001testing testing one two three. welcome to today's school board workshop. We're thankful to your time and dedication to our district. This workshop is now called to order. Our primary focus is to create a safe and productive environment for all participants, please be reminded that exit doors that are clearly marked for emergency exiting. While in the board room refrain from obstructing the exit doors. All attendee must occupy all seats with the exception of immediate ya. There is a overflow area. Upon activation of the fire alarm system please exit from the room in an orderly fashion and remain outside until the authority that has jurisdiction that's deemed the building safe to return. Thank you for your cooperation. Please rise and remain standing for the "pledge of allegiance" by royal palm elementary. please stand for the "pledge of
002allegiance". I pledge allegiance to the flag uft united states of america. And to the republic for which it stands, one nation, under GOD indivisible with liberty and justice for all. you MAY be seated but they do have a little video so we'll wait. [Singing] thank you and thank you so much to the team at royal palm elementary for the pledge and that very wonderful performance. Yes. We will now, board alhadeff has requested a moment of silence from a staff member from stoneman marjory. MS. Alhadeff. would I like to why a moment of silence for britly chatman worked as a campus monitor. Sur vuvuzelaed by her mother and two sisters. She leaves behind a plethora of kindness and compassion. She will truly be missed. Please join me in recognizing a moment of silence ininer hohor this
003time.. Thank you. thank you. Board member holness has also asked a moment of silence for a student in honor of MS. Kye a dedicate asked compassion teacher at boyed anderson high school. She treated every student with kindness and fairness, ensuring they receive the care and attention to thrive. Her infectious smile and spirit will be missed. But her legacy of kindness, dedication and love will en did youer. Please join me in the moment of silence. Thank you. fellow board members, each year the school year of broward county recognizes counselor week. Today I'm glad to recognize these individuals for their dedication to enriching our school community and serving as guiding lights for students as they navigate their academic achievement and personal growth. The school counselor of the year and brace embracer of the year award to create
004an environment of learning, resilience and compassion. They represent the highest standards of what it means to be an outstanding school counselor and brace advisor. Today we honor the school counselor and brace advisor of the year who's honors that's impacted the success and well being of countless students. Please join in congratulating, for elementary schools. [Applause] Sandra tomas for middle schools. [Applause] And ronald sicardi for high schools. [Applause] In addition, congratulation to see christina taylor the brace advisor of the year. [Applause] We thank you all for the great work you do with students everyday and appreciate your contribution to see sfud -- student success. In addition please accept this bag of goodies. Now I'm happy to introduce belinda daisy school counselor supervisor for some closing comments. as voluntary -- advocacy. I want to acknowledge that the counsel
005association recently honored you as a school community and family advocate year award. At their annual conference. [Applause] Congratulations, on this prestigious honor and thank you again for being a staunch advocate for the work our school counselor do at broward county public schools. as we prepare to begin this school workshop we are reminded that our pro efficiently' see for all students. We begin the vital task of sustaining this achievement. We will continue educating all students to reach their highest potential. Our theme this year is believe and power achieve one broward. Today's workshop will the board will review the items as advised and presented by the superintendent. Our first item for discussion is the annual superintendent report of the ccc settlement agreement, I now turn it over to staff for a brief presentation. good morning, MADAM Chair,
006board members and members of the public. Turn this over to MS. Holingsworth and DR. Washington. good morning, everybody. Thank you for allowing us this time examine DR. Jodie washington is going to take it from here. DR. Washington. thank you everybody. Student services initiatives. Do we have the presentation? All right, so it is the time of year that we bring forward the annual superintendent's report as it relates to the status of the conditions outlined in the ccc settlement agreement. It is in policy 1240, the diversity policy that outlines the superintendent will bring an annual report in JANUARY. This will be followed in bye a report in APRIL by the diversity committee. Just some background information, I know this is the third year that I've brought this report forward, so I'm sure we're all well aware of
007what we're doing. But as a quick reminder in AUGUST of 2 thou, the school board of broward county settled with a group called citizens concern about our children to ensure that diversity is promoted throughout all schools and district. They appointed members of the diversity names were named in the lawsuit as body stakeholders charged with monitoring the district. You can see those here on this slide. Just some updates since the last report in JANUARY of 2024, diet verse committee brought their report in APRIL and within their report they made 39 recommendation as it relate today that report. New is a current status as each of the indicators but you'll also find the status of where we are as it relates to the 39 recommendation that's the diversity committee brought forward in APRIL of 2024. And with
008that, I'll turn it over to the board for discussion. thank you, thank you very much. We'll go to public comment and we have MS. Pier grant, the committee chair of the diversity committee. good morning, sorry I was reviewing the report. Thank you so much to staff and the superintendent for a robust report. It was like 517 pages and I've been reading all of them and appreciate that you are taking the recommendations of the diversity committee. I think the report looks great. i'm hoping to align our report with the superintendent's report. My only slight citism is a couple of conditions and indicators doesn't give us a why and a how? And so I will hopefully have an opportunity to address that with the superintendent. He should be coming to our meeting next month but other than
009that, I'm super excited about the direction with the district and the work we've done in the committee. There is a lot of stuff to look through. And I'm looking through the report now but I'm pleased to see the changes and I hope this is continued to getting the district where all the conditions and all of the indicators are met. So thank you so much. thank you and I will say thank you also to staff I know there was a long period of time that this was not getting done and it's the second year in a row that we've done it so I appreciate that. And now we'll move to board discussion. Do I have any board members that have any questions? Okay. MS. Fam? Did you have your hand p? -- up? yes, I just
010wanted pose a question. I want today go one item a time. I know it talks about student having access to a hard cover copy. The govern wants everything go to go digital. am I mistaken in that. MS. Holings worth? so yes, we're looking at hard copy and digital materials that's how the vendors are then sending them and purchasing them. They never want to take away a hard copy. We have students that they have to have whether they have an a dom accommodation or not. We'll be doing all that with all of our instructional materials. thank you. DR. Zeman. thank you so much, chair. Couple of comments. This is such a big step from previous reports so thank you for doing that. On behalf of my constituents and I mentioned this earlier, a summary that MAY
011help the chair, but certainly help the community absorb this quicker. This is attorney. Due to amount of data that suggested that there were some real concerns about the way that we treated people in the schools and where they lived. The conditions are good. The metrics are good. The data that we dwaurted is good. I love that there is more explanation and more analysis this year. It kind of gives reader context and I think if we had a summary, they would observe that quicker. Things like a one to one laptop policy is not just good for learning, it's good for beating back any kind of disparity impact that condition afford access to technology at home. so I'm looking forward to us moving in that direction as soon as possible. I still think though that there is
012an opportunity with this report to answer the underlying question. Of are we at a point where we have diversity and we have equity in broward county schools? And to me that is aligned to the executive sum reer for next year's report. Is that we might want to answer that question up front. If we're not there, no matter how close are we? How much progress? What is the priority that this board is giving to the underlying causes that caused this lawsuit with settlement with them in order to make sure that the future is better than it was in 2000. Last I checked 2000 was 25 years ago. That's a long time. And I think the community wants to know why there is still some not-mets here. And are equal to other not mets. Are you achieving
013100 percent at grade level. And we're not doing that in majority white schools, universally we're not doing in majority black ethnic or schools with ese clusteders in the line. But when you look at the overwhelming evidence that comes through in this report there is been tremendous progress in the last 25 years and that progress ought to be celebrated. I would love that that message was like presented in the report itself. That there was a little bit more editorial rather than just the data and the analysis which is really great. Huge jump from last year but I think there is an opportunity for us to note the improvement and satisfy the communities interest in whether or not we're continue to go work on these issues that came out of this lawsuit in 2000. Thank you. thank
014you, MS. Rupert? thank you. My first question, first of all, thank you so much for this presentation and the information that's in it. I remember not too long ago as another board member another board of commissioners board maybe four back. I was really digging in deep by myself. So I appreciate the fact that it's very transparent. We're holding people accountable and every one of my colleagues are looking through this with a fine tooth comb I appreciate that. My question is on continue 6. How many media specialist do we have in all our schools. Ratio, broken down by elementary, middle, high school, and 6 through 12? And obviously, there is follow-up needed, I don't expect you to answer that today. DR. Hepburn. thank you for the question MS. Rupert. That's definitely a foum. That's something we're
015looking at now. We do fund every school for a media specialist. but we've provided autonomy in the past. We'll provide a follow-up of current state right now to the board. thank you, I appreciate that. And I think that was it. DR. Zeman, touched on the two not-met areas and then I guess the last one for me is condition 5, athletic facilities. It's not meant for the building part. This is something that I've struggled through and I'm sure our parents, our students and our employees are struggling through them too. We are making progress because we're closing that gap with the smart problem lag. Smart program lag and I appreciate that and I appreciate the forward motion that we're doing. And we've already talked about maintenance before. And oh I guess, are we still at the point
016where we have publication dates that are 15 percent older than 15 years? DR. Hepburn? I'll let MS. Holingsworth expand with that. given that we've had time with media specialist and that's one of their function, weeding shall we say. So the innovative team has been going out and helping. So we do have some schools still there and we're working with them and addressing that. I look forward to that continuation and I get it and sadly, in the public knows this as well as we do which is you have lower enrolled schools, the money for the schools go down, and you have to make these very tough choices but when it comes to parity, it's important for us to continue putting it under microscope which we're doing and looking forward to the next update. Thank you so
017much. thank you. MS. Alhadeff. yes, I'm going to speak on page 37 continue 7. My question is on 7.5, can you explain what the big 5 is and why this condition has not been met yet? DR. Hepburn. DR. Washington. yes, thank you for that question. So this is a situational not-met due to the transition from the using the discipline management system to focus where our data is coming.. In previous years all e didiiplinenehas s bebe enred totoasas and ere e wawaa behavior dashboard within basis that broke down time of day that referrals were happening, primarily locations and it did break down referrals by demo graifk. Sol that data analysis report isn't available this year as we transition from using dms into focused our data is housed in focused but the behavior dashboard that was use
018today create those reports on a quarterly is unavailable right now but we're working on the focus team to be able to continue with those reports. But that's not to say the data is not being analyzed. We do have specialist assigned, they do go and meet with the schools and review their data particularly for students who have high number of referrals to make sure that we have services in place for those students and that we're getting them the help they need or an environment that is most supportive of their needs. and the big five? the big five is report that looks at the time of day that referrals are happening. Where in the campus location referrals are happening. Who on the campus has the most, the disparity data and I'm trying to think what the 5th
019one. It's a report that breaks down the data for the schools to be able to make decisions about to I need to shift a lunch time or class change or is there something happening at this particular class change. Are we seeing more in the afternoon than in the morning. It helps them tone gauge in those conversations. great, and 7.4 with the resources to promote positive students behavior changes, are these different that you gave examples like, spbpi champs district family programs. Are these, one of these at least available at every one of our schools? DR. Hepburn? DR. Washington? yes, waefp one of those is available at every school tai.S school wide positive behavior plan. It's a plan that schools collaboratively with teachers and administrators their council work on an annual basis to create a positive. We're
020looking for students doing the right thing instead of students doing the wrong thing. Every teacher has access to training, it's available online. We come out and do it in-person, they can come to a training on a saturday or after school whatever works best for their schedule. And then there are district family counseling available in every innovation zones. In one innovation zone there is more than one. But we also have, every school has their own positive behavior intervention system that weren't listed there, but each one of them has what works in their environment. is there something better focus at the high school level? DR. Hepburn? DR. Washington? programs specifically for the high school definitely? Each one of the high schools has a program that is part of their school wide positive behavior plan. They MAY have
021something vested or embedded with that. I cannot remember the name of the, there was, I can't remember the name of the system but at high schools that they use for example for to track students get to go class on time and they'll reward those. I think it's hero. hero, that's one of them that's a positive incentive program na several of our high schools use to not only track those that are doing the right thing but also encourage them when they're not through some minor consequences. okay, yeah, so I think that that's wonderful. I think obviously, kids thrive on positivity and those positive reenforcements. I think we need to do a bert job at the high school level and I love to get landyn's perspective on that. So if there is other programs out there, if
022you can follow-up, let us know what they are but more importantly make sure our high schools know what they are. Thank you. thank you, DR. Holness. thank you, MADAM Chair. So I know that it's you know as a past teacher and understanding the challenges that many schools have in terms of indicator 3.1 in schools demonstrating at our above average performance. I know in the past, DR. Hepburn, we spoke some of our great leadership in our schools that are doing an excellent job. We had endeavor showing significant gains. So how are we capitalizing on this success of some of our school base leadership and ensuring that the schools that are not performing as they need to be, that these others school base leadership are involved in supporting those schools. DR. Hepburn. thanks, for the question. I
023don't want to steal DR. Fulton's thunder because she MAY be itching to answer this question. DR. Fulton. we have great examples of exceptional leadership across our district. So every month all of our principals come together in what we call regional meetings and they are kin to best practices where when there are great things happening in one school, principals come together together and walk that school where that principal talks about what are the exceptional practices that are going on that they can scale out to other schools. It allows other principals to come there to see it firsthand ask my questions that they MAY about the best practices going on. And they were able to scale that across our district. We also now do that within regional we cross over to other regions because we're one district
024and we want to make sure that what is happening in this region, we're scaling across. Our main goal is to be a a-district to all our students. great, I appreciate some of our principals looking at these great performing schools that have significant gains and so on. But sometimes, for example, MS. Beaver was in endeavor and moved to walker. How are we when these principle palsing who are achieve significant results at their schools in addition to leadership visiting the schools that are doing well, even when these principals moved to other schools, how are we utilizing their expertise in getting such great results to help principals, you know, adopt similar practices and so on? so since you say MS. Beaver, I shared an example of how we're scaling up her leadership and also mentors the principal at
025learning center. She is a first-year principal. And one of the program that we provide for one-year principals is a mentor and we strategically select principals with skill set so it was an opportunity to match the endeavor with MS. Beavers so she is now able to mentor, developer and grow her so all the best practices that are en grounded at endeavor are not lost. She is also available for anytime she wants to call the phone and call and talk to her. But we also use MS. Beavers we have a great example of MS. Brown. They walk side by side with other principals and really get inside on what are some of the challenges that you're having and they're able to give their firsthand experience because often times the challenges are the same. But now you're able
026to work with the principal who has walked the shoes and they can give them their experience. So I think it's very important that we do a lot of mentoring and budding up our principals because principals learn well from each other and they have the respect of each other's work. very good. I guess I can conclude that this is a district wide efforts in utilizing these principal efforts. And I you know, I appreciate % what happened with MS. Beavers and I hope we have MS. Beavers across the district and I'm sure we do. But if we can utilize, have it result driven when we're looking at the principals and looking at the results along with the experience, I think it's a great effort in trying to improve the overall performing of schools district wide. So I
027want today also talk about indicator 2.1, and also indicator 2.3. So I remember when this came to us in the past last year, I spoke on the students access to computers, I am a little dis appointed that that is not met because that is something that I spoke strongly about. There are kids who MAY not have access to a computer or internet at home. We can't, you know, assume that because an internet basic internet cost MAY be 10 or 20 or whatever dollar it is, some just truly can't afford it. I mentioned this last year and I really kind of was looking forward to us achieving this indicator this year, and it wasn't so DR. Hepburn, can you speak to how are we going to ensure that all of our children those who are economically
028disadvantage can succeed by having equitable opportunities for access to the internet as well as access to the computers. Because you know, I have two kids in broward county public schools and majority of their homework assignments, at least 50 percent or more is computer base, internet base. I cannot imagine the challenges a child MAY have when parents cannot provide these for them to succeed. What are we doing tone sure that these kids will have equitable opportunity for success? DR. Hepburn. thank you for the answer and I know MS. Davis is going to answer this one. It's our goal that we have one to one devices for all students and also our goal to assist students that have wi-fi access, it MAY not be a free solution but maybe very low cost working with our partners verizon
029just to make sure it's an affordable solution for families. And then I'll let MR. Davis talk about the existing plan to ensure that happens to move one to one for all of our students. good morning, trey davis, chief financial officer. To compliment what MR. Hepburn said. We have 80-20 ratio across the district. So we have what amounts 11.2 devices per students. Where we're lacking is deployment for students to take home when required when they MAY not have a computer at home. The principals do have autonomy in some cases, they do issue computers to their at-need students while others do not. As far as the number of devices in our inventory, we've exceeded, the dwiesz one to one in a one to one sense. Relative to internet service, irrespective of say social socio economic status, it
030would be an expense to the district. The district through for example, prior plans like instructional continuity plan has put out information on the ten million program, internet essentials, now internet, that information is available up on our website. Some of those are low cost and you mentioned the cost could be a burden for some. Especially even at $10. There are like usac life line programs for select providers that do provide no cost internet services, that's also been put out on the website as well. That being said, to what the need is actually at each school. I just wanted put that out there. DR. Holness. okay, DR. Hepburn, I'm concerned because the comment that I heard is that some principals provide access at-need and some principals do not. How are we going to create consistency? It seems
031there should be I have rather than a choice. We're talking about disadvantaged students. So how do we take that away from the principals instead of it being their choice into making it an directive and then I have another question and then I'll be done. DR. Hepburn. we're working through the process. One thing when MR. Davis came to the board, he reviewed to see we have devices and the age of the devices and make sure that they're useable and assess the land sxaip to find out some principals do and some don't. So we're in the process to make sure principals know how to hand them out, know how to maintain the inventory address broken or stolen. We're working through the nuances. And proved the concept last year probably 12 schools and given those students dwiesz for
032some -- devices we're work on that to roll back the autonomy. We did a lot of research just to understand our current state so we can address it in a appropriate manner. okay, so are we hoping to achieve this in the upcoming school year? Where we can work through all of those concerns and the principals with then be on board with providing access? yes, so we're taking this and equitable manner like right now, trey and his team is working with MS. Hude and ste office first. And then we'll work our way. okay, so DR. Hepburn, last year, I was very disappointed about but I really had expected that this would have occured. So I'm hoping when it comes back to us next year, the internet access and the computer access is not going to indicate
033not met because I think this is really important. And I think as a district, we can do this for our economic disadvantaged kids. And one last point, regarding the low cost or no-cost internet. You know, are we using any kind of measure for families that are have significant economic issues those poverty situation that those kids at least can have that at no cost even if we have majority of our kids at low cost. Are we using any economic line to determine who can which of our families can get access to internet at no cost? I think that's something that we should look into. If there are not, there needs to be a measure based on financial situation to even provide it at no-cost to students. Is that something that we can? absolutely, we work with
034partners for low cost or no cost, they have to demonstrate financial need with the partners. okay, so there will be some families that will be no-cost. depending on the availability of certain programs. There are a lot of very low cost as low as $10 for wi-fi but for no-cost it depends on availability of the program through partners through nonprofit through for profit and even through state and government. well thank you DR. Hepburn thank you so much and I'm looking forward to next year to seeing improvement but I appreciate all the other areas that I met. Thank you. thank you, landyn. good morning, I want to thank MS. Batista for giving me a thorough summary of the background on this. Very understandable, I echo DR. Holness comments. That'ses something that a lana and I hear at
035school. I have a question, regarding what MS. Alhadeff was speaking b.For the school wide behavior plan that district created criteria? DR. Hepburn? DR. Washington. so we worked hand and hand with the p fw s project out of florida so it's a hybrid of their blueprint versus wla over the last six or seven years, we have found to work in broward schools. thank you. So I know, I know, students that are high school serve on their sacs and are able to provide input on this plan. But I think it would be beneficial to look, I know some principals already do this, but involving students in a creation of a behavior. I can choose any school and look at their positive behavior plan and ask some of their students about if they know what what is on
036this plan and they will probably tell me that they are not aware, right? So I think that's something that would be really affective in the years to come. I have one question on indicator four, or I'm sorry, condition four. When it comes to indicator 4.4, which high school collaboraters with students to design schedule. We hear often at schools that students feel like they get to their sophomore, juno yor even senior year. And they're like wow, I missed out on a lot of opportunities, I fell minuted and I wish I knew freshman year what the opportunities were available to me. We ask the questions sometimes at our school visits, if you can be a freshman again, what would you want to know about your school. I know this is a little bi complex rerecommdatiti, but I
037ththghght would I I rorow it out there. When students go in as freshman working with counselor what four years looks like. That's a path that they know that connect follow. I think it would be something beneficial for all the students and something that the students we talk are asking about. And finally when it comes to the area indicator 4.2 about students having access to courses not taught on their campus, our enrollment is phenomenal and we have a plethora of opportunities for students to take advantage of. So I think it's important I don't doer broward school to promote shows stunts for students to be able to take advantage of. But overall, I want to say thank you for this report. It was very easy to understand and I'm looking forward for students providing feedback on the
038diversity committee report. thank you. thank you and so everyone knows duel enrollment, we have fiu, anyway. MS. Thompson. good morning, thank you for those reports. I have two comments. First, for the athletic, obviously lost my page, for the athletic fields is this an area where we can partner with municipalities. I note ben brooke has voiced publicly that they're willing to invest in a field, field lights, field bleacher. I know there are some parents fundraising but because of the costs it's not obtainable just for a parent group. Is this a proj thaekt we can research. yes, so those are on going discussions and work more in local agreement. Because usually when you get involved, it's a benefit to us. They do a better job sometimes in being able to readily maintain them and keep them up-to-date
039and in the specific upkeep. And some of the challenges with the stadiums, facilities, we work through those, sometimes it's the community don't, I've been through this as a principal. We don't want the baseball field to have lights, we have enough lights with the football field so. It's a push and pull with the xhienlts. Some people in the community are championing and then you find out the hoa says no. Those are on going discussion. The one leverage point that we can utilize with field conditions is working with our cities where we can have some shared space outside of school hours. as a foum, can I get an update on the conversation with west broward. It seems like the community is in favor. And then I would like to dive in more to page 40 with the
040student support instructionalist. How is it determined that the schools that they're at? The 55 schools? DR. Hepburn. repeat that question. That you just mentioned about broward. no worries. At page 40 at the bottom, the students instructional as identified by multiple data sources. So what was that? DR. Washington? yes, thank you for the question. So behavioral data, referrals from school social workers, referrals to family therapist, attendance da taxer students with chronic health conditions, it's overall wellness data, is what we refer to it as. Just anything that can be a barrier to academic success for students. The schools with the highest numbers with the barriers were those selected for the ssis positions. okay, and I know we're going to dive into this later, how are they trained to provide these serves? so if we can put a
041pin in that part of the conversation and have that, then in the next, they are part of the next workshop and vernika winter is the direct rer of health service who's oversees sis program and person pel. She would be better to give you an answer. I can give you high overview. we can pin it, I have a lot of questions for the next one. okay, so perfect. thank you, MS. Bulman? thank you. I just not to beat a dead horse but I wanted to revisit number 2. 2.1 and 2.3 that DR. Holness already wraut up but to me, having when all of our educational plat forms are internet base, for students not to have internet access at home it seems like that's a major obstacle to gaining equity. I'm wondering and also concerned even if
042you have a 10-dollar access plan, you still have an infrastructure problem sometimes and the ability to maintain that internet access in a home. I know it's difficult for people to do that when people are clipping the hedge. Is there any alternative like hotspot? Like if you're a student that has income threshold that would make it easier. When you don't have internet access and all of your work home is online how are you able to compete with your peers and get things accomplished? It's a huge barrier. so in addition to possible low cost solution are there any other strategies that are available? I'll let MR. Davis answer that, -- na is to go to the library et cetera, right? There are other options and select hotspot. What I personally don't like, there is the fact that
043there are safety issues associated with that one particular student has to exit their home to go find internet access. great and there are other barriers to transportation, you you're mentioning high schooler but there could be a second grader, OFth grader doing things online. yes, during the pandemic, we had a lot of support this. Having buses equipped with mobile hotspots, there is been a lost pull backs because that money has run out. As we're working on our plan of deployment, we're also work withing partners to figure out costs and solutions for families that have that specific need. I just think if this is the way that we're delivering education, and there is a huge barrier. There is a difference between coming home and opening up your computer and doing your homework, and that's a huge gap.
044That's like, you know, just a basic. exactly. You just took it out of my mouth. Maybe in a future platform, it is a basic need for everybody in our country now. It's pretty much a requirement for everybody today to have some form of wi-fi internet access, especially our kids. So we're trying to maneuver with work withing partners to find the best solutions. It is a basic need for everybody today to have some form of internet and form of wi-fi access. thank you. I'm going to go and we have two other people but we have to be cognizant of our time. I'm going to mention computers again. The one to one computer is in our school as landyn has said, we heard from students, although it MAY be on paper that we have one to one
045and you know well, it does not rollout one to one on annual classroom maybe there is 32 students in the classroom but only 25 computers in the cart. These are things we hear all the time. So although, we MAY look we're one to one on paper, we have to make sure that we do a better job that we're actually one to one in the classroom beyond, you know, having computers outside. And also for internet access, I was going to say maybe we can work with the county or municipalities or even the state government as somebody who wandered around in norway because I didn't have wi-fi and couldn't fientd anyway to the hotel. It made me think that it was important that that was a opinion need for a variety of reasons. So I think it
046would be great if we can partner with getting those hotspots or getting public wi-fi where that is not a barrier anywhere to anyone. And I would love to be able to partner with other people to have that company. Condition 5, the facilities, they talked a lot about football fields and it spoke briefly about baseball and softball, but we also pool facilities and the gym, did I mention we have baseball in the gym. So I think when we need it's more than just putting turf or lights on a football field, and i will just mention that really important is the lightning detectors and some baseball fields have it but at the same time the softball fields don't and that's not safe for anyone especially since we live in south florida. So those are things that I
047think should also be included. We cannot check and say, yeah, everybody has turf. So I think we're not yeah, we're not, the only facilities I saw in there was baseball and softball. It didn't mention pools or gyms that I saw. Maybe I was past it. For condition 6, the maintenance of schools. We know that that's not happening equally across the district. Some of it has to do with timing but some of it has to do with budgeting. So I would like to just have more information on that and same thing with books in the media center. Some is because of media specialist versus media clerks. But go to the libraries, they're full and when you go to the east side, for example, dana elementary just got a beautiful new media center but their books are
048very scarce. So maybe we can partner with people who help us get appropriate books that they have access to that they are in the right age, or you know the right time frame. But I will tell you there are way less books in the east than the west. And that's just a statement that I'm going to make. sxl 8.1 where it says about, it says its met but every five, like a five-year priority plan. I know we have a defp, but I would personally not saying that that falls in line of priority. I won call that met because it spells it out, but there are thungz that should be moving along fasters than others. Soy just question, saying that we do have a defp but when it says that it's prioritized, I don't believe we
049have that. So we should be working on that as we look at our defp tha. Is it for me. We have two people that want to talk more and then we're calling because we're coming to time. MS. Alhadeff. it's paorn that our warning detectors are working at the schools that are the lightning detector. And then as far as the one to one on computers, I agree with my colleagues this needs to be a priority. But we've done this dance, we went through covid and we did a fantastic making sure that every students had computer and had access to wi-fi so. We have the experience already about rolling this out. And one thing I want to say, especially at the middle school level, if you ever have seen a middle schooler, their backpacks, they look like
050ninja turtles, their back packs are so heavy they're nearly falling over. There needs to be a conversation regarding the health of a child with such a heavy backpack, the affects it's having on spines and how we can give them a computer about possibly eliminate from having all of these textbooks and also having conversations with teachers and brin pals in regards to you know, maybe, you do not need to bring have a three-ring binder for every class and bring every assignment to school to this point in time in JANUARY of 2025. So I think these are real issues that need to be solved. Thank you. thank you. DR. Zeman for brief statements. I'm not going to be brief, chair. This is a very important in our community cares deeply about this and it's something na is
051not as important. I walk my 7th grader to the school bus in the morning and I carry her backpack, it's so heavy, now we just walk. I'm a big guy so I can carry it but I feel bad giving it back. We don't have lockers, the consequence of that I'm not sure that we've taken into full consideration. Nor have we stopped and thought about the could lid experience. That's a very important important point but the community wants every kid to have a chance to learn. And want evan nasher parent to have access to paying for field trips online. They want access to many of the beautiful apps that we created and so efficient and rapidly reducing the amount of paper that we need to move around between schools and homes and sthingz like that. i'm
052going to take DR. Holness to another level and say that we need to talk about at our next school board meeting and set a goal for AUGUST 11th where we can say if you don't have it provided by a club or foundation or another group that has provided sistrum going through district 5. Which is great if you're within five houses. If you're the 6th house, not to great right. But I think given that we deliver services online, more now than we deliver them in physical media. That this now is an impair I have -- imperative. If you read the details, it's one to one for teachers. We pads the need a long time. If you're teaching and you don't have a laptop, you can't do your job. My believe if you're a students, if you
053don't have a laptop you cannot do your job. I think it's a differentiater for other schools. Instead of saying, you need to pay for the bus or you need to buy yourself a laptop and internet, we're better than that, we look at people and find them where they are and we do individual assessments. I'm really ashamed that there are wireless devices that provide internet service that are not being used. Like we pay for those with taxpayer dollars and something is stopping them from getting to a home that does not have internet access that's something that we should be ashamed of and we should fix it quickly. but what I want to talk about at our next school meeting, what do we need if it's not provided by somebody else. And again, we're not going to
054vote on anything today on a workshop but we can bring it back to the next school board meeting. That's why data is so important. For a board like this that is suppose to be legislating to make our system better. Last point and I'm sorry to take a little bit of time here. If we wanted update these conditions, how would the general council advise us to do that? MS. Batista? thank you for that question. So, as I think either you or somebody else mentioned, the conditions have been there for 25 years. On sbh of them, such as the ones relating to technology are really outdated. That's something that I would really have to research because this is part of a settlement there was no sunset time under the settlement to address or to have an opportunity
055to change the conditions, so that's something that I would like to follow-up on. chair let me follow-up on that point again. Do they represent the minimum? MS. Batista. so at the time when they were negotiated, it was the desire of the board to just have equity across the district. Certainly, you know, the board can address or give more than what is stated there. I just wonder, chair if we can think about that and come back to it it's a big issue, ririt. And maybe if dirsrsy y commitittee mamaybe our pepes s in thisfield, maybe wewe go back to the litigants and say, hey, we want to argue this. The rawer lawyer that brought this is still practicing. I feel like we're walk blindly on a yard stick that we created 25 years ago. And the
056whole world went from yard stixz. If we care be quitity, maybe the board wants to say. Just like state law, you've got to meet state law, but that's not where it stops. We try to do bet per as what they set as a minimum standard. I know we have to comply, but it would be an interesting exercise to come back to the board and give us an answer. Chair, is that something that we can ask for consensus, maybe ask our general counsel to give us ideas on how we can update these conditions to more modern conditions and maybe exceed them if we choose to do so? sure, I think MS. Batista, said she was willing to do it. great. so she will come up with a follow-up maybe, do you want to bring it to
057the meeting or workshop or just email us and then we'll figure out how to move forward. sure, when I do a foum, I send it to the board members and you decide. terrific. One last fact, this is not in the report but it's important. We looked at c-rated schools because in broward school, we don't have f and d schools anymore. It's awesome, not only a-district, we eliminated the bottom P.M.Ing -- performing schools. When you look at the c-rated, 85 percent are black or hispanic. We need to think about equity and cause and effect. And are those scores low because they don't internet access at night. My kids are up to 9:00 or 10 doing homework online, without it they could not get their work done. It's essential, and as long as we have inequitable ratio
058outcomes on academic performance, we have work to do on equity. And DR. Holness, it's not cheap, I'm not saying it's a freebie. Are we providing everything that a student needs to be successful? And the answer is, in some places, due to economic despair pit. If we don't have laptop at home, we're not. We have to always provide things that are required for success. Otherwise, how do we look at lowest performing schools and say that there is some other inexplainable reasons why that inequality exist. That is not a natural equality, it's something that is create asked we have to figure out how -- thank you, chair. thank you. MS. Leonardi. yeah, very briefly, I share the same concerns and compassion around internet access and technology. So I second that. So the textbook piece. I do understand,
059the concern around the weight of the textbook. I will add a caveat to that. When I was in the classroom, I had students and I think we assume because all of these students have grown in the digital age, that they prefer electronic textbook, a lot of students want a hard copy. While I support the electronic, I think we need to use common sense when we're applying this. And honestly, sometimes students need a hard copy according to their iep, again I support moving digital but we need to be able to provide the hard copy textbook when students want and need them. And just make sure also, that teachers and classes have the textbooks that they need. To my colleague's point about updating the conditions, I'm wondering when we can expect the follow-up? MS. Batista. I can
060have it within a week. okay. And I would ask that in the follow-up that there are action items available to the board. So if we do want to move forward with updating the conditions, what does the board need to do to make that happen? Does somebody need to bring a b item so we can have concrete stuff that we can take or options that we can choose from. Thank you. thank you, and thank you and we'll end with MS. Rupert. yes, mine is 30 seconds. Continue number 39, we met but we can do better. Using school choice for all not just the well-informed. We need to step our game up for all students and families that have and ubds the benefits of school choice programs, college, accreditation, they open up financial freedom when it comes
061to freedom for the rest of their life and have the ability to be knowledgeable and financial decisions. We're not getting it done and for a particular people particularly essentials of e sol families, it's rather difficult and we need to take a look at it and figure out to you to bring it up. Thank you. thank you so much. The next item is mental health and resources for students. And I now turn it over to stapp for a presentation. We're going to recess the meeting to set up the board. thank you. Again, the next item is mental health and wellness resources for students. And I now turn it over to staff for a presentation. good morning, everyone. Simone chief academic officer. I want to thank the school board members, and DR. Hepburn. Today jodie washington our
062task assigned executive director of student services initiative. And DR. Daniel shapiro and MS. Melissa director of students services. Today's presentation, division focusing on a critical priority of our mission, the mental health. The comprehensive supports and services we offered to meet the diverse and evolving needs of our students. It aims to implement the voice. You will hear directly from students, staff and a parent who will share their personal experiences and inside. These stories serve as a poignant reminder of our significant work and provide a foundation for continued progress. Thank you for the opportunity to spotlight this essential work. I now invite our executive director DR. Washington, to begin the presentation. thank you everyone. Thank you MS. Holingsworth. My team and I have happy to bring this item to you. The student initiative divisions has been working
063to ensure the comprehensive needs the students are met in ways that relevant and meaningful to them. Throughout today's presentation, we would like for to you think of mental headlight services being the work of association. Social workers and family therapist who provide intervention services, we have several mental health is also the work of the bus drivers who greet the students as they board the staff, the staff who welcomes them, the food service who serve them a warm meal upon arrival. Mental health is also the administrator mentor and sense founder whether that is through being part of the school barred, 5,000 models and wellness club, students against violencer wildfirer, choose peace, humans relations council or dozens of other pro social clubs that we have on campuses. Students who have a sense of belonging, have lower levels of
064depression, anxiety and stress. They also improved academic outcomes and increased levels of persistence in face of challenges. And now MS. Behrnisa wicker. Can we have the presentation up, thank you. good morning, we're going to start with a mindful moment and a few of our student speakers. my mental health is important. Because it helps me think, feel and act right wh. My mental health is good, I feel good about myself. I am happy and I love the people in my life. hi, my name is sibria, I'm 8 years old and I'm in coco gradadat westchehester ementary.Y. Thisyear myacacher introduced my class to inner explorer. We do a loss on every morning before we do any work. I love 9 program because it helped, it calms me down and causes me to be more focused for the
065day. It makes us slow down for ten minutes and refresh by listening to the practice. But before that, it has us stretching our bodies which makes me feel more relaxed right away. After we do the lesson, I feel different than when we started. My favorite exercise is the shark fin which we do, which is when we do long slow breaths and it makes me feel calm. Sometimes I do breathing, I learned at explorer other times t.Helps me happy to do inter explorer every morning and it makes me feel good. [Applause] now we're all experts in shark breath. And now for our student openers. good morning, I'm gabriel rodrigo and I'm a student at stone man douglas and honored to talk to my experience as it relates to mental health. Mental health is one of the
066important things. Well most people teens MISS Mental health can be a huge load to carry. The reality is, there is always somebody willing to help and you wants the best for you, whether that's your parents, friends, counselor or ment olz there will always be a person that walk you through hard times. Fior me, many who have helped me. The reason I stress so much is because many of my peers I felt alone. A great example hi transition between middle school and high school while going through a pandemic like most of us. It was an unknown and scary time especially when people could not be near each:00 this is when I met melony a district support counselor at my school, MS. Taylor quickly showed care. Anytime I felt doubtful, insecure or with lack of self confidence,
067MS. Taylor would be right there for me. She has been one of my biggest influencers and mentors in life and continues to be to this day. Aoep just a couple of months back, when I started the progress of college applications, I felt overwhelmed and did not know already w tore start. I approached MS. Taylor with my senses. She worked with me for countless weeks guiding me along set a plan for my future and college. To finish, in our district, the help is here initiative reminds us that no students is ever alone and there is people na want to help you walk around with this tough thing called life. MS. Taylor made a difference for me and many other students just like me. Thank you. [Applause] good morning. Hello I'm elias, where I serve as PRESIDENT
068Of 5,000 miles of excellence it's a program for boys. Project has helped me become a better student laider in my school and community. It has taught me to be a better organized and learn new things through field trips and workshops. Thank you. [Applause] to me mental health means prioritizing my mental and well being. I can become the best version of myself succeed and view life from a healthier perspective. It means putting other demands over my mental health. We have to take care of our mental well being and then we can help others. It affects every as sect and essential every stage at your life. [Applause] good morning, I'm jabari I'm a junior where I serve as the PRESIDENT Of 5,000 role models of excellence. It's a leadership program for young males. The 5,000 role models
069project has helped me become a better student and a leader at school. It has taught me how to be a better listener. Mental health refers to how somebody feels and thinks with the challenges they face with their life. Mental health is about their emotional well being, how they handle stress, relationship and school and other pressures and how they deal with things like anxiety, sadness or anger. Thank you. [Applause] mental health is an integral part of our lives. It impacts our daily experience, and how we show up for ourselves and others. As you can see from the various student perspective, students needs vary and that's why the unique needs of each student and what mental health means to them, whether it's feeling connected to others or thiefing therapy. Good morning, I'm vernic decker of mental health
070services. Our student initiative presents today' workshop mental health and wellness support. Present with me are the leaders of our division who play you a critical role in the mental health of our students. good morning, marissa director of student services. good morning, DR. Daniel shapiro director of school counseling. pat rylee once sets, excellent is the grat you'll result of always stwriefg to do better. Which we are excited to share with you. We also recognize that there is much more work to be done when it comes to health and wellness for each and everyone of our students and striving to do better and explore new ways for us to expand. As a team, we work together to increase the success and wellness f students, by promoting mental health and building positive community connections. Today, we will share
071an overview of mental health services available in our district which align to guardrail 5.2 and 5.3 of our extra strategic plan. Our goal is to access resources through prevention and intervention that promote wellness for all students and families. We'll begin with an overview of mental health and the broward mental health supports that we have in place. And then we'll talk through some of our highlights and initiative. We'll follow that with highlight of our community partnership which are essential to our mental health support. Following that we'll talk you through a sample how a student MAY react. And then we'll share a few action steps that our division is working towards and continuous improvement. Lastly we'll here directly from a few speakers about their experience with our mental health support. At this time, I'll turn it over
072to DR. Shapiro. all right, thank you MS. Winter. As the students explained, mental health is about our social well being and psychological and determines how we handle stress and healthy choices. The first point we want to make is mental health in the clinical and school setting are different but also compliment', others will need it in a clinical setting and school setting and some in both. Some of the difference, in a school setting, it's short-term, and identifying that the situation is the student is going through and it's collaborative between members of the school community. Where as in the clinical, it's longer term and more of a comprehensive treatment plan and deals more with diagnosis and also medical management. So it's important that our students are in school or out of school and they're taking care of
073their student health in both places. Our approach in broward is four fold. So there is prevention, a lost students mentioned programs that helped prevent mental health. And intervention, ones the student is showing signs of improvement and we also have personnel that plays different functions and mental health and many important community partnerships. another important point to make is that mental health is not only for the well being but also affects their ability to learn and grow academic. It helps to improve focus, increases engagement and helps them retain information at a higher level and gives them a higher level of receptivity, we have counselor, school social workers and student support instructional specialist in select schools that support students with their mental health. Briefly, the family therapist provide strategies that help improve relations. They have 12 sessions to
074work with families. The associate workers do mental counseling, home visits, they work with non attendance and can also do cycle affiliation and work with behavioral threat assessment and suicide threat assessment and cult aces. The school counselor work in the areas of academic, life skills and college and career readiness. And the way they deliver these services to students, is through group counseling and classroom and school counseling initiative and also community initiatives that bring resources for the student to support their mental health. The district mental wide support is a multi collaboration where each plays an important function that makes sure that students receive the wholeness of support. They're school counseling, our department, there is mental health services and coordinated student services, exceptional student education, equity and also the student services department. Each of which with have rolls
075and personnel that support different aspects of student mental health. Now I'm going to pass it back to MS. Winter to talk about how these departments work together to support mental health. Maenlt. Within the student services, divisions, there are four primary department that have programs supporting mental health which are all highlighted here. Social work, equity diversity and mentoring programming and counseling. Mental health support throughout our district has a tiered approach with some support and some focused on students and others with a much more targeted mental health approach. I'll highlight and then provide an opportunity for a speak tore highlight their particular role in mental health. Keep in mind, speakers are only highlighting one thaoer and not responsible for all items captured in that tier. We selected one tier item to take a deeper dive. Available for
076all students such as access to mental health professionals on campus as well as classroom lessons teaching life skills and wellness. We also have a number of prevention programs and social services such as foster care, heart and nursing as well as support around bullying and abuse. schools have staff onsite, on suicide prevention -- individual trained in deescalation strategies. The mental health also facilitate the district's youth first-aid awareness training. So teach staff to identify and identify and respond to signs of mental health among our youth as well as how to help youth in both crisis and non crisis situations. Currently over 26,000 of broward county staff have completed the first day training and more are completing the course this year. Our first speaker as an example of tier one mental health support is MS. Steven ton a
077school counselor at rocky middle school. [Applause] good morning, everyone. My name is johnsh I stevenson, braim my mama for that, I'm the school counselor at rock island elementary school and proud PRESIDENT Of the broward school counselor association. And today I want to talk a little bit about the importance of mental health support in our schools particularly from the school counseling perspective. As a school counselor for over 20 years, I have seen firsthand how we play a vital role in nurturing the well being of our students holistically throughout academic, personal, college and career development. Just like how we prioritize academic lenering, we must also promote our children's social and personal development so that's why I'm encouraged to see that many of our schools are implementing a multi tiered approach to mental health and through a comprehensive
078school counseling program. At the tier one, universal support, 80 to 100 percent of our students do receive preventive services, it's especially important to have school counseling and mental health professionals accessible to all students. It also includes integrating life skills, wellness education into curriculum providing valuable resource like resiliency programs along with the help of our other mental health professionals. As a school counselor, we also use and provide evidence base practices to address pressing issues like bully prevention, violence prevention and abuse through affective positive behavior intervention support systems, classroom lessons at every level and school wide initiative for access to all students. Furthermore, proactive not reactive strategies like school base crisis prevention programs along with designated designee , resiliencely say on which are the corner stone of all of our mental health programs. Our tier one program
079also emphasize the programs of deescalation and training staff on how to handle challenging situations calmly and effectively. By prioritizing mental health support and a comprehensive school counseling program in all schools at all levels, we create a more comprehensive inclusive supportive and nurturing learning environment with all students can thrive. Thank you. [Applause] now we'll move to tier two strategies in our presentation. Tier two supports are a bit more focused such an a mental health response team responds to a school crisis or the district facilitate suicide prevention at schools. Make referrals to family counseling program, broward coalition and other community partners. Schools identify students with individual or group counseling as well as engage families in the response to process. Some school also receive option to their child participating in the health screen to go proactively measure students.
080Then connect them with a mental health professional as needed. To highlight an example of one tier two targeted support at some of our schools, I would like to introduce our next speaker, MS. Susie gluk, which is a new role to the district this year. Our ssis have made o efr 2000 referrals to date to mental health professionals. MS. Suzy gluk. good morning, I'm susie gluk and I'm the student specialist at monarch high school. My role is to be visible and accessible. Students are observed and identified as ththey entethe e buildi riri class chchanges anand lulunch time and dismissal. I ensure that interventions resource sxz support are taylored to each individual's needs. students requiring additional resource right side not just given the name of a person or office to seek out, I personally escort them, make
081the introduction sxz follow-up to ensure success. Many students are not aware of the he resers available to them and possible lacking the self advocacy skills to become independent and successful members of our schools and communities. As the ssis, I am accessible, I am here to help and if they need more, I know somebody. Often times I am able to link them to internal or external resources they would not have taken the initial to find on their own. Students show up at my door daily. Some need to talk and I serve as one of the trusted adults while others are in crisis and require need crisis intervention and I connect them to a mental health professional on campus. I do check in with students, we practice calming strategies, I offer encouragement for the steps they've already
082taken and they leave feeling empowered. Thank you foyer your time, and thank you for allowing me to take a difference in this new role. [Applause] we'll now pred to tier three, strategies within our district. Tier three are more intensive support, such as those who require need intervention as well as students who MAY complete a suicide risk assessment. staff continue to engage in deescalation, as well as respond use the mobile response team with involuntary tier examinetion being our last resort. We're also partnering on a program to reduce the trauma by providing transportation to schools to the hospital rather than the use of a police car. We're also providing referrals as needed. To share a few exam nalz our mental health services provide, we have one of our suicide coordinator MS. Summers and our crisis coordinators MS.
083Winters. good morning, I'm tanya summers and I'm one of the suicide prevention coordinator specifically for the center register I don't know broward county schools last year had the vision to create through suicide coordinator position and I hold one of those positions. As a result we've been able to create and implement a more comprehensive program inclusive support for all holders in the realm of suicide prevention. The work that they do is two-fold to impact and support the mental health of all of our students. We provide suicide prevention curriculum to students in elementary and high school in a tiered approach and we also support schools throughout the district with a hue side risk assessment. Thank you. [Applause] good morning, my name is jamie fuentes and I'm the crisis coordinator who oversees the allocation team also known as
084m heart. It speaks to implementing the recommendation of the margin stoneman act which comprehensive lea dresses school safety. The m heart team ensures that students have access who can provide mental health services collaborate with professionals to increase the mental health and operate as a added layer to schools and mental health team. The m heart also promotes the heart app which is tell another is xaoe where they can submit a request and be corrected to a broward school mental health professional at the m heart team. With mental health being our focus we support the district by providing crisis response, through date, we have supported over 700 students through grief intervention. Thank you. [Applause] now that we have outlined a few of our key pieces of our tiered support for public schools, we think it's important that
085we highlight a few of our prevention measures. We think about the intervention but broward schools take such a approach that we wanted to highlight a few of the prevention items that we have in place to support our students. There are a variety of platform utilized to increase awareness such as website, paralitchingers and as a way for us to communicate. For parent nights and community night presentation, we have the B.C. Ps resources shared through school events, parent night and to discuss our intervention topics. Wellness walks and talks is also a new initiative where they staff visit schools throughout the district to speak to various personal and students to supports that can be provided at the school site. The district also offers inner explorer which you heard one of our stud epts share. Hoping skills for stress
086and improved focus. Staff are encouraged to provide mindfulness and also available for all families free of charge after-hours at home. Our student lead prevention programs are engaged in all of our school buildings to create a positive environment and build student connections. Student feeling connected is a key to their health and receive a variety of lessons such as life skills and wellness and school counselor presentation. For our students support specialist as I mentioned this is a new position added in 2024 and working in select schools to serve as an additional school to recognize the need of our students and resources. Focused on proactive measures such as creating wellness clubs, and conducting students check in to ensure the mental well and well being of all students. Our wellness centers, at a few of our schools, our wellness
087center offer a safe supportive environment where students can, they provide essential services including counseling services, stress management and resources to help students manage mental health and build resilience. our youth mental health awareness training consist of the youth mental health aid by foster students promoting early intervention, reducing stigma and enhancing collaborate with stoik elders. Now that we have outlined, we will now go to some of the interventions that we have to those students that need. thank you MS. Winter. This slide provides a high level overview of our mental health professionals and programs. School counselor are generally the first point of act. Their s efshses provided by social workers, school psychologist and family therapist include assessments, screening and providing and crisis intervention. Teris metrics is screener that started as a pilot and has grown into 36 schools.
088The resource team against short for m heart, assisted to our response to crisis. Two of their staff are also assigned to the district management team. Knowing that we cannot do this work alone, partnering with organizations is vital. This side includes a few of our part necessariser. For decades, the children services administration has awarded funds to the family counseling program to provide counseling service to see students, and families. Last year, they were awarded two million dollars. This year, as a JANUARY 16th, the program has served 166 students. in 2022, broward schools entered into an agreement with our managing entity broward health coaddition. From its inception in APRIL 2022, we have severed 2535 students. This school year alone as of JANUARY 27th, we have referred 547. Our partnership with the united way includes choose peace, a violence
089prevention program and substance abuse prevention through school assemblies and high schools. Facilitating corrections between schools and families and the community. In broward, the coordinator leads the partnership to help further assist with student. Agencies and the behavior partnership go through a stringent process of eligibility and screening of their operations as well as their mental health professionals on an annual basis. Currently we have 19 agencies. Since mental health looks different for every students, so does the support that every stud inter receives. We want to share an example of two students going through their day and what interactions MAY look like. These are not specific students nor what every students experiences but simply a picture whaf mental health services MAY look like for students in the school setting. I will now turn it over to the linda day,
090supervisor of life skills and wellness. good morning. A day in the life of a an elementary student in broward county public schools. And MS. Adam's third grade class, the school day begins with a routine to help students begin on a positive note. Emily, a student in the class appears to be struggling with anxiety. Ms.S adams, using her youth mental health awareness training, ymths that she learned as part of the first mental health aid. Greets emily with a warm smile and speaks with emily about she is experiencing. After confirming emily is feeling anxious, MS. Adams connects her with the school social worker. The school social worker MR. Torres uses play therapy to help emily express her feelings and work through her anxiety. They talk about their worries, practice deep breathing exercises and MAY gameses that builds
091her tolerance. Le saying strategies to support emily's emotional well being throughout the school day. Today is help is here day. A initiative encouraging all enters to connect with a trusted adult. On these days, emily looks forward to her meetings with her school counseling, smz chancellor. Throughout the week, emily interactions with her teacher, social worker and school counselor create a web of support that helps her navigate her challenges of her anxiety. She knows she has a team of caring adults who understand her struggles and are there to help her succeed both academically and emotionally. The day in the life of a secondary student in broward county schools. 10th grader alex struggles with building social connections with with other students. Every morning, he starts his day with a life skills and wellness class lead by MS. Carter.
092This class o frz essential topics such as the communication, empathy and stress managementment. MS. Carter uses activities to help sud enters with their social schools. Later that day, alex edge case. In these can hesings. He learned how to hope with ethical. Alex finds these lessons empowering as they provide him with practical strategies to develop resilience. Alex's parents attend the response to intervention meeting with the school psychologist DR. Martinez. During this session, DR. Martinez, works closely with alex's family to identify specific barriers to forming friendships. They discuss alex's interest, explore social scenarios, and develop personalized strategies to help him connect with his peers. DR. Martinez, provides them with resources and tips on how alex can join clubs or activity that align with his passions, making it easier for him to meet like minded students. In the
093evenings, alex and his family attend counseling sessions with MS. Harebohr the school's family therapist. These sessions are focus on strengthening family dynamics and enhancing communication. MS. Harper works with alex's parent to help them understand his social challenges and support his efforts to make friends. Together, they practice conversation starters, discuss social cues and support a environment that encourages alex to step out of his comfort zone. Thank you. [Applause] as mentioned earlier, mental health support is on going process. Of making strides in what we currently have in place and exploring ways that we can remain committed to continue us improvement, each and everyday. These are a few action steps that our division is committed to in terms of improvement. One is access to mental health resources, we're leading campaigns directly to students and parents sharing resources through
094various plat forms. Promoting the help is here initiative highlighting trusted adults on every campus. Signage and visuals on mental health resources and mindful practices and we will continue to make our stakeholders aware and how to access them. Secondly, our district participants in a range of activity such as mental health fares, school events, resiliency pop up shops and en caging communities. We will continue to engage in events to attend school and resources. third, to gather representing from various departments garner input parents and community partners through avenues such as wellness walks and talks, student dwraoupz, district and community groups. We will continue to explore other ways that we can make sure that every single one of our students is aware and access to the mental health resources in our district. The most valuable information we receive let's
095try to make today better for somebody else. Thank you. [Applause] hello my name is daniella I'm an 8th grade at plantation mittedle school. Today I would like to talk to you about the wellness club that MS. Nadine our instructional specialist host at our school. MS. Nadine comes in and does an activity with us every month. I feel it's important because being in middle school there could be a little bit of drama. We all had a good time trying to figure it out. When she comes in, it's a good time and we do activities on probably solving and how to communicate. This gives us a chance to get together in the feeling of your comfort that you're not alone. Thank you for your time. [Applause] good morning, I'm in TINth grade. Today I'm going to discuss
096with you the impact of nto program as a student. For starters mentoring tomorrow's leader is a peer-to-peer mentoring. We achieve this by hosting informational club meetings and having mentor help out any mentee with any problem such as family struggles. In this club I have ex selled aufp as gaining a high level of support education. I have meant to be a true leader by being cooperative having integrity and being true to myself and others around me. These very characteristics have allowed me to become more confident in my collaborative and essential skills. I love attending nto when it comes to scholarship and future opportunities. We are given many chance to see take part in readiness events preparing us for life after high school. I also pressure the add tmosphere. Everyone is always a part of something. I
097met many incredible students who are also look to go be involved in our school's community. This is what mtl means to me. my name is vivan and I'm a student at falcon middle school. Today we're excited to talk about a transformative program that has had a profound impact on myself and many of my peers. Resiliency lessons. In this era, everybody is on their phone and hence, access is the online world. One of those people is me. Who after working on a course, immensely benefit fromed resiliency lessons. Thanks to the wonderful sil bass and outstanding options, I have seen grow myself grow more knowledgeable. When I was younger, I use today visit unknown websites fall for scams easily and just be completely clueless when and a half gaigt the internet. Today with the incorporation of resiliency
098lessons such as their virus techniques, I can safely navigate internet. Although resiliency lessons have not only helped me online, I have seen improvement in my reyent see and leadership qualities and much more. With its smart and innovative way of thinking, resiliency lessons have helped me along with many others a approach my challenges with confidence, and creativity. Thank you. [Applause] hi my name is caddora, resiliency lessans has made a difference. Anxiety can affect a student both mentally and physically, it can have thoughts which can negatively impact performance. Physical angity can cause problems such as increased heart rate and increased hart rate. Offers practices and educational resources designed to help students with anxiety. Affect techniques and other relaxation practices. As somebody who personally experiences stress anxiety, I incorporated techniques such as breathe exercises to help manage anxiety
099during tests, it improves my concentration during tests. In addition to providing practical tools, also raise awareness about anxiety and affects of it to help students better understand. Thank you. hi my name is iser kana, I'm 8 years old and I'm in second grade at well chester elementary. I'll be sharing my experience. The program helps me be calm by practicing deep breathing and stretching and taking a mindful minute. Inner explorer is not just to calm your body down, it helps everyone relax and enjoy their time. It also helps everyone start their day with positivity and inner peace and great energy. My favorite lessons from inner explorer is the shark fin. It's my favorite because it helps me relax my brain and calms me down when I'm mad or sad. My favorite sound practice is a native
100american do, I encourage everyone to join the inter explorer program. Thank you. [Applause] good morning, my name is dearra and I'm the proud principle palos verdes mac middle school. In NOVEMBER of 2023, I expressed an interest in hosting a wellness center in response to a survey. We identified a critical need for wellness center at matt nickel based on the life skills and wellness assessment data which revealed that 66% of our students scored low or very low in key areas like self management, self awareness, self relationship skills, responsible decision making, and resilience. This data confirms the importance of providing mental health support for our students. The establishment of the center started with a wellness walk and talk in DECEMBER of 2023, by the student services initiative division. A diverse group of students and staff openly shared
101their experiences and its lasting impact on our social and emotional well being. The trauma from covid is in addition to divorce, death, homelessness, and low self-esteem to name a few. This center has since become a safe non judgmental space where hundreds of students receive support. The students have access to two counselor, two social workers, and a registered behavioral tech. The wellness center offers individual and family counseling. Group sessions on topic such as conflict resolution, coping with loss and social media will begin in the near future. Our parents have embraced this initiative signaling a positive culture shift in seeking mental health support. We are committed to revisiting our data at the end of the year to measure the impact and ensure we're meeting the needs of our school community. At matt nickel we're dead indicated to
102supporting the academic, social, emotional and cultural development of our students as they so aply say in student services, help is here. Thank you. [Applause] good morning, members of the school board. i'm nora gifaro and I'm aaron Mclaughinmother. I'm here to share my experience with the family counseling program and the positive impact it has had on my son aid an. As a parent, I have always tried to be the best mom I can be, but like many families, we have faced challenges. Before he started in this program, aid an struggled with frustration, frequent tantrums and difficult to managing his anger. He also had a hard time respecting other people's opinion. Since joining this program, I have seeing significant improvement in his favor. His under control has improved, he's now showing more respect for other view points.
103Now, our home feels calmer and more connected. I'm getting closer to my son and I can see how much more confidence and secure he has become. This experience not only has improved our relationship, but it's also helped me grow as a parent. The expertise provide through this program allowed me to better understand how to redirect my approach with aid an. He's now living a much better life with increased self -esteem and a much more positive attitude towards his school and responsibilities. Aiden feels free and happy to be who he is he's confident, aiden is my third and youngest child. My other children are benefit from this program. i try other therapy places, but this program has been the most affective for my family. In my opinion, this program is not just beneficial, but it's essential
104for the educational emotional and mental health development of children. It has been a great foundation for stability and process in aiden's life and for our family as a whole. I like to specifically comment that program for having professional like MR. Steven, who is not only highly experienced but also deeply knowledgeable about both learning process and the development need of children according to their age. I'm so thankful to the school for offering this kind of support recognizing that when families are strong children thrive. I truly believe that programs like this are available and I hope you can continue to make them available to all the student who MAY benefit from it. Thank you so much. [Applause] now that we've had an opportunity to hear from those directly impacted by the efforts of mental health programs, we
105want to take a moment to thank our board, our superintendent, our district leadership team and all the amazing staff throughout our district who worked tirelessingly to support student heys mental health and wellness and everyday. Wile continuous to strife to improve mental health. We appreciate all that our district has in place and the multi fauceted approach that has taken the many individual needs of our students. Together we connect those support for our wellness of every student and every family. We appreciate you and open the floor now for board discussion. thank you so much and wow, just wow. What a true pleasure and treat to have students talk to us about resiliency lessons and clubs can inner explorer, and I think we would all agree we need more kindness clubs. So thank you so much for that.
106Before we go to the board discussion, we have some public speakers. Le the first one is hard to read so if I say it wrong, I apologize. Jay agnusma from sonrise. I'm not sure if everyone on here wanted speak or if some of the students signed up. Jackie lucekom. hi good morning. And that was such a lovely presentation and showcasing all the various programs and models that you have for mental health and wellness, thank you so much for all the staff that do so much. I brought up a district advisory council, a model that staff did not know much at the time. I think there are others in the district who might. Sxl that is a certain for mind, body medicine which was brought after tragedy at msd to help with the mental health of
107students and staff. There was a lot of work done in the district, there was a program supported by philanthropic funding, and a lot of students were trained. But there are remnants of that program left and I feel it would be good to look to see who still has that expertise and resurrect that program and look into its potential value to students. I'll read you a little bit of what it does, it helps community implement exclusive public health interventions to heal and relief trauma, grief, chronic stress and anxiety and build resilience, strategies that foster physical and psychological well being and provides this through online and in-person training. I can provide a hand out for you if you would like. But I feel that having put so much in that program just in the last few resent
108years, that was an investment that kind of needs to be continued on wards and there are a lot of folks that can tell you about it. I'm not clear on funding for health. There was a lot of talk about health tra supporting and I think it would be helpful to see how that money is broken up. Look at investing more at associate work, the value of recess, not just in element rye but right through the various layers of time, circle time. At least have kids finish the school year, even though there are some that don't know the name. And at the end of the school year where kids are coming and going and twisting and twidling of thumbs that MAY be also some time to have this mental health preparedness, because rolling it out, so
109you don't get to one particular topic, you can be preemping that thank you. thank you, and I have to say, I have been to schools where they are very much using the mindfulness practice so if MR. Shapiro can comment on that briefly? yes, thank you. Yes, thank you. We have several different mindfulness approachness and some that trained still do some of those sessions. So we're open to continuing to expand that. thank you. Next is katie van. good morning, my name is katie van. I'm shamari and I'm ca I can't moore. We would like to take a few minutes of your time to talk about the numerous events with have at our school. at our schools, we have numerous opportunities to be leaders. We clubs such as human relation and choose peace not violence. for example,
110the hello challenge is a new initiative created by hrc that allows students to create new bonds with their peers. during this initial t if, we have students from different grade levels meet and talk to get to know each other. The whole purpose of this event is to share the connection sxz create lasting bonds. During this school sessions, we give out music and try to create a fun and welcoming environment. another initiative at our school is anti bullying week. We went to be a out stander instead of a bystander. Showed a special film to over 400 of our students. The students were able to voice their opinions with q and a. bebesides the assembly we were immensely proud with our activity which shows kid getting their pink he's painted to show that they made a pinky
111promise. We wore messages and participated in anti bullying lessons through our code to connect classes. It is our hope that weeks like this, teach and raise awareness that each one of our students treats each other with respects and mace positive changes. all of these initiatives ensures that our school is a no place for heat. Me personally, enlting the school was scary but I always felt welcome from one. It's not just academic at you're school but so many events that also spread a positive message to the community. when I was in 6th grade, I was very anxious but knowing we have spirit week, now makes me feel like a leader knowing that I'm giving back to my community. during my 6th and 7th years, I was very shy because the other kids who lead them made
112me nervous but there is always something to look forward to. This year, being one of the leaders who leads the activities, I'm able to bond easily with my peers. coming up on the sixth grade yae, the change is overwhelming. Having these initials tiff helped me coming out of my shell. From the big 8th grader saying hi to me. So enjoying something with my new found friends. This will helps everybody come out of their shell and enjoy the school. I want to thank the board for listening to this presentation by glades middle school. [Applause] thank you so much. Thank you for coming out and sharing that presentation with us. Next up is samantha sedradi. hello how are you guys? It's so nice to see you guys here helping out mental health it's nice to see you
113guys making a change not just us. I'm sa man at that I'm the PRESIDENT Of our spoken word club which is lead by our sponsor Mcavenuy, who is super amazing, just like the other teachers. Many of you know poetry like cat in the apple but spoke is happening. I have dyslexia, and I wrote a poem that I shared. I took it to a competition called louder than a bomb and my poetry group won semi finals which is really amazing. [Applause] This club helps us build communities within the school. It gives a safe environment to talk about your feelings and what is going on in a fun way, like you know, not just oh this is going on, blah blah blah but you're able to talk about it fun and express yourself and talk about it
114actively. The paper always listens to you, so it's nice to know that people are listening also. Thank you. [Applause] thank you. And if you have not seen the presentation that sa mantha does with her partner, it's pretty phenomenal. You have to see t.Next is sidly dolphin. hello I'm sydney and I'm the PRESIDENT Of many clubses at share and technical high school. hello I'm part of technical high school and I'm also PRESIDENT Of one of the many social clubs. One of the clubs the members are nominated by teachers and staff, we organize events including the teen summit's where we meet at other schools. It helps, individual promote positivity. Hrc organizes student panels, where we, concerns and opinions that were not -- . we also have the say promise club, against violence everywhere. And prevent violence school
115board. So one of the activities was to start with the hello campaign. By uplifting, we also did the lunch time mixer where we just art sports music. Get to know, very successful. With did the trusted adult staff and go to if they have any personal issues. The final club is where we spread the message. Lead their creativity flow using chalk on the school concrete. It allowed them to uplift themselves. The other is where white day where white symbolized peace. Gave them something to bond over and allowing them to meet new people and make new friends. we also did positive social norms training. It taught students how to stand up for themselves and others and the speak live bullying and musical which give inside on bullying consequence sxz everyone it shows how everyone has reasons to
116act the way they do and it was a unique way to show that. And the lastly we did the black history quilt and it shows, by making different parts of a quilt that significant -- signified. That is to support mental health and build relationships between students and their peers and teachers. We welcome everyone to find our outlets by uplifting each other when things are rough and even when things are good, we uplift each other and support each other. Thank you. [Applause] thank you very much. Next is kalob campbell. good morning, student board members. My name is calob and I'm the PRESIDENT Of black union. I was the vice PRESIDENT Last year and I've been part of the club for my whole entire career. The whole purpose is to be cultural experiences service hours or historical
117inside. Many think that since it's called the blackstone union only allowed for african students which is not the case. Anyone with join and participate. we collaborate with other clubs like history honor society and hollywood history at virginia beach clean up where I learned a lot of historical clubs about virginia beach being the first black beach. We learn especially in black history. We host an annual auditory contest where students can P.M. And display poetry contributing to the cause for african americans and african dissents. One be love if philosophy which is a martin king. And also being able to speak in a panel for martin luther king. I still face hardships just like DR. King, being PRESIDENT Is not easy, I lead and there is nothing I regret. I do it to leave a lasting impact on
118the students and the school itself and hopefully a love community remains. Thank you. [Applause] thank you very much. Okay, we'll now go to board discussion, thank you for all the students for coming out. MS. Thompson. I didn't realize I was first but that's great. Thank you so much for putting together this presentation. I think it is much needed in the district and I hope it's one of many because as you said, there is a lot of great things going on but I do think there is some room for improvements. So as many of you know my background is in mental health, I'm the only mental health professional on the board so I say this with much respect and I hope you take it that way. how are ssis people trained? DR. Hepburn? MS. Winter? so
119part of the criteria for ssis has to do with their years of experience with mental health. So in order for them to qualify for the role, they had to have had a degree in mental health or similar respect but also have had years of experience in work with youth as well as work directly in mental health. and I just want to share some feedback I've gotten from different schools is they've been told that their ssis people are mental health people they're there to haent control to spot, just like this person said that -- I think there is a lot of overlap in the variety of positions we have. So that's some feedback on that. When our student are returning from hospitalization or baker account, what is the process that they're being supported? MS. Holingsworth. thank
120you, I would like to differ to MS. Summers. good morning. Our process when students return from a baker act, there is two steps, so if the baker act was initialed by the school, we have a suicide risk assessment that is done and also a safety plan and then the school continues on with the safely plan and they let all the stakeholders know, parents, teachers whoever needs to know, whoever touched that student, they ask that they still meet and ease through a suicide risk assessment and that continues on and communicated to all stake hold thaerz work with the student. thank you for that. For clarification who is the point person for that student when they return? the point person is typically the school counselor? okay, thank you. You might as well stand up, so for suicide
121prevention curriculum can you walk me through that curriculum and the use of video in the classroom. ?Fm well through our suicide prevention curriculum, there is one video. The suicide prevention curriculum is for 5th graders that one is called riding the waves. And 6 through 8, there is one video that talks about suicide and a student who is struggling with their mental health in some different scenarios and in middle school and the high school curriculum does not show a video. and when you're showing the videos, who is in the room? for our curriculum, it's tifp I canly what school we're going to. We do provide consent forms and they're watching the students, the students, teach and her facilitaters. so there is a trained facilitator where that video is showed? yes, we do our teachers on special
122assignment do those curriculum primarily. okay. That's all on suicide. Thank you. thank you. And then, I want to dive in a little bit more. Because we talk about how each school has assigned social workers and there is a mental health professional at all time, how many schools do school psychologist have? DR. Hepburn. MS. Holingsworth. I would like to call on MS. Eagan for that. the majority of our school psychologist have about two locations but it's based on case management. So our supervisors of psychological service right side frequently numbering the number of cases on each site and if they need to regroup staff they're constantly doing that to make sure we're meeting the needs of students. okay. And how many, so school psychologist primarily in my experience with doing testing and evaluation so. You're saying that
123each psychologist are only has two schools that are in charge of the evaluation and testing. I cannot tell you exactly because we do it based on the needs of the school as well but there is no more than two. And in addition to testing and evaluation, they're supporting students academically and behaviorly sometimes with supporting our mtss process and always supporting our mtss process but also doing some individual support and communicating with stakeholders and families. okay, and for school social workers how many schools do individual social workers have? good morning, good morning. I think it's good afternoon. thank you for the question. Our associate workers they're full-time at a school which many schools are full-timer. And others have two to three. Depending on whether it's a by ling cal or middle. I would like to see
124a foum breaking down social worker assignment as a social workers I had four schools, my colleagues that I talk to have three and then bilingual show worker has ten that she is a buy ling cal social worker for. So if I can get that data, that would be awesome. Thank you. school counselor are generally one per school? DR. Hepburn? MS. Holingsworth. yes, typically the school counselors are one per school and DR. Shapiro if you would like to add. those that have over 700 can have more than that. Typically the schools have a director with two counselor depending on their population determines the amount and high school have a director with school counselors working with them dependent on the student population. and what tasks are student counseling doing breaking it down by level, please. yeah, so
125I'll say what all of them have in common and then I'll break it down. sure. what they all have in common is the first thing is build relationships and make sure that they know their students and they also doda at that, they do individual counseling session which are brief solution sessions. They have school counseling classroom lessons, they do school wide and other initiatives that support mental health. And bringing in mentors, community resourcers to support students and bringing students out into the community for their benefit. They also facilitate student conferences to help the students. They cult with a staff administeringors, parents, teachers to give the school counseling perspective and this again. So all of them have that in common. And they also, so there are assisting students in academic in the life skills and wellness and
126also in college and career readiness. So that's at all levels. Now it looks different at the elementary school especially for college and career readiness. And as students progress into middle school and high school, they are making sure they're on track for graduation, they're making sure that they're developing a meaningful education on plat foamseder like cello where they do interesting inventory and part to promose secondary. And others facilitating and systemic ways of making chooses on their next steps. I hope that is helpful. it is helpful, sorry. Sorry I know these questions seem a little around, and the screening, I believe that's at 30 schools? yes, 36. and then once the students are identified who is in charge for the casework of those students identified. so I'll start to speak about it and then I'll differ to
127colleagues. So, it's district staff goes to the school and works along with the school administration to organize the implementation. The students have to be opted in by their parents in order to participate. Once their opted in, the school, a trained school staff member delivers the,e,he assessment. Once ththrelts s come back, theyeye e immedielely reviewed. So students who are in a category one, receive immediate support because their results show that. Sxl if they're category two, it's within 24 to 72 hours, if it's category 3 and so on. The results are distinguished immediately and support is organized for them. who is providing that support? the school counselor, social workers, it depending on the need of the student, the support is provided. okay. And then going back to social workers what would you where social workers task of
128this school? they're probably the discipline that wears the most hats that's for sure and they probably should have one in every school but we're getting there, if anyone finds more money. But they have over the course of the last several years, definitely aligned more with mental health duties. We tried to minimize the additional social service programs that we have. I'm a associate workers as well and a clinician, that's what I've tried to build in the program so we have a balance of social service needs as well as the health needs and that has increased in terms of what they're doing at the schools. But yes, they're often doing, BTAs, sr As, sometimes if they have the opportunity they MAY do groups and obviously see students more for counseling and monitoring. and how many of their
129task is -- . That's a big thing. It will be for the rest year we're trial to get everybody acclimated to focus and the new foundation protocol that is built into that. and if you can explain why it falls under the social worker per view? thank you for that question. Because I have pondered that thought as well for many years. I will tell you historically and nationallily, that attendance falls on social workers nationwide. And the department here even in the district used to be social work and attendance but I definitely don't agree that that should be one of their primary roles. I appreciate the response. So I want to break it down for any colleagues about really how mental health works in a school compared to this amazing presentation that the staff has put on.
130And I really think all the feedback. A lot of social workers role, like I said I had four schools, was spent on attendance, so we were not able to do mental health as defined in the roles here, I would say probably threish hours on attendance on average. While you're at your one school, one day a week you're doing rti meetings and doing attendance, so you're not really able to use the skills in the trade that you went to school for. My school counselor at one of my school high-need school was spending more of her time testing and sr As because there was not the social worker there to support her. And my school psych colling, so the direct component that we hope to bring to our schools and know no is not happening at our
131schools, maybe not everywhere, I'm sure there are some schools that are great but overall I have concerned about what we're telling and what we're actually getting. If that makes sense. So summarizing 3 points and then I'll let other people take over. I think there is a big silo in our mental health. So I think school counseloring are doing a terrific at school counseling but they're not talk to go social workers they're talking at school psychologist when we're all suppose to be a team. I would like to see communication and inter disciplinary and teen so that everybody is on the same board. I know everybody wants more meetings but that would be the best way. I think also steak stronger roles it would be great to have a point person for the baker act. Again that's
132hard when a social worker is not there everyday or a school counselor is tied down, I'm a big proponent of having a social worker at every school. I think that would be life changing for a lot of students and will also alleviate some of the burden on the environmental health slash curriculum planning. So a way to establish stronger roles not just for those professionals but also for the principals so they can best utilize the people in their schools and that would help with marketing, because I can tell you my elementary students don't know where to go when they're sad. Like my personal children, I asked them last week, and they said maybe their teacher and the teacher would call you. Well yay, but there needs to be a better communication and by doing that is
133by allowing more associate workersing to make sure that their tasks are mental health case. And then finally just, I know we have amazing programs, really sifening some of them down so it's only one school psychologist per school so we can truly maximize the support we're giving and have the greatest students impact. I know hans you guys that's us and DR. Hepburn ooh I'm put thating in the universe that we have really good sports and really good programs and really good people, we might just not be using them in the best way possible. Thank you so much. MS. Leonardi. thank you so much. I want today acknowledge all the students that spoke before us today and all the students doing work at the schools. As adults, we have a lot to learn on the inside and
134bravery and thoughtfulness and kindness of our students. So I want to acknowledge those students as well as the adults in our schools and at the district who make that work possible, all the club sponsors, the mta sponsors, the 5,000 role models, the folks who sponsor the union all the groups that we heard from today, they're often adults doing the work free to support those causes, so I wanted to acknowledge them as well. In the presentation, specifically following you know, taking us through the day through the life of a third grade students, emily. There was a specific example after a teacher confirms that enter fee is anxious, how does that happen? DR. Hepburn? staff. so that was one example of a connection to a mental health professional. Often times they MAY call the front office and
135ask for an escort to the social work office or call to see if the counselor is available. So it they look at how the teams and that's why we try to emphasize that there is multiple school members so if the counselor is ever busy, you have other trusts adults, that's a site by site process. okay, so cause I think, it's very important for us to get into the concrete details and I think MS. Thompson did a good job of that, just now. So I'm a teacher, I'm concerned about the mental health of the student, I call the front office who then calls the social worker? Because five years ago when I was in the room room. Does that not happen anymore? DR. Hepburn. staff? thank you. Yes that is the process but the, the urgency
136is what is the point here. Because that by passes that. We always inform our social workers that that's the best way to get referrals. They can immediately send the students or have somebody send the student. So they can see them right away. okay. In the example that that was given, you know just one example it did not seem like a crisis situation, and I'm not going to pick apart the different hypothetical ways, but it's demonstrative for me as a teacher it was different school to school. And I think as a MS. Thompson illustrated for us, the school social worker MAY not be immediately available as the well counselor, as well as the school psychologist. So I will just say in my experience, you know, I had students who were in crisis, and they could not
137meet with a mnt al health professionals and that's a reality today. And that is my immediate concern. A comment was made about if we had more money, we could have more school social workers and I'm a little frustrated because in previous years, we've had extra funding in the mental health referendum to the tune of 8 million dollars. So I'm wondering where the disconnect there and I know that preceded you, DR. Hepburn but it's frustrating to hear that we need more money for more associate workers, my frustration is what we've had this money and then we roll it over and allocate it to things that are not health related. Can somebody speak to that? DR. Hepburn. yes, so we'll have to look at the situation, my first time hearing about the need for additional social worker,
138we've always talked about the need for mental health and that can expand and also pratts that we purchase to supplement our needs. That's what we've been doing. So we'll look at the need for additional associate workers and take the appropriate path necessary. And I think you've hepburn, you've done a great job socially, breaking down the silos and it seems to me that this is an area that we need to work on. And my last question is in attendance, since MS. Thompson brought it up. what is the plan around improving attendance county wide? DR. Hepburn. so I'll let them talk about some current strategies but we have a future workshop coming to discuss attendance and strategies. Some of the schools that we've been concerned about their attendance rates as a result of strategies that have been
139implemented. Those have been absentee rates have decreased and also principle thalz that they've been working and sharing with their colleagues. You can talk about any additional thing, talking about strategies and study. yes, so we have been working regularly with school principals with associate workers with community members as well. We have a couple of attendance committees working on what strategies we can put in place that will get the message to those who are willing to here it. Almost just intervention at schools have put into place. One of the main things is it has made it very transparent and easy to pull reports which wasn't the case before. With a click pum the number of students who have ten percent or more ub sanses and being able to pull the da that -- I've worked really hard
140just in the time that I've been task assigned to make sure that everybody understand attendance is everybody's job. Just like mental health is everyone's job, so is attendance. The teacher should be the first point of worker, not just get the associate worker. -- social worker. No make contact and find out what is happening. And yes refer to the social worker but maybe they don't understand that coming to school is important. You can handle that conversation as well. So changing some mind sets so but one new intervention that is going to be rolling out next week, I think it is, or some week is focus is generating attendance letters that used to be a manual process that we have to pull report and then a social worker used to get the letter out. They auto send
141on friday. So there is no thinking behind it and then it's on, the parent to then schedule a meeting because if a letter goes out, it has to be followed up with or the letter will continue to go and then the it send ant will have to say. So there are a lot of new things coming on. We're also looking at a new marketing strategy for the upcoming year to be able to make sure the parents understand their and what that does for their academic. So that's something that we have to push out next year some more literature. thank you and shout out to all the teachers who are making the attendance phone calls taking, hours after schools to do so. So like you said, it is, everyone's job and I know that our teachers
142are taking that seriously as well. And just the last point I want to end on, I don't want us to forget about the mental health of our most vulnerable population that's are very scared right now. Particularly, our lgbtq students, you know, and our immigrant students, I'm hearing from our schools that people are very scared and I hope that we are doing the work of supporting those most vulnerable communities. You know, obviously mental health is something that impacts students regardless of their different identity but higher suicide rates for different communities and I just hope that we can, I know we're doing that work but I hope we can continue to do that work to support those communities disproportionately impacted. Thank you. thank you, MS. Rupert. thank you. My questions is on page 11. And very interested
143in the baker act transportation pilot program partnership. I'm not sure if MS. Thompson already covered this. I had to step out to get my winter coat and gloves to come back in so please forgive me. So if somebody tell us a little bit about why this was started. As I parent understand why, but I think it's important for people to know that. And are we seeing positive outcomes with this positive program. DR. Hepburn. thz winter. thank you for this question. We've been working on this pilot program a while, I actually left a meeting this morning to get here because all the agencies were coming together. There is a collective approach, it has not started yet, it's in the final phases and scheduled to begin very soon but it's a collective approach between the pro ward
144and division, broward division. And the goal behind that is to start with nine of our schools that are ebd programs so that rather than students being transported with police vehicle that they are transported with an ambulance service and so, this morning was just one of the final conversations for final input before we actually started and we look forward to gathering data to look at the impact of students and the possible trauma that is associated with that transport process and hopefully that will give us position so that all of our students be reduced in their dramatic experience. thank you, that's awesome. And I know that they're having escalator go to these calls. As you know, many many calls go there first, before frankly they get the help that they possibly need. So I'll be curious from
145my perspective as positive and I hope we're able to implement that soon and look forward to hearing from that. I also wanted to talk and thank you MS. Leonardi about our families fear and anxiety about new federal mandated immigration status. how are we helping our students and families through this troubling time? And I know we have policy fromomla timeananwe had a best practice that we were doing. Are we still following that policy and is there another part of it that we have to actually, you know, help with either creating more policy or finding out protocols where are we with that aspect. Especially my families in pompano beach. DR. Hepburn. thank you for the que, I know there are things going on in the county as we speak, getting information as we're talking here. But specifically
146for our schools, DR. Fulton provide additional information. We sent the memo out to the principals, just detailing how you should approach a situation if anybody is coming to gather student information or even city a student simply proper guidelines, you need proper document to actually see a student also. No different than when a police officer usually comes to our campus to exercise a warrant or dedetain a student. So it's the same protocols but we have additional layer with support of our esol department if it is a immigration related issue, they're ready to provide benefits to the family. So we monitor daily just to make sure that we can respond appropriately to any and all situations that are coming across and working with partners outside of our schools just to take the temperature pulse, if they have
147any specific questions, because often times the communication to some of our constituents in the county or groups of people in the county, they will receive it better from their support system if it's a local church or a local organization that they're used to engaged with. And if there is anything in addition to what I just mentioned. I would say, you are correct and it's every changing information that is coming out there and it's causing a lot of angst in our communities. We've been working with this esol and before this, we've had an immigration support plan in place for about 7 years now, right so. We have been supporting all of our students especially our immigrant students. We will continue to support them as well too. We're reaching out to schools but the main thing, is
148we're having schools name anomalies, we have not seen any as of yet not to say that that MAY not be something in the future. But we want to make sure that we're keeping our pulse with students. The most important thing is we want our families and students and staff to remember, we will continue to provide a very inclusive environment for all our students. All of our students are welcome and we will continue to educate them and support them as the need supports them. thank you, and through the superintendent, follow-up question. I've been hearing about absences, it's increasing. So these students are staying home what kind of out reach are we doing to them? And are we able to accommodate, our classroom instruction? How does that go on? Or if somebody is discussing broward virtual? I
149mean, I don't think this is, I don't think we've seen hit the apex yet, so DR. Hepburn. yes, so we've been monitoring attendance. We have not seen any a nomaly, so once the message got out, we started monitoring attendance because we went through this adoration before. So we have not seen any anomalies, we're providing what we can. Including our virtual franchise if needed. As far as providing, learning opportunities outside of virtual our virtual franchise, we cannot do that because there is no such thing as hybrid learning anymore so we have to stick to the guidelines for the state. But we'll provide as much as support as possible. We know that situation can happen, if a parent gets deported and the child is left here. And MAY be caught up in the foster system. We'll deploy
150it that is need today make sure that they stay in line with their academic needs. thank you, thank you so much. That is it for me. All right, thank you. dr. Holness? thank you, MADAM Chair, I appreciate the opportunity to respond to the wonderful students that we had here today. I thought they were very impressive and in fact, I heard one of our, I think she is 8 years old she said sometimes life can be tough. And I was very impressed with that, because that is absolutely true and kindness club can help you when life gets tough. So small acts of kindness, we can learn a lot from that as adults. And I certainly appreciate that, I know the kids are gone but I would be remiss not to say, let's give them a round
151of applause. They were just wonderful. [Applause] I would like to thank you MS. Veronica winters, for such a great presentation, this is well thought and planned out and we appreciate it. We appreciate when we see this kind of presentation, you and your team, MS. Stevenson and we have MS. Gluk did I say that correctly, and the others. Thank you, thank you so much. Now I just wanted to talk about a couple of things from other board members who mentioned some points that were interesting and I would like to mention some of my concerns. Board member, thompson she is not here right now. But she did mention to which the superintendent responded regarding the, the social, the number of social workers that we have throughout our district and service in our schools. and I cannot recall
152also there was a concern regarding the, the job that these social workers are doing as oppose today -- opposed to actual working. We had a job where we changed the description of our guidance counselor, I believe, I believe we did it for social workers as well. So I am quite surprised to learn here today from board member thompson's inquiry, that our social workers are still doing appears to be doing, you know, duties outside of their job description that this board revised those policies to ensure that they're doing the specific job of social work and guidance counselor. DR. Hepburn can you speak to that? DR. Hepburn? if I can get the team to address it, I don't know if we changed the description of social workers, if so, what are the specifics in the tasking responsibilities?
153so I'll start and then I'll kick it over to MR. Otelo. They help address barriers to academic and education. When they work around attendance often times what we find when we do peel the onion, there are -- they MAY not have school uniforms, they MAY not have transformation, there are social barriers that is within the school social workers their job description on what they should be doing. I will ask MS. Otelo to talk about the job description and if that was updated? thank you. DR. Washer. the job description was reviewed well as the other. There was only one bullet changed for the school social work at the bottom that says other duties are assigned because, they're scope of work is completely assigned with their job description as is their job description. It's a variety of
154things like community connection, parent connection with teachers all of that, so it's not like there was anything outside of the scope again in reviewing it and reflecting on the concerns, I know that I even speak that they have that they have many hats. So we're trying to minimize those things but to DR. Washington's point, it's really the whole child that really they depend on their work on. Because there is a lot of fa sets of what they need to do to support the families unless you have other support staff perhaps at the schools. Some schools have liasons but it falls on their description. I understand but now that it's been clarified, I guess the concern is they seem to be inundated with primarily attendance. So if that is the concern and attendance is within the
155scope of the job description, can you reiterate how we're going to deal with the concern of their focus being primarily in attendance as opposed to the wide range of duties that they have within their job description? yes, and I'm going to pass it on to MS. Washington in a minute. but I want to build some context around the student attendance was a concern of across the country, average of 35 up to 40 percent of absenteism. It was a it became a large concern for many communities hence why we see more people supporting initiative around attendance including our social workers. That's why you're witnessing more support from social workers and roles within our district as well as replicating what other school districts are doing to address attendance needs and once we, see a decline in absentee
156rates, we'll see other things that they're engaging in. okay and DR. Hepburn, I know you want to pass it over but I have a follow-up. it appears because there is great ir need to focus on attendance due to certain factors, then their work increased as far as that area. So we did mention, would you say then, because we did talk about increasing a number of social workers. Would you say that increasing a number of social workers would allow, them to focus on the other areas that they should be focusing on instead of attendance. I cannot give a definitive yes, I would have to evaluate what is going on. Like DR. Washington mentioned attendance could be a result of many factors going on a home or outside of a home that is causing the students not
157to come to school. So peeling that onion, there are some issues causing homelessness or mental health issues. So I will not be able toll answer that question until I fee the need for additional. understand. So what kind of action, and maybe you cannot answer that today. But what kind of action can we have in place to ensure that social worker is not only dealing with attendance but other areas in addition to attendance? How do we make sure that all areas are covered? As board member thompson had expressed a concern? so, reflecting on what MS. Thompson and MS. Leonardi, I was about to call you MS. Leonardo, ever since I heard that a couple of months ago. MS. Leonardi is really looking at if we have silo making sure that there is a cohesive system of
158support across the board. So he value ating it, looking at what our desired state and we can come back with specific answers and specific plans hon how we're going to address those. no problem, do you need to go to staff. if she remembers the question. I do, a lost processes were manual and it made the work a lot more just tedious. tedious. yes, it was just a lot. And I think with our shift in ensuring that everyone ends attendance is everyone's job. As a former school principal when I had a kid in attendance issue, the first thing I said, call the social worker, I'm guilty of that but in all the supports attendance is everyone's job and that's the message that we've shared. We talk within our groups of individuals with the school counseling like
159what is your role, what is the mental health professionals roles what is the associate worker what the administrator's role and then by auto mating some of the systems, that helps by taking some of what they had to do that took so much time it has taken stuff off their plate. okay, DR. Wash wau, I can safely say that now. With that in mind, considering that we're auto mating a lot of attendance procedures, know that that is taking place, would you say that board member thompson's concern is no longer that concern, because when it's time of the social worker to pay attention to attendance has now been alleviated? I would not say na it's totally been alleviated, they wear a lot of hats. They have a lot to do. but does the automation, of attendance impact
160the time to which social workers with spending on attendance. I would say it helps but it does not alleviate it no. understand so it's still a work in process. yes. so I have those my follow-up to board member thompson. But I did want to make other comments. Regarding a lot of effort in awareness in resources and how to access those resources, right. so, you know, I have two sons in broward county public schools. One of them is an ese child and what I realize for a lot of ese students, when they have compounded issues on school grounds that in addition to their learning challenges, it really makes for a great stressor on them. And so being able for the staff to be able to identify their stressors and to intervene and respond to them is
161very important. So I did notice that my son was in one high school and now in another high school. And stwlrp inconsist anses in the identification process f stresses as well as the intervention process. Andive I have so say, I don't know if they say kudos my more. But kudos to -- my son's increase outcome has increased significantly. I can say that it's the same for many. Because I've experienced it myself. How do we create consistency in terms of how schools identify what stresses, