the implication of I'm I'm

181I'm okay either way. We want to extend it to an hour so that all pre-registered um folks want to speak. I'm okay with that. But just know that we still have agenda items that we are responsible for as board members and we don't want to skate through those on the back skirt of public comment. Um so that we can address, you know, we still have business to discuss after public comment is aired. Miss Rizzie, does anybody else have Okay. Thank you, Madam Chair. I think um for purposes of consistency and fairness since at the last meeting um you know there were more speakers than we had a lot at times we gave everyone two minutes. I think we should stay consistent with that or we will be unfair to those constituents we reduced time for

182last uh at the last meeting and so it looks like 18 times two rounds you know 36 minutes. Um, and so I I just think that that would is something we should consider because we've already done that. Thank you, Mr. Hedge Path. Okay. Thank you, Madam Chair. Um, I definitely support the superintendent's efforts to streamline our our governance meetings and u and so I do I do very much respect that. Um, I have had a lot of uh, you know, comments and concerns uh, aired to me ever since campaigning that, you know, we are uh, we are also inaccessible here uh, the top floor of city hall where we have to pay for parking and my constituents who come from the fourth district um, you know, if they're at the farthest point, you know, they're

183they're driving quite a ways also to get here. Um, and then there's security and there's all the things that that are important to have, too. But there are a lot of hurdles for for folks to to be here to share their uh their their beliefs, their concerns with us. And u and so I would also support the the doubling the time for the um you know to an hour for our um our our business meetings so that people can be heard. And I most certainly want to I want to respect our our our governance structure and uh also the efficiencies. And I want to say that thank you to the leaders of our our uh you know school board too to make sure that we're trying to to trim the time where we can. Um

184but yes, so I would support um the the uh you know our time for the um for public discussion, public comment on our second meeting also. Thank you Mr. Pible. Oh Mr. Jafari and then Mr. First of all, that's that's a short followup. Madam chair and colleague, um when we look at the numbers of people that come down and the passion which which they speak, that's a fluctuating scale. Generally, when you have a hot button issue, something that occurs within the school system, something that impacts employees, you're going to have a higher number of of of the public that actually show up. And so I I don't think that we should make any any set standards based on that because it fluctuates and we just have to be able to kind of float with the

185fluctuation until we receive them, get their answers to them like they need and and let it go like that because there's going to be other times when there's only going to be five speaker. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Pival. Thank you, Madam Chair. Uh like my colleagues, I am in favor of public comment and believe that there should be elasticity to it. But like all things elastic, there is a breaking point. I do believe we need a backs stop for time. Whatever that number is, if it's 25 minutes or an hour, I I won't belabor that. But we do need I believe that we need to figure out what the maximum time we're going to all lot to that. And the reason I say that is is I don't want to get into a binary

186conversation here where reducing public comment means no public comment because there are other means of public comment. There are written comments that can be submitted. Our email addresses are plastered over the website but we all hold district meetings. I hold one every other month with my city council member. So, I am always listening to constituents all across the city. Just because they're not here in front of us does not mean that they're not being heard. Thank you, Mr. Perl. Miss Burke, thank you so much. Hard decision to make. Um, I'm glad that we had the opportunity to discuss this and that the the those who are watching know as well, but Mr. Persel, Mr. I wasn't going to say anything, but he just stated something. So did um Mr. Jafar, so did Mr. I want

187to call you by your first name, Hedgepath. Um, number one, we're we're not accessible in this type setting. I mean, that's just the way it is right now, no matter where we are. Number two, if there's a something that needs to be addressed, I get lots of emails and phone calls. Sometimes they're not even pertaining to my area. Sometimes they are, sometimes it's turn the page, such and such, and the answer's right there. So, um, I agree with you, Madam Chair. We don't want our our constituency to think that we're not here for them. However, there needs to be more than one platform to be heard. There needs to be more than one platform. So far as coming to committee meetings, I'm not I'm if I'm working during the day and your meeting is at

1884 to 5 or 5 to six, I people have families. So they really make an effort to be here when they come. But I want us to keep in mind in order to be heard, there is more than one platform to be heard. And I rather that they come to us first, whether it's personally on the phone, on the street, in the grocery store, than have it to grow to the extent and we not know anything about it. So, we do want to be open and transparent because we aren't we aren't able to solve everything here at at that point because we can't respond. But there are school systems where the board does respond. I'm not saying we should do that. One of our neighboring Oh, yeah. Yes. Yes. Yes. They respond and it's a

189lot. Thank you, Miss Burke. Okay. So, I've jotted down everybody's thoughts. We still have to make a decision for tomorrow. We have 18 um pre-registered. Just to add a point of clarification if I may with the decision that you all make tonight about the individual speaking. Please take in consideration the organizations that have also we have two organizations at this point that have registered and they are allotted five minutes by policy. So please include designation for that subgroup as well. Thank you. Thank you. In just a second, Mr. Dr. Harris Muhammed. So I've jotted down um everybody's quasi suggestions. Um, but I'll call out those that pertain closer to tomorrow evening just for the sake of time. Um, I we had one that said they were okay with doubling the time. Um, however, they were

190open to being consistent to last month's meeting where we reduced the time to two minutes um for speakers and and three minutes for organizations. Um, and then we had the only one that was kind of close to a suggestion as it pertains to tomorrow was um to limit pre-registered um speakers who if they've signed up for two months in a row, then perhaps give someone else opportunity in other months. Um I will also say that to my colleagueu's point this is it does fluctuate from month to month right over the past three months however believe it or not we've only been able to afford the opportunity to pre-register folks because we just didn't have enough time. So the question tonight is one of two options really. Do we stay consistent with what we did last

191month um while policy committee comes together and figures out that will just be our rule of thumb in the interim when there are times where it exceeds the max number. So for tomorrow, we allow for pre-registered folks to speak, limited to two minutes for speakers, 3 minutes for organizations, whatever that time frame may be. They have until tomorrow at 1:00 p.m. to pre-register. So, they still have opportunity to pre-register. So, that may mean an hour. It may mean, it just depends on whatever it's going to be. We'll know that by 1:00 p.m. tomorrow. or do we cut off the time to a certain extent um regardless of pre-registered or not where public comment ends to my colleagues point Bad um chair thank you so much for giving us that summary that number is going to

192increase based on the leveling information that's been given to teachers My phones have been hot all day. So there we may end up with 36. So um and people are calling asking what is the information to you may have madam clerk may have received some personal emails. I don't know but folks want to know how to register. They were coming tonight which they could have but um it's going to be more than 18 I'm sure. So again the decision is do we remain consistent with pre-registered speakers with two minutes um for you know regular speakers three minutes for organizations regardless of the amount or do we decide to have a cut off time those are the two questions that we have before us and they're not easy answers I'm struggling myself so Mr. for Madam

193Chair, I recommend we remain consistent with what we did last Mr. Hap. Okay, somebody else have to hear comment. No, I just think we need policy to guide us the way that it is. I'm a policy driven person. This is none of us want to um demonstrate in any manner that we don't want to hear from our constituency. That is farthest from the truth. I just this is not a warning. It's just it's just a woman who who loves policy. We [Music] we gota got to let the policy guide us and I appreciate that and to that point the policy the state is a certain time frame that it is and so I I I respect everybody's point from the day I really do um do not place us in a pickle as a governance

194team the policy says this if we have communities that struggle with the way that the policy is current currently written, then we have that power to address the policy. So, I I don't agree we should we should go back to what we did last month because let me share this with you. It's going to be the expectation every month. I'm I'm just sharing with you what is going to happen. And so, but if that's the will of the board, um I will stand with you on that. But it's going to be a recurring problem with with this. Um, so I I say follow the policy. What does the policy currently state and then let's implement that. Mr. Farooq and then Miss Rizzy. Sorry, Mr. Jafari and then Miss Rizzy. My apologies. Thanks, Madam Chair. Uh

195to be clear, the two minutes I I think that for consistency purposes, we need not go up and down with that and and stick with that. But I also look at the fact that, you know, two minutes for somebody who's focused and comes before us. I think that's sufficient time for them to speak their thoughts and for us to basically get a general tenor of what of what their thought patterns are. I think that is sufficient and I think that it does allow for them to articulate their point to us. Thank you to Thank you, Miss Rizzy. Um, thank you, Madam Chair. So, if I remember correctly, last month we went to two minutes, but we were able to stay within the 30 minute time frame. Is that correct? We went outside of it. We

196went to 45 minutes. So, if we for the amount that is pre-registered at at this moment, um we will be at an hour for public comment tomorrow. If we do two minutes, if we do two minutes, that's not including those that may register overnight and tomorrow. So, public comment for an hour is a very long time. I tend to be in favor of um staying consistent and then working to change the policy and imple that policy once we've done that. Mr. Cameras. Thank you, Madam Chair. Um, I did just pull up the policy. Um, it does say 30 minutes, but it also does say the school board reserves the right to adjust the time allotment for speakers to ensure maximum community member participation within the public information period, which suggests the twominut There's nothing to

197suggest that we're not following that. Um, but again, we owe it to the public ahead of time to communicate to them what the expectation is. We doing it the day of is just not fair to the community. Um, so let's do a vote on I don't want to do a motion. I I'm trying to get my thoughts together here. All right. Clarity. I just want clarity. Are we voting on how we're going to proceed tomorrow or and moving forward? So, let's be consistent. Oh, no. Cuz it's tomorrow, right? You see what I'm saying? I do. I do see what you're saying. Well, we'll give the opportunity for policy council to really dig deep into the policy and and come back with some recommendations um by next month so that we'll be in a better position.

198Not next month. By August. August. Give us August because we want to stay with the practice. That's right. Of two. But until then, we do need to decide something consistent until policy council can really wrap their arms around this. And so that was the whole point of us bringing it up today. Okay. So what I'm hearing the consensus is from several members is to remain consistent with what the approach that we took on last month where we allow all pre-registered voters to speak but limited their time to two minutes for people and three minutes for organizations. I'm just going to go around and make sure. Okay. Just clarifying question, Madam Chair. Is that an uh an adjustment to the agenda, an amendment to the agenda? And do we need to vote on that tomorrow night?

199Well, we could technically vote on it tonight. I would prefer if you I know that I don't have a dog in the fight, but I prefer if you all voted outright on this. Okay. Just so we can keep it clean. Okay. And I'm going to refrain from speaking on the agenda. All right. If are there any concerns about us voting on it tonight? Okay. Um then we need a motion. Madam chair, may I make a motion? Motion to amend public comment period for our June 4th meeting as well as our Jul, excuse me, didn't mean to jump ahead. June 3rd meeting uh to three minutes for organizations and two minutes for individuals to accommodate for all pre-registered speakers. Back on the motion. Do you have that or you want us to repeat it one more

200time? I think I have it. I have to amend the public comment period for the June 3rd, 2025 meeting to three minutes for organizations and two minutes for individuals to include all pre-registered speakers. But this won't just be for June. It will essentially be until policy committee comes up with a revised policy and we vote accordingly. So I want to make that. Yes. So for a cleaner motion, take out the date and and and if you're open to a friendly amendment because including tomorrow's date mean this is the it it just demonstrates this is the only time we're going to implement it. Sure. So for future meetings until the policy committee convenes to discuss and bring forth a policy, you don't have to add that. But I just recommend removing the date of June the

2013 to say beginning June the 3 or um for future meetings for future meetings instead of June 3rd. Thank you. Dr. Could you just um for clarity sake for those who might be viewing could you re reate your motion motion to amend public comment for future meetings to allow for all pre-registered speakers limiting them to three minutes as organizations and two minutes as individuals. Second there. Motion is second. It's been moved by Mr. Hesp and seconded by Mrs. Jafari. Mr. Pible has thoughts. I I really hate to extend this, but that is a dangerous precedent that we're setting. If somebody really wants to tank us, they can sign up a thousand people for July. I mean, it's certainly something to consider. I mean, I will tell you that again, on the other end of this,

202when it comes down to doing board business, we still have to do board business. And so, if if public comment is an hour and a half, understand what you're voting for. That means you're signing up for an extension of our meeting. So just I just want to put that out there. I I I agree because next month for example, 40 people could pre-register whatever the numbers are. We are signing up to say if you pre-register regardless of how many people is on that list, we're honoring that request. Okay, Mr. Jafari has a thought. Yeah, Madam Chair and colleagues, but that's a consideration we can take up in the future. If somebody comes and they abuse abuse the process, I'm quite sure that Dr. Harris and the policy committee will build in incremental steps that we

203can take to address that. Uh we're going to again have fluctuations. It's going to be up sometimes, going to be down sometimes. But here I think the thing is to be consistent with what we did last month and with the months moving forward. But it's not as though we're just sitting here and doing nothing twing our fingers. We are going to address the issue. And for right now two minutes what what are we talking? We want to reduce it to 45 seconds. Any other thoughts before we vote? Madame Clerk, Mr. Perl, no. Miss Ricard, yes. Mr. Farooq, yes. Mr. Hedgepath, yes. Miss Rizzy, yes. Dr. Harris Muhammed, no. Miss Burke, yes. Mr. Jafari, yes. Miss Fernandez, no. Motion passes. Thank you. All right. Next up, administrative updates. Um, colleagues, it is 9:13 p.m. Receive an

204update on care and safety. Good evening, school board members and superintendent cameras. I promise I will be brief. Uh on November 11th, 2024, the board unanimously agreed to modify our policy 3 8.3-2, which is our acceptable technology and cell phone use policy. Um if all remember, there was an executive order given by uh Governor Yncan that said as of January 1, 2025, we would ban cell phones. It is actually now in a law as of May 30th. House Bill number 1961 is Senate Bill 738 that was signed into law on May 30th. So, we have very few options and wiggle room. That's what we must do as a school division. We did provide um a survey because we wanted to hear from our families how did things go. We'd like to have done it a

205little bit later, but that's okay. We do have some information to share on some of the globes. Um and this survey was open to the public. We had about 230 some odd responses. Since um the posting of this presentation, we've had about 20 additional responses. So, it hasn't changed a whole lot. Um but as far as the globes go, students are talking more to their peers and participating in class discussions. Lessons are more interesting. Uh and and again, this is from students, teachers, administrators as well as um some of our caregivers. Uh we have not experienced a lot of concerns generated about cell phone withdrawal which is great. Um we talked about that when we start originally talking about this and then overall student engagement has improved less bullying and mean group chats and students

206are more focused. So that's some of the glows according to the data that came in but there were some glows that came I mean grows that came through. um consistency with policy implementation across the division, support for teachers when students are not adhering to the policy, caregiver buyin and reinforcement, reconsidering the types of devices that should be used such as smart watches. And Dr. Harris Muhammad, we'll have to bring this back to the policy committee because now they're smart glasses. And so we'll probably need to amend the policy again to add smart glasses and whatever other devices they've come up with um because technology is consistently changing and then our caregivers feeling uneasy about not being able to contact their students. And so those were some of the grows um according to the responses from

207the survey. Now, I will share we've talked with uh Chief Jefferson as well as the secondary uh direct PD directors and uh they have talked about some recommendations for next steps and things that they will be doing with school leaders. Certainly, we don't have to go into all of those things uh this evening, but we'll be happy to expand on any of those. Both of them are waiting in the back. Um and then with that, if there's any questions, we're happy to take them now. Mr. Faru. Thank you, Madam Chair. I'm thrilled about this policy and I'm thrilled about the some of the glows you're seeing about reductions in the group chats and stuff. I am concerned because as I went through this, there's a pretty clear divide between the perception of the adults and

208the perception of the students across how it's implemented, the utility, the efficacy. So I mean that's a big So my question is what is the plan to address that? Because one of the things the only thing I worried about when this was being discussed was I didn't want to create another way for us to police children in the schools. There's there they already control so little about their lives and their bodies. And I've also firsthand seen how devastating it can be when it's not implemented properly because where my kids go to school, it's mostly little children. They're in elementary school. A lot of kids use the little watches and only the caregivers can text them on that. And it really helps during pickup and drop off. And several teachers were um honestly pretty um authoritarian

209about how they policed on that. Well, two things. One, the executive order as well as the law is pretty explicit about what's included and so there's no wiggle room because it will not be our intention to break the law willfully. But the other piece is in all fairness to our academic team who manages school leaders and all of the activities in the school, this data is pretty much hot off the press and so we are going to need some time to talk about what our response is going to be. So happy to bring it back at a future meeting should that be the will of the board because we do want to explicitly lay out what the response will be given that the concerns were so varied. Thank you Mr. Jafari. Thanks Madam Chair. Um

210Mox as I listen pretty definitive that the the phones are the cell phones are prohibited. Is is that what I'm reading and what you're saying? Yes, sir. Okay. And I attended and I might be getting ahead of something here with committee reports, conference reports or whatever, but I attended a conference the other day and council board council gave the update on the legislative rendering. And if I could have excuse me, excuse me, Miss Haney, can I can I get you to articulate that because if I if I remember right, you indicated that language had been removed that it basically removed the prohibition and replaced that term with restriction and restriction kind of left some leeway in terms of how we should or would be able to apply it. Can you explain that to Sure. So

211um the BDE guidance the executive order which told guidance BDE guidance talked about restricting or eliminating cell phones used both which suggests that restrict eliminate choice two words and then the code that was adopted and by the general assembly and approved by the governor makes a reference to restricting cell phone possession. We're just talking about the part about during the school from Bel. Uh and so the specific language there is uses restrict cell phone usage from bell. uh it doesn't use the same verbage that or eliminate. Um so I think you can decide what you think restrict means. Um I think the administration and the governor have certainly view it as meaning you have to prohibit uh possession youth during you know from bell to bell. I think that's certainly what their intent was, but

212they didn't use the word debit. They used the word about um Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And then yeah, I mean, I'm happy to answer any questions, but that that was Thank you. Slide three. um they have all of the VDOE guidance definitions and so bell to bell means when the first bell rings at the start of the school day to begin instructional time I guess that was missed until the dismissal bell rings at the end of the acade end of the academic school day bell to bell includes lunch and time in between classes class periods Mr. Jafari. Okay. So, just to be clear on this, this means that the phones will be prohibited. They won't have phones at all. They won't be restricted. They will be prohibited. Yes, sir. The House bill and Senate

213bill says ban. Thank you. Ban is clear. Thank you, Miss Parks. I just want to um get your thoughts about um something that I think we brought up a couple of meetings ago in terms of consistency in executing the policy. Could you talk a little bit more about um how you all plan to ensure that the same expectations are being honored across the division? Yes. So that that's something that we are partnering with our academic team certainly our secondary chief academic officer as well as our principal director. They manage school leaders who will have to enforce any of these changes. And so um as shared earlier we do want to be fair to them to give them an opportunity to this is the data that has been been presented. These are some of the areas

214where our constituents feel that it's an area for growth. Um, and then what will our response be? Thank you, Miss Rizzy. Madam Chair, Miss Parks, do you have any idea what our um neighboring districts are doing where this is concerned? I don't know everything that they're doing, but I do know that there's some similarities. And I will say I'm happy to report that we've had a lot of districts to reach out to us because remember we started this conversation very early in 2024 um by bringing on the cell phone pouches and so people reached out not only locally but across the nation to say hey what are you guys doing is it really really working. I will say principal Dabney did opt to keep the cell phone pouches and that process has been very impactful

215in her building and still gives her the same thing because they are restricted. She's just using the pouches which the division invested in and so we're glad she's continuing to use them but um I can talk with some of our other divisions to see the things that that they are doing as well. Yeah, I would like that. Thank you. Sure. Thank you. Thank you. Next item is 5.02 receive an update on early college academy support plan. Good evening. Good evening, Madame Chair, school board members, superintendent cameras, and all assembled. I'm Courtney Ward, the director of secondary success pathways, and I'm joined here with my colleague, Candace Vanie Chaplain, the manager of college and career pathways. We're pleased this evening to bring before you an update to the Early College Academy. Um, for the sake of

216time, we have provided some background information to formally address the questions that were brought up in April when we came before you. Um, one of the things that we will continue to reiterate with our students, families, and community is that the Early College Academy truly does provide students with a wonderful um, financial investment in their future. Reynolds sites nearly $20,000 of funding saved for students that earn the associates degree. Next slide, please. We also clarified here the um difference between dual enrollment and API and really hammering down on dual enrollment offering real college right away. Students earn those college credits when they take and pass the course versus API in which they have to pass a high stakes test. Often the score depends on whether the credit is accepted by the comm the transfer college.

217Um, and lastly on this slide, just reviewing the credit waiting and how credits are weighted in the college GPA versus the high school transcript. Next slide. We reiterated here as well that RPS has anou with Reynolds and Reynolds is our assigned community college partner for dual enrollment. We included some of the other school divisions around us and the partnership that they have with Breoint. And here we wanted to outline um three unique formalized avenues for completing community college coursework. We all want the students in ECA to earn a associate degree, but there are two other pathways that are very viable for young people that wish to earn college credits while they're in high school. The uniform certificate of general studies is a 10 course pathway that gives students 31 to 32 credits that can be

218transferred to all public and most four-year colleges and universities in Virginia. Likewise, the path passport is a pathway program that um is five courses that equates to 16 to 20 credits that are also transferable to all public and most private 4-year institutions in Virginia. Next slide. And our plans for expanding this will include um Senate bill and House bill from the state on allowing more access to students to dual enrollment within their high school setting. We spoke about this in April. We would like to expand to include dual enrollment classes taught on campus within our in our comprehensive and specialty high schools. Of course, that would require our teachers to apply to the community college and get approved, but it will cast a wider net to offer more students who can't get to Reynolds physically

219during the day the opportunity to take one or two courses a semester or a school year to also gain community college credits, I'm sorry, college credits while they're in high school. I'm going to transition to um Candace who's going to offer an update on the 2025 grads. All right. So, um in terms of academic progress, uh we know that we had um at the initial uh creation of this slide, 38 of our 41 students um who graduated, but it actually is 39 students who graduated because one of those students had an I at the time of graduation and earned a grade, a passing grade of C for the course that he had the I in. So that takes it to 95% um graduation rate for our students. And as you can see for the class

220of 2025, a number of them earned Latin honors because uh they did exceptionally well um in the program. Get to the next slide, please. Uh in terms of our students who struggled, those students who struggled and were at the GPA of 2.75 or below and therefore were on academic probation, every single one of those students were cleared of that by the end of the spring semester. Um all of those students graduated and the junior who will be returning had A's and B's at the end of the spring semester. That does not include the May master class that the student was taking which all students enrolled in that class no one had a grade less than B um at the end of that seme of the May master courses. Next slide. When we reviewed our fall

221semester uh from this past year, we took a moment to really think about how those students did and we were all concerned at the number of students who were dismissed from the program for not reaching the minimum GPA. Um so much so that we even met with our partners at Reynolds to talk about what is it that how did that semester go? What can we do to improve upon that? and we reached out to the students individually to find out from them what was going on in your personal experience with um the program that we need to know that we can improve upon so that we're improving the program continually. So some of the comments from students are listed in this slide for your review. Next slide please. Additionally, we reached out to our school

222counselors to talk to them about the work that they did with those students um so that we could reiterate the importance of collaboration and communication and responsive intervention with those students. Um getting feedback from them about the types of things that they did with students who had concerns. um once they had that information from the coaches that we work with at Reynolds, how they interacted with the students and with the families as we were supporting those students over the course of the semester. Next slide, please. Moving forward, um considering the fact that we lost 11 students, we still want to make sure that this opportunity is available to students within this division. So those 11 spaces that were lost in this year, we added onto our newest group, our newest cohort of students, making that

223cohort a cohort of 51. Um, so taking into account the 11 uh spaces that were lost in that fall semester. So those spaces are across the division. So there will be a total of 51 students in the class of 2027 and currently in the class of 2026 there are 30. So with all of this information we wanted to really be thoughtful about how we can improve what it is that we do with ECA and how we support our students and our families through this. So some of the things that are we've outlined are listed here. um setting expectations early. We do have an April orientation with all of our students who are accepted into the program. Of all of our students who were accepted, all but three students attended that um early orientation. And those

224three that did not attend had a followup orientation early uh early last week. Actually, they were able to wrap that up last week with our Reynolds team. um promoting resources year round. So really pulling together all the resources that are available to the students so that we have both print and inerson information about those resources um so that we can really push their use of those resources that are available to them as fulltime Reynold students as well as RPS students. Um annual orientation prior to the beginning of the school year. So ensuring that that takes place. We know that that was not a piece that took place for us this year because our ECA coaches were just coming on board when the students were beginning this school year that we found to be a deficit.

225And so, um, in talking with our partners, they have committed to ensuring that we have that, um, and that we do that collaboratively with our students this year. Um, and then of course building stronger staff connections. We already have a monthly ECA coaches and counselors meeting but including our principles inviting them to attend that as well. Um and in addition to that I meet with my colleague uh who works with the ECA coaches um and she and I meet every other week to also talk about concerns um and information about our students or needs that they may have at any given time. Next slide. All right. Um finally for me um the additional next steps that we have are again looking at support and making sure that the students know not only know that they

226have it but how to use it. Um making sure that our intervention is specific to student needs including um study skills, time management, those types of things. For our students who are first year students, they are all enrolled in a class called SDV 100, which is a course that talks about the resources that are available at Reynolds and uh it is with those ECA coaches to help them understand the things that they need to do to be successful. Um boosting that counselor connection. So again, continuing to work with our counselors to make sure that there's a clear bridge with our counseling staff, our students at Reynolds, our coaches at Reynolds, and our families. And uh formalizing things that we do with students outside of the regular school year. So, for example, this past year, uh,

227we were able to work with Reynolds so that during our spring break, the professors were still available to students for students to do makeup work, extending time for them, and spending time uh, working on assignments that students may be behind with, formalizing that in other breaks and other opportunities during the school year where the Reynolds calendar and our calendar may not match. Um, and provides that opportunity Um, we had one additional piece with that last bullet which was to really maximize the role of our future center navigators. That is something we are going to narrow down on this year. Lastly, in the ECA student experiences, we want to create a feedback loop where we're constantly getting feedback from students about their experience in ECA so that we can adjust as needed. Second, we want to

228strengthen the cohort experience through SCV 100 as well as the cohort of students that are metriculating through the program so that they feel a sense of community with their peers which they often miss from being in their comprehensive or specialty school. And then lastly, um use our wonderful engagement team and social media to highlight the milestones in the program so that students feel a sense of pride and visibility. We're happy to answer any questions at this time. Dr. Harris Muhammed, Miss Burke, thank you so much ladies for this presentation. This weekend, actually yesterday, I had a graduate reach out to me um of Open High School who participated in the ECA. So, I'm going to leave the attributes of the student limited. However, what she shared with me was deeply concerning. And this young lady

229spoke from her heart. Her family friend encouraged her and actually behematly directed her to give me a call. and what this what the student or graduates she's no longer a student what she shared with me um and I did a lot of listening and one of the things that she shared was how do you propose changing the ECA format so students at any other school she was naming schools will be able to speak with the recruiters during a time so we can talk about scholarships. So she was one of many students who participated in ECA that during a certain time they're in the program. During that certain time is when individuals came to talk to the students at that school about scholarships, employment, enlistment. And so here we have several students who went through the

230ECA program did not have access to having just a conversation about financing their future. And so we talk about equity and opportunity. And so I asked her, being the mama educator person that I am, one minute, what did you do different? And her response was, I couldn't because they told me I was in ECA. That's not the message that we want to send. And that really hurt me. And I said, even though we may not can do anything for you right now, then I started sending emails. My colleagues got the email this morning. Superintendent got it. Mr. Cooper got it. We have to do a better job, and this was coming from the mouth of a babe. We have to do a better job in making sure that we are closing the gap for our

231students who are in programs that we support them to be in. We encourage them to be in, but then they don't have the access to talk about scholarships because this baby family came from a country in Africa. Thank you, Dr. Harris Muhammad. Miss B. Thank you, Madam Chair. Um, and I must thank Dr. Harris Muhammad because um, seeing your email, I too had the opportunity to speak with some students. You know, I love this program. Always has. If it had been around during my era, I would have been there front and center. Um, looking at several p the class of 2025 was very impressive. very impressive. But I'm not happy, and you all know that, when I see two students listed for Armstrong and two students listed for a school of the arts. And one

232student who has graduated shared that when he wasn't a senior that the students were mixed. They weren't all from the same school. is that now they are in the same school, in the same group. The coaches and the team at Reynolds put the students into two groups because that's how they flip from class to class during the day. Typically, they are separated by um the simple separation is by school. That's that's my multiple schools together to split the group in half. So all of Armstrong's students aren't in the group with fair with Franklin. They don't mix with TJ or the other schools. Right. So it would depend on how it's that's the problem. That's the problem. That's that's one of the reasons from what I'm gathering when you are in this from what this young

233man explained to me. He said, "You used to always talk about relationships and partnerships, but now by having just Armstrong students, they don't have the opportunity to mix with others. So their feeling is also that you don't expect any more from me because I'm from Armstrong or the school of the arts, school of the arts. It's always southside and the east end." All right. So why aren't our children mixed as they were in and to de develop relationships, get study partners? The support piece bothers me greatly. Number two, um I'm glad I heard you state that the principles are in a meeting also with um currently it is the ECA coaches and the ECA counselors who meet together and what we are going to do in the future is also invite principles. Sometimes principles will

234be able to come in, sometimes they won't, but it will bring in another layer of support for the student. So the school counselors are held responsible for what I'm hearing today. Um the support there is very it varies from school to school. Well, he was in study hall and he didn't do it. Some children need more support than others. I'm an elementary background, so you know, I'mma do everything for you and then some. But we also we're held accountable for our students when they fail. I'm not going to look at the students. I'm going to look at the persons who are in charge because if we have students down to two in two of the poorest neighborhoods most challenged and if somebody else says 12, so what is Hugen not doing? I know what they're

235doing because I was told that too. So somewhere along the line I heard a lot of the teach the coaches and the adults are meeting where are the children? Nine out of 10 they know about and I know this for a fact from a friend's daughter granddaughter that's in the program who did well about asking for support. They don't stay behind or come in on an extra day a Saturday or whatever for support and they don't even tell it even though I know parents were told that but you know you hear it once it's gone. So my my my question is and I know we were to have a conversation. My question is number one, where is the the contact with the parents to connect? All right? Cuz there's some smart children who are not

236in this program, but they need support. Some of the parents don't have the time or whatever else. It's their children, but they they haven't had those experiences themselves. So number one, why are they segregated? When we speak of equity, why are they segregated in just their schools? I don't have to compete with Mr. Jabari. Jafari, excuse me, because I see them every day in my school. So, I have a list of questions and I'll send them to you as well, but I'm I'm I'm just not happy seeing such a low number. Thank you, Miss Burke. Miss Rizzy, I'm sorry. Before, did you want to make a comment to her question? I just wanted to say we want to take that feedback into account and to look at our plan for ECA going forward because we

237certainly don't want to have students have an experience where they feel that they're not able to connect with their peers across the division. Thank you, Madam Chair. Um, you know, at this late hour, I'm kind of reaching an intellectual crash. And so, um, you know, I'm happy to hear about these options outside of ECA, uh, because I hear from some students that they just aren't interested because they don't want to leave their home schools. They miss their teachers at their home schools. They miss their friends. Um, so I'm happy to see these options. Is there a way we could get like a one pager on just the different options that students now have um to access college credit while in high school? Yes, we'd be happy to provide that at a future date. That would

238be wonderful. Thank you. I've had the pleasure of um speaking with um um several of you over the course of last couple of weeks just by proximity being in the same room um for graduations over the past couple of weeks. Um and you know this is certainly a hot topic. Um this is a great opportunity for a lot of our scholars. Um, and I think that we have a great format that we have um, we've started to follow. Um, but just like anything, there are always exceptions to the rule. And I think that's the area where we I would suggest focusing and honing in on a little bit more. Um, for some of those um, students who may not just be ready to completely adapt to that environment. And I think those touch points would

239be great throughout the year. Um certainly collaboration, partnership, and just that that feeling of community. Um that they don't feel isolated. And certainly um if there is folks that you see red flags along the way, you see those rather early. Typically, it it's addressed in, you know, um absenteeism, um grades, testing, um and to really get that level of support for those who may not may be the exception to the rule because we all have them. And I' I've gave you some personal examples of of different um families that I've interacted with that share the passion to want them to um graduate early but just maybe are not familiar with the resources or or haven't really had that model in their households before. And so, you know, sometimes when you give a packet and you

240say, "Well, here's here's the orientation." Your parents can go this extra step when you get home. Not all families are equipped to do that. And so we do need to be sensitive to recognizing that we had some great numbers this year and I know they'll be great next year. Um but if we can just tick and tie those small details and those outliers um so that those that we see need the support and and really recognize um and own that I think that will be better because of it. Um because we don't want any child left behind. But thank you for your efforts. Thank you. All right, moving right along to 5.03. Receive an update on 2025 2026 staffing. Good evening. Good evening, school board. Good evening. Yes, green lights on. Good evening, school board

241chair, vice chair, members, as well as um superintendent cameras. My name is Monica Haskins. I'm the director of talent acquisition. I'm also here with my colleague Rodney Robinson who is the director of teacher teacher leader pathways. So, um I wanted to first jump into the wonderful highlights which is a huge win for the district. Um, we're currently recruiting right now for 105 classroom teacher vacancies and that is out of a record, excuse me, of 1,35 positions. These are classroom teacher positions. So, our vacancy rate is just over 8% at this time, which is a significant improvement over previous years, which it was over 15% at this time in previous years, which is great. Yes. Yes. Hands and feet. Yes. It's a huge win. Very excited in the green. Yeah. Yes. And um we've distributed 25

24226 contracts most recently in April and as of today 98% of those have been um received with the intent to return to RPS. That's also a significant improvement over the past years. And I attribute that to um next slide all of the efforts. Um I want to give a shout out to the talent acquisition team, team of recruiters, manager of talent acquisition, lenture, subsp specialist, onboarding specialist Shireena as well, wonderful support. So all of all of that combined and I'm pretty new into this role and I've come in and the team is rocking and rolling. So, I mean, every day they're working hard, they're pushing, and you can see it in our numbers. Currently, they've already filled for this school year, well, for the 2526 school year, they've filled 125 positions already, and we have

243105 more to go and we've got some time. So, I can see zero vacancies in the future. All right. So, on to the talent strate strategies that we're implementing. Teacher job fairs. Our RPS events are very um successful. We have our February um all teacher event where all of the schools participate. They're very well attended. The principles are there um repping their school. There are on-site interviews, on-site offers that are done at these fairs. So we do those annually in early February and we try to be the first ones in the region to get out there and do that and then the other districts of course will follow but we try to get ahead of that and be on top of that. Um we also have RPS fairs for our support. We had a RPS

244leap fair and all of those are very well attended. And next we go on to lenture fairs. Those are very important. We have one tomorrow at Henderson. So, very excited about that. We also had one in um the fall in November. So, that is where we um have an opportunity to meet um those that are interested in how to become a teacher. They have lenture questions and we're here to support them. We have a wonderful lensure team that's able and ready and knowledgeable and they connect with um the teacher leader pathways and all of it's connected and we're able to grow our own that way as well. And we also have school partnerships where we go to different college fairs and also there is a um handshake platform. So when we can't really go to

245certain schools, um sometimes we don't see a big return on investment when we go to the all teacher events. Not all schools have education fairs. So in those situations, they have a handshake platform where it's a virtual um connection with schools and school employers. So, we're our recruiters can go in at any time and pull up a school and reach out directly to students and by email and set up virtual interviews. And that's exactly what they do to, you know, we don't want to just post and and pray. We want to get out there. And my whole thing is I say this all the time, that's turn over every rock. So, even when you get an email from a candidate that's asking a question, um, may not be a candidate, maybe just a person in

246the community saying,"I want to become a teacher and you ask the question, do you have a bachelor's degree?" And yes or no, but don't just let it in there. You keep it going and get them routed to where they need to be so we can possibly turn that into a success and a win for us. Okay. Um international recruiting is very very um very very good for us right now. We've hired 20 total that are um 19 are still with us. These are international J1 teachers and they are um from the Philippines but they could be from other countries as well. Yes. So we again we've hired 20. 19 are still with us and we have four pending for this upcoming 2526 school year. and the two of them are at Carver will be at

247Carver, one at Lucille Brown and one at Henderson. So, we're looking forward to their arrival into the United States. And um they on their J1 visas, they are able to be with us for three years and then apply for an extension for an additional two years. So, five years total that they could be with us. Miss Haskins, I'm so sorry, but given the hour, if I could ask you just to hit the highlights in one minute. Okay, gotcha. Thank you. And in digital outreach, give a big shout out to our communications team. They are on it. We do a flyers. They post for us. Have you ever real quick, this is something I want to add. Have you ever been on your phone and just scrolling through and see RPS ads come up? So yes,

248it's like when you think about something, all of a sudden it's on your your feed. So I love that. So that's our digital outreach. And the next slide, you can see several of the recruitment events that we've attended since the fall through present at different schools, different events. And we have next slide hiring incentive that was on a first come first serve basis of 30 early commitment bonuses of $7,500 and we have offered and 25 folks have accepted. So we still have five available bonuses and that's for the high vacancy schools. Okay. And I'll pass it over to Mr. Rodney. Uh good evening. All right. Uh just to get a quick overview of the seed program. Um few years ago, not this current board, but the board before threw a bunch of money at COVID

249money and said solve our teaching pri crisis. And so we came up with the boot program, which is build our own teachers, which transitioned to the seed program. But since then, the seed program has transitioned to five different tracks. Um starting with RTR, which is our oldest partnership. Um then our teacher track which is our currently our largest part largest group which is about 85 50 of them have already earned licenses and have been serving in RPS. Um the um U of our teacher lensure cohort. Uh that is a fairly new partnership between us our University of Richmond and the community foundation. We have 22 make that 17 because five finished this spring. So now we're down to 17 this summer. Um the career switcher program which is a relatively new partnership which is growing.

250Um in those four programs alone we have over 125 teachers. Um and then this fall we're kicking off the associate teacher program which is helping those that have associates degrees earn their bachelor's degrees while working as substitute teachers in Richmond public schools. And the unique thing about that program, thanks to Lynn's team, that is fully funded by local local budget. As we know, the federal government has been a little inconsistency inconsistent lately. And so that is fully funded by our Richmond public schools dollars. And so we are really excited about this. Uh the big transition, however, is financially these programs are not sustainable. And so we're going to begin to transition to a a Richmond public schools internal lensure program. in which we have to uh apply to the VDOE. That's for the 26 27

251school year. That will save us about 100 $150,000 a year. And we're going to send that application off next month, get feedback from VDO. Hopefully, it gets approved first time. If not, we'll get feedback, make it work, and it'll be ready to go in 2627. And currently we have a waiting list of 30 teachers for the C teacher track and we have 29 folks um for the associate teacher program. Next slides. Um slides nine through 13 are breakdowns of each cluster school and the currency vacancy rate current vacancy rates. Um I have colorcoded you'll see the different various colors. Uh green means they have a low vacancy rate of between 0 to 10%. Yellow means 10 to 15% and red means it's over 15%. But I do want to note those that are red. For

252example, on slide nine, you'll see a preschool that has three vacancies but a 20% vacancy rate. That is because there's only 15 teachers at the preschool. So take that into consideration when when you look at those reds. And that's all. I will h be happy to take any questions. We both would. Any questions, colleagues? Dr. Harris Muhammad. Thank you so much for the presentation. So our l do we have a lensure specialist like a person that what they do Monday through Friday is lensure. Yes. Okay. Will we have one? We have a lure specialist and a lure assistant. You started today. Sure. Okay. Welcome. Yes. Um and and the reason why I'm asking is because I received several emails and calls about individuals not receiving their contract because of their lensure status. They submitted the

253paperwork. They don't know where the paperwork went. So how do we combat those challenges in our lensure on the lensure team? Most of the complaints or questions regarding lenture I'm seeing because I'm also checking the lensure inbox and seeing what types of inquiries are coming in. It is from folks that are due to receive um you know an expiration the end of this month and it's a provisional license. They've had two extensions. They've had co extensions and they've run out of time. So, they're upset, but they have been communicated with. Um, we communicate verbally. We communicate follow up in writing. So, we have we have receipts. Um, trust me. But, I mean, we're here to help them, but you know, we can't handhold the entire time. They've got to do their work, but we do

254guide them through the process. That said, I I do want to acknowledge this has not been the strongest part of our operations and if there are individuals who have struggled with that, I would like them to email me directly so that I can highlight it for the team. Um, this is one of the reasons that the assistant was added to help address this. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Cameras. and let us know how we can help if we need to just hire more people. But yes, to the point of the superintendent, um I lost my point. I was going to say, um yeah, it is. But so, okay. So, thank you for that. Um, which leads to because they're on a three-year provisional license. I just want to remind us as a division, they are

255not full-time licensed teachers. So, when we request data on the percentage of licensed teachers versus those that are long-term, those that are on a license, even though they have a provisional license, that's it's it's provisional. So I think when data is submitted to us in the future, Mr. Cameron, we can have they don't how many provisional licensed teachers we have, licensed teachers we have and out of that long-term subs because what happens is that number can be conuted. How many teachers, how many vacancies do we have? And if the individual doesn't have a full-time license, that is really a vacancy. It's it's they're they're they are a substitute. So, we need to add that into our data. And so, I don't think we've been doing that. The long-term sub vacancies are are vacancies, which means

256we can they're still listed as a vacancy. We could still fill that position. So, we do have the long-term subs counted as vacies. So, let me let me narrow it down to Martin Luther King Jr. Middle School and OverB Shepard. Mhm. That data was not correct because we I had several long-term substitutes in that building, but they were not counted in the vacancies. That's crit that's critical for those schools. And I know that for a fact. So we that I'm that's why I say I don't say things unless I know that I have the facts to back it up. And so because I know that I'm in contact um always with the schools and those are just two schools in the six. So I just wanted to share that. Thank you Dr. Harris Muhammed. Mr.

257Cameras, did you want to I just wanted to clarify a teacher with a provisional license is a full-time teacher. A teacher a long-term sub is counted as a vacancy. Correct. Thank you. Yes. Any other questions? I have one specific to my district. Um I you know we we continue to have challenges with um with vacancies um particularly in River City Miles Jones. My question is I saw where there were some offer letters that were sent out. Um are any of those for my schools for for um Miles Jones? I'm referring to I forget the page that I was on. Are you referring to the uh Yeah. So um the bonuses. Yes. If you could go back to that slide, Matt. So that's page um slide five where I see where there's five um hiring incentive

258incentives um for early commitment bonuses for teachers for milestones. Yes. So is that including that in the vacancy numbers that I find? So their vacancy number was five higher. Okay. So we're still at a very large amount. Okay. I spoke with principal Tally last week and we currently have 29 folks for the associate teacher program and the goal is to put a significant number of those at Miles Jones and they will have a five-year commitment to RPS. Great. And so that will kind of stabilize things as at Miles Jones. Great. Thank you. Shout out to um Dr. Tally. She's doing amazing work over there. I appreciate you all giving her the support that she needs. Thank you. Thank you. Those numbers are incredible. Right. All right. Moving right along to our um next item. receive

259an update on 2025 summer school uh programming and summer professional development. Good evening. Good evening. Thank you for your patience tonight. No problem. Um I am Sydney Gunter, director of academic programs and supports. Um again, I will give a very brief update about summer learning with some new highlights um that I did not speak about last time. I was here a few weeks ago to talk about our programs um and our sort of enrichment activities for summer school. Um, we actually kicked off summer training today at 8 a.m. at Hugenat High School. So, we trained about 300 teachers today and we are going to start again tomorrow for the second day of division training and then Wednesday and Thursday the teachers will be in their actual summer school sites to set up classrooms and plan

260um and meet with their summer principles. Um, so we are ready. We are um prepared to start summer school and we're excited. Um, I just want to highlight a few things in the presentation. Um, because I did speak about, like I said, um, our programs and experiences last time. Um, but I want to talk about a few new updates. Um, one big update since the last time is we have had the chance to work with, um, Richmond Parks, Recreation, and Community Facilities where we will offer transportation from some of our summer sites to their parks and recreation programs for kids who are already enrolled in the program. Um so we will offer from Lois Harrison Jones tool from um Southampton to Westover, from Overby to Battery. Um the Broad Rock site is actually at Broad

261Rock School. Um and the final one is uh Henry Marsh to Powatan. Yes. So kids do have to already be enrolled in the um recreational parks programs because those are programs families have to pay for, but we will transport them. Um and those programs are over at 5:30. So that gives families a longer day for care for their students. And they're also on Fridays and they go through August for those families. So we hope to continue that partnership next year so we can advertise the collaboration a little earlier. Um so more families can enroll in those programs and summer school. Um another update um are the summer numbers. So the numbers that are in this deck are from May 20th. However, I want to share today we have 1,42 elementary school students registered, 636 middle

262schoolers registered for summer school. Um, so we have staffed appropriately for those numbers. We are going to have to cut off registration today um because we can't continue to staff and plan as more kids register. Um, but if we have class spots available the first week, we will make them available. For example, if we have a third grade class that um only has 12 kids, you know, and we can accommodate three more kids, we will make them available if families do come on the first day, as they often do. Um for high school the enrollment numbers have also increased. At Hugenot High School we have 140 students registered for remediation, 138 for credit recovery. At RTC 79 for remediation and 97 for credit recovery. Um another partnership I want to highlight that I did not

263talk about last time is our virtual Virginia free aotment grant. We did receive 100 spots for students from certain schools to take a free virtual Virginia course this summer. Um and so those kids will be able to obtain a credit this summer um from all of our comprehensive middle schools. Um our specialty schools, high schools, which we know sometimes have limited offerings because of the staffing. Um and three high schools we know um are challenged with credit recovery. For our summer adult professional learning, which I did not have a chance to speak about last time, we're excited about what we're going to do for our grown-ups this summer. We talk a lot about the kids this summer, but we are going to continue learning for the grown-ups. Um, so we have summer professional learning um,

264starting with summer leadership academy. So this is for our principles, assistant principles and other leaders that will be at River City Middle School and the theme is dream big, lead boldly, transforming schools through inspired leadership. Um, so that's a time where they will get to hear hopefully from some of you and superintendent cameras. um as well as the other offices in RPS like the operations team, the grants monitoring team um and the procurement team. So, a lot of operational things they need to plan and start the school year next year. Um they will also have time to collaborate with one another just to prepare early for next school year and have all the pieces and know who to ask if they have questions for next year. Um summer professional learning institute is for our teachers.

265So that will actually take place at Hugenot after summer school starting July 22nd and they're going to rotate on um anchor sessions focused on inclusive practices, culturally responsive instruction, and literacy will be our big three priorities for that. Um and we will have a special cohort cohort for literacy and math coaches at our federally identified CSI schools to give them that extra layer of support um and coaching training. Um as well as our middle school Vanguard teacher cohort, something we're developing to specifically support middle school growth and improvement for those teachers. Um we also have the passion for reading professional learning. So that is PL specifically um for K5 teachers, interventionists, coaches, and school leaders. And that will happen throughout the month of July and August at the Richmond Convention Center where um teachers will

266focus on the youth reading intervention program which has been um wellreceived this year and used in many schools. Um they're going to focus on accelerating reading fluency um and building language comprehension um for next school year and we will incorporate that into our literacy blocks um for next school year. And then finally for our grown-ups, we have Canvas professional learning. So, as you may have heard, secondary schools are transitioning to Canvas next year. The grown-ups have received PD throughout the school year. However, we're offering optional sessions throughout the summer that they can hop in virtually, learn more about Canvas, play around this summer. They're going to get more PD in the fall, but we really want to help them transition over the summer um into Canvas. As we know, our community colleges use Canvas. It's

267just a great platform for students to be able to use as they transition to um post high school opportunities. Um and that is it. Any questions, colleagues, feedback? Miss Ricard, Mr. Hedgepath? Um I will keep this short. When we transition to Canvas, one thing that our teachers were able to use because it's anytime you change a platform, it's stressful. there were like pre-built courses that they could take and kind of do as much or as little as they wanted. Is that the same for our teachers? Yes. So, our academic team is also receiving summer Canvas training so they can build in professional learning for teachers in Canvas. Um, so they can experience it as a student. Um, and also there are like Canvas training sessions, I guess to call them, embedded in the platform that

268our edtech integrators are using to facilitate that training that will be available for them to use as they're learning the platform. Mr. Hedgeb. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you, Miss Gunter. U I'm really excited about all of the history related uh field trips that our young kiddos are are going on. U but I was a little bit concerned that I didn't see any social studies in the um in in their in their curriculum as far as it says math, reading, and science remediation. Like do are the students getting the context? Are they getting the um the social studies content before and after some of these events that or uh experiences like say the Civil War Museum uh that they're going to see? Unfortunately, we've not been able to expand to a history class in summer

269school yet. They'll be getting some of that context through like their readings in English, but the the way we experience history in the summer is through the field trips. We've only been able to support literacy, math, and science in our day. Um because we also have anal block in our day for the kids. Um, so that's definitely a consideration we can we can think about for the future and how we can add that into the day. Um, but the the quick and easy win for us is just to take them take them to experience the history, I think. Um, and then follow up afterwards, but that's definitely noted. Our history specialist would love that. Thank you. I believe someone has Oh, sorry. We have one more item. 5.05 05 receive an update on tennis revitalization

270project. Thank you, Madam Chair. I'll be uh very brief. As you may recall, there is a local group that is proposing a tennis center and a national uh tennis hall of fame focused on black athletes uh on the field next to Lois Harrison Jones. Obviously, that's property that we own and so we went forth with an assessment of that property to understand what it's worth and so we can properly discuss what we would need in exchange for that land if they were to move forward. Obviously, that would all then come back to the board for discussion and decision-m. Uh the the headline is that the sort of market rate for that land would be just shy of $4 million per acre. The lot that is uh identified for use is four and a half acres.

271So that's eight just shy of $18 million for that lot of land. Um my sense is that is well north of what the group anticipated. Uh but I will take this to them, hear their thoughts, uh and then circle back to you uh with some possible next steps. Um obviously that is a significant amount of money. With that, I'm happy to take any questions. Mr. Hedgepad. Thank you, Mr. Cameras. Is this where we would then transfer this property to the city for them to sell to this group? Is that how that works? That would ultimately be the mechanism, but obviously uh we would only do so once the board has decided to do so and with guarantees about compensation either in actual uh money uh or through other benefits. For example, we've discussed uh resurfacing

272all the tennis courts across RPS. So, we before moving any further, we just want to know, well, wait, what exactly is this land for real worth? Uh, and now we have a sense and it's it's rather significant. Thank you. And now I believe we have someone with Oh, Miss Burke. Yes. Oh, I don't have it. I wanted to ask something um otherformational items listed and I don't have to get the answers tonight, but um 6.01 just as an FYI. Tomorrow, you will receive the evaluation form for our superintendent and for um our clerk. also to include the superintendent's goals and evidence attached. And then my second question is, are there any questions regarding that, Madam Chair? And you have about a week or so to complete it. We just need everybody to complete it because

273with the board evaluation, we only received six responses. So, we had three people who didn't respond. Get That's right. So please, it's required by the state department that we complete that. So you will get that in the morning. Um the other item is 6.04. I know Mr. Hedgepath asked a question and I'm hearing that those million dollars count up from the property but not in my district in terms of Woodville Elementary. Is this something that's going to be I can't put it in the universe. How is that going to take place? all the work we've done to build a new um Woodville Elementary. Mr. Superintendent, please. And my last question is I was at Armstrong today. And I'm going to show you all the pictures later. How terrible because of a water leak on the

274track, the same track that's been there since 196 something. Just pat pat pat a burst a water mane burst or whatever pipe burst and it has gravel in its place. So, I'm I just took a look at the scoreboard again that's broke on homecoming night and hasn't been repaired. So, my question is, and I was asked this, um, yeah, remember everything went dark. Um, Richmond High School for the Arts, and I was asked this this afternoon. What scoreboard will be placed at the new school? Will it be better than not the same type as Hugenot has because that was 20 the old model and also would the football field be turf. So at some point thank you Mr. Cameron. I don't know the answer but I will get it for you. Thank you for bringing

275um item 6.01 to our um attention. colleagues, please if you could um ensure that you send those back in a timely manner so that we can have a productive discussion in our meeting for July. With that, I believe Miss Rizzy has motion for close session. I move that the school board of the city of Richmond convene in close session. One for consultation with legal counsel employed or retained by a public body regarding one personnel matter as authorized by Virginia code 2.2-3711A88. Two for consult consultation with legal counsel and briefings by staff members pertaining to probable litigation as authorized by Virginia Code 2.2-3711A7 2-3711A7 and three for discussion of matters that would involve the disclosure of information contained in Scholastic Records concerns one or more students is authorized by 2.2-3711 A2 second second it's been moved

276by Miss Rizzy and seconded by Mr. Hedgepath Madame clerk Mr. Peral yes Mr. Ricard yes Mr. Farooq. Yes. Mr. Hedgepath. Yes. Mr. Rizzy. Yes. Dr. Harris Muhammed. Yes. Miss Burke. Yes. Mr. Jafari. Yes. Miss Fernandez. Yes. Motion passes. Thank you. We are now enclosed.