001So good evening, everyone, and welcome to our work session. So we are beginning this meeting at 6.02 p.m. So this work session is our opportunity to ask any additional questions regarding educational specifications and hear from our ACPS team regarding that matter. So with that said, I'm going to turn it over to Dr. Hutchings. Thank you, Madam Chair. And we're really excited to finally have this discussion, right, to keep moving with this high school project. And I mean, I just want to give a shout out to our team in spite of this global pandemic and all the other things that we are working towards. We're still working through our high school project. and making sure our high school project is on time, as well as other projects such as Douglas MacArthur. So I'm really excited about
002this. I do want to turn things over to Dr. Mann so he can start off sharing some information in regards to our EDT. Just to give a recap to the board, as you all know, we have provided the board with an overview on what educational specifications are and how they're used and how they're developed. We provided you all with our draft educational specification. document. We've been working with our EDT. We've met with our staff. We've met with students. We've had community sessions. I think we have another community session that's coming up this week or next week. We are providing today the information with some of the revisions that came out of the correspondence, as well as the sessions and meetings that we've had thus far. So with that said, I'm going to turn things over
003to Dr. Mann to take us through today, and then we will open the floor for questions. Thank you, Dr. Hutchings. Just we're pulling up the presentation while we speak. All right. If we go to our central questions, we have. Five essential questions and good evening board. So our five essential questions, what feedback have been received from the EDT and staff and students on the comprehensive program educational specification? What changes will be incorporated in the final revision? How does this align with the school board's proposed CIP budget? And what is the school board being asked to approve tomorrow? And then what are our next steps? And so our near-term decisions, we know that the board made a decision on co-location on February 4th. We are next at the comprehensive program at Ed Specs, which you'll vote
004on tomorrow. And then our next decision point will be design concepts, which will have a meeting on March 18th. And then we'll actually have a decision on April 8th at that school board meeting. And so, as we mentioned in our two by twos, we had our EDT meeting and we took the EDT through three different breakout rooms. One was focused on the heart of the school and what does that mean? And thinking of the media center and a learning commons as the heart of the school. and getting their feedback, but also taking them through what a heart of the school could mean. And then what types of flexible learning could happen in a classroom and labs. And so we had a discussion around high intensity and low intensity labs and what those differences are. And
005then also flexible and large and general classrooms. As we know, we want as much flexibility in the Minnie Howard campus moving forward. And then lastly was what feedback did we receive from our teachers and students and their reactions to the heart of the school, the labs, and any other decisions that they, or discussions that they had that following Monday in the feedback sessions with staff and students. Next slide. And so we think about the instructional priorities for the EDT for the high school project. We are using project-based learning, which the EDT decided on way back when, when we were talking about one or two high schools. But with project-based learning, it gives us the ability to think about interdisciplinary instruction. But also we know research has shown that project-based learning has also increased academic outcomes.
006And then we are all excited about the work the team under Dr. Jacobs and others have done with the industry advisory board as we think about moving and really discussing workforce development and work-based learning opportunities for our students, but also teach professional learning as we want to make sure that our teachers have firsthand knowledge and experience that they can give students in the classroom of what it means to be a biologist, what it means to be in the arts, also in human services, so they can then when they're doing those project-based learnings, have those direct connections. And then lastly, equity. We know with our strategic plan with equity for all and the connected network as we've been bringing back to the EDT that we want to come up a level from focusing solely on the
007Minnie Howard campus, but now we want to make sure that we. refocus and that is now the connected network and we want connected access for all of our students including students at satellite cfc and when the early college comes online and then also student engagement and in that discussion on equity that all students are engaged whether that's academically socially that they know that they are part of the titan experience moving forward So our staff feedback, as we talked about the heart of the school, the library media, we heard from staff that they agreed that the library, the Minnie Howard campus is the heart of the school. They suggested that we add quiet rooms and collaboration rooms in the library. Security was a common thread that came up even with the students that they asked about
008questions about access control and safety. And then Dr. Hoover, I don't know if she's on the call today, but also with the students, there was this concern about Wi-Fi functionality and outlet availability. And then open spaces. The staff were really excited about higher ceilings and better transition spaces in the buildings, but then also they were excited about the ability to provide input into workspace and visibility. Next slide. And so for student feedback, varying designs on what the heart of the school is, I think one thing that we all thought during our EDT meeting, they all agreed that the heart of the school is where the students are. So that could be in the library, but it could also be on the athletic fields. It could be in a classroom, the band room. They're excited about
009larger spaces and more open space, which is a common thing even among the EDT members of having more open space. Again, you'll see technology, Wi-Fi functionality. And then from the students who live this world of transportation, they were concerned about the price and availability of student parking. public transportation options and access, and then also concerned about bus schedules and overcrowding as we think about transportation moving forward with the connected network. And then lastly, security, more cameras, and then fewer entrances and exits, and more supervision in those areas. Last slide, this one. And so what's changing in our final comprehensive program in EdSpecs? So as you may recall, there was many discussions in our two by twos about small learning communities and to make sure that we clear up the confusion. We're going to be going
010with the term interdisciplinary learning neighborhoods. This aligns with our goal of project based learning throughout the connected network. And then in the design piece, you'll see that we've talked about additional labs and what that means. And then you'll see. that we're moving the pool, co-located spaces and underground parking as optional elements of the program as far as space. And at this time, I will now turn it over to Ms. Gulick who will take us through the rest of the presentation. Thank you, Dr. Mann. And if we move to that next slide, we'll show why we moved those items into optional design. So we talked a little bit about this at the first presentation. And so just showing what the school boards, the ACPS construction budget is, which we think based on the school boards proposed
011FY22 to 31 CIP includes $150 million for construction for that construction contract that we'll ultimately get through. through procuring a CM at risk. In the blue, you can see those are the spaces we have to have. It's the higher end of those, and we really want to make sure we're really making an investment in our school for our students and for learning and making sure that environment is absolutely optimal before we consider all of these other things. And so that is why the pool, as well as the underground parking and those co-located partner uses have moved out. We need to still speak with city staff and are working with our partners, but not necessarily anticipating funding contribution from their side. And so some of these things we may need to eliminate from the total space
012program and the comprehensive program. EdSpec provides the flexibility for us to do that as we get into the design and discover more and more of what we'll be able to include. We can go to the next slide. We wanted to focus a little bit on the aquatics facility because we know that this is a community desire and something that we've talked about being a part of this project. As we mentioned before, it is expensive, currently $14.5 million for this competition-size eight-lane pool, including a separate diving tank. And net zero requirements we bring this up because pools loot use a lot of energy, as you can imagine, with the HVAC equipment that's required the amount of water. And different equipment that's required for to operate the pool facility it adds a significant amount of energy use
013and because of that achieving that zero is much more difficult, we don't know of any existing. pool aquatics facilities that do meet net zero energy requirements. And so we just may think about this need a little bit differently and potentially in the future separating it out and exploring other alternatives so that it's not taken away from our energy use of the building. what we're exploring with our architect with Perkins Eastman. There's been a lot of discussion about, you know, if we do have a pool using this facility, not only for the high school and for athletics or high school PE, but potentially K through 12 swim education. And so what is, instead of a diving well, what would a training pool look like to teach some of our young learners how to swim? and things
014like that. So that's one thing that we are considering. And we're also looking at the potential for a six lane pool, still competition length, but six lanes versus eight lanes and considering how does that limit us from an athletic standpoint. If we can go to the next slide. So this was the same slide we have for you before. So just reiterating what the school board is being asked to approve tomorrow, which is the full document. It will not have every detail in it that will ultimately be designed. We'll continue to work through that over the next year as we design the building and certainly coordinating and getting feedback from our staff and the educational design team throughout. But in particular, we ask you to approve this because it includes the proposed capacity. the list of
015spaces and in general the configuration or organization of those spaces as well as sets up that budget expectation. So that's what we're asking for you to approve tomorrow. We can go to the next slide. And again, just reiterating that this is all part of a grand plan for us to get to a September 2024 opening. And that's why all these scheduled things are imperative to make sure we stay on track and so that we can move right into the design. We can go to the next slide. And then just wanted to give you another, just the list of all the things we have going on. Our team is working very hard. And so we have tomorrow anticipating that school board approval on this document. On March 8th, I believe there are rolling staff meetings as
016well as we're working to. schedule a school space team. We have a separate school space team who focuses on the kind of building elements from the educational design team. So working to meet with them. And then March 8th we have our community design kickoff webinar. Just a plug that we sent out that the invite for the March 15th meeting or March, it's actually March 16th now, that meeting as well as a survey to start to get some people's ideas about what they're hoping to see in that new Minnie Howard building. And then we'll have this kind of design kickoff next week. We have a few more EDT meetings. Like I said, that March 16th community meeting, March 15th community meeting has been moved to March 16th. So it's now Tuesday evening. And then we'll be
017presenting you concepts before you know it and asking you to decide on that. And then we'll leave you alone for decision-making for a little bit. So that's pretty much all we have for you today, but really interested in having you all. ask us your questions or give us your feedback to make sure we can have a successful vote tomorrow. So actually, Azuka, maybe you could stop sharing for now. And I'll turn it back to you, Dr. Hutchings. Thank you, Ms. Gulick. And I'll turn things back over to the Madam Chair. Okay. Thank you, everyone, for that presentation. And I have some questions or eight questions so far. Ms. Gentry. Thank you, and thank you to all the staff doing all of this. I know there are a lot of other things on your plate as
018well. One kind of clarification, you know, looking at, actually looking ahead a little bit past tomorrow, but looking ahead to that kind of next milestone date, you know, with the April 8th. I appreciate the rationale you explained for kind of sort of putting in their own kind of separate category the questions about the underground parking and the pool and things like that. I guess I just need to understand from a timeline point of view, we're not making those kinds of decisions with the EdSpec vote tomorrow. Would we need to be making some definitive decisions on pool? or underground parking by the April 8th design concept meeting? And the reason I ask is I'm just a little concerned about, you know, the amount of time. Those are issues that potentially the community might be very, very
019interested in, and I just want to make sure we're leaving enough time for that and for people to understand, you know, those kinds of decision moments. Yeah, so I would say with regards to that, by the time we get to concept phase, we really like to have nailed down all the elements of our building that will be incorporated, especially the big elements. I would say parking is definitely going to be a decision by then. I would say by then we will definitely know if some of these co-located uses are going to be funded by the city and therefore incorporated. And we're having those discussions now. As far as the pool, I think we're working with our architect to see, is there a way? um we could uh in in any concept we could evolve the
020concept to potentially include that or not include that piece of it because i do think it takes broader discussion and potentially looking at alternate ways to deliver that pool and maybe if it's not part of this project maybe it's part of some some partnership in the future and how do we make sure we design for that now that's helpful thank you miss anderson Yeah, I just want to follow on about the pool. I mean, are there discussions about somehow taking that out of the net zero? Because if we don't know that there is one that's done that way, I mean, I think that's asking a lot of us to try to be pioneers. We're already being pioneers in the city anyway for this net zero thing, but to do something that hasn't been done. at
021all is just beyond, I think. We somewhat agree. Of course, we'd love to have net zero energy if we could, but I do think just today we've started to have this conversation with city staff about what will be allowed and could we potentially look at the pool facility separate from the net zero energy requirement. So that is something we're exploring. Okay, great. I actually had another one too, Madam Chair. Can I, I just, it's just a comment that I think I made in my. two by two that I'm just concerned with. I love the big spaces, but I also want to make sure, like I'm somebody who absolutely hates and cannot work in an open office environment. So I want to, and I read the comments about the visual distraction from having, so I want
022to make sure that when we're, and I've been in places that have the movable walls and it's just too loud. So I just want to make sure that when we're doing those things, I love the ideas, but I just want to make sure that we're making sure that the visual distraction and the noise distractions are going to be something that we really look into. Yeah, could I ask someone from Perkins Eastman to maybe to respond about how we mitigate some of those challenges? Thanks, Sean. Sure, thank you. We share your concerns. I think, as I mentioned the last time, we're very sensitive to appropriate acoustics in the learning environment. In fact, I think we're champions of those issues, and we do have a research project going on that's exploring how to enhance acoustics in active
023experiential learning environments, which might be very reverberant. So, yeah, we'll have, you know, complete focus on, you know, enhanced acoustical environment in the new facility. As we know, that's sort of the baseline of a 21st century educational environment. Also, visual distraction is something that, again, that we're very sensitive to. But transparency in the... learning environment. So visual connectivity is both a factor in safety and security in the learning environment, but also a way to, you know, activate a variety of different, you know, spaces within the educational setting. So extended learning environments that complement the classroom, for example, require, you know, supervision, you know, of those kinds of spaces to be effective as well. So We will absolutely be exploring each of these options as we move into the next phases and you'll see some of
024this start to come to play in the concept design and subsequent phases as well. But great questions and great factors for great learning environments. Thank you. Dr. Reif. Thank you for the presentation. I also have two questions. The first one is about the budget. Can you just remind me or review like the replacement of the fields and the teardown of the Minnie Howard site? Is that included in this budget? Yes, it is. Okay. And then I was wondering, I enjoyed reading the feedback from the focus groups that happened. And I wanted to ask about two things. But one student comment that I thought was really interesting was in terms of taking public transportation. This student had commented that it would be nice if they could teach us how to ride the bus, which I just
025had to flag that because, you know, sometimes the best laid plans. I mean, I don't. I don't know. It's just at least one student is thinking they need a little bit more guidance in helping them learn how to ride the public bus. So I just wanted to point that out. But I was interested in the feedback about two things, the Wi-Fi functionality. It seemed that there were both students and staff who commented on that. And I was wondering, were they speaking about their experiences in the existing building? And I know we've talked about some kind of infrastructure. change that would increase the broadband. I was just curious what how that impacts this project or what thinking what kind of technology or hardware would be in the new building or is that like totally kind of
026separate from this process but to improve wi-fi functionality and then I have to say the security concerns raised by the students. more concerning to me. And I just was wondering if we could get a little bit more insight on that. I know, you know, we've had some recent conversations about school climate and, you know, the sample for the school climate survey was quite small. So I'm really interested in seeing a more robust survey of school climate in the future, but any insight into some of that feedback, I'd really appreciate hearing. So I know the team can elaborate a little more, but one, I do want to just address the climate survey. That is a part of our work that we will be doing with ACPS 2025 and having division-wide climate surveys that are a lot
027more robust than they've been previously. You all are going to get an update on that tomorrow as we're talking about ACPS 2025. In regards to the technology component, And the team can elaborate on this, but I'm sure everyone right now is responding from their current experiences and not necessarily what they may foresee is going to happen in the future. A lesson that we've learned about buildings is how we built T.C. Williams, right? Thankfully, we have built other schools since T.C. Now we can say we've opened Patrick Henry, we've opened Ferdinand T. Day, and they don't have the same internet challenges that T.C. Williams. experiences now. So we are able to, when we are doing our buildings, we're able to use the latest technology that's available at that particular time that will allow us to, you
028know, have, you know, the appropriate broadband and bandwidth, excuse me, within that school building. We are and we have upgraded our King Street bandwidth for internet. And we will see how it all works out when the students come back on March the 16th to see how that looks. But we have already started that upgrade because we knew we were going to have some challenges. And we've been having challenges for several years that we're trying to mitigate. But Dr. Hoover, I see you just came on. So I'll turn things over to you. No, I think you did a great job. There's always lessons learned between every building. And we have met with the architect and the planners talking about making sure we have a distributed antenna system to make sure our cellular service through the buildings
029works and things like that. And technology is always changing. So we never want to spec out what we want eventually today. So it is a close working relationship. Certainly, we've built a bunch of schools in the last several years that we've learned about. And again, so I think being part of the process and now after we've experienced this pandemic and we're going to be, I think, teaching a little bit differently than we have before, that's all going to influence our future decisions. I don't see any other hands. So I think one thing I would add to what has been said, Michelle, that I noticed, what it also really pulled out for me as we were having discussions in the EDT was this notion that connectivity is really important to high school kids. Like our students,
030that is their... one of their primary forms that they feel connected. And so I think it also reveals how, as we design, as we, you know, go into concept and design these different spaces, like connectivity, even just with technology in as many spaces as possible, I think is going to be important for the kids to feel. just connected across the school. I think it's a part of that. It just revealed to me that how much it's a part of that generation. Excuse me. So I also found that very interesting, but I also felt like it lent itself to discussions of the spaces, like even how the library can be used in various other spaces in the building. Okay. So with that said, I don't see any other questions. So I guess if we have everything
031we need, this was a very short and efficient work session. And tomorrow we are expected to vote on the ed specs. All right. Well, I appreciate you all. Anything else? I just want to add about if you're attending the next meeting at seven o'clock, that that is a separate link. And SLT members were mostly given the public link. So you have to log out of this meeting is the whole point. Thank you. Okay. So with that said, thanks, everybody. And we'll see you, some of you, maybe not all, but we'll see some of you in a few minutes.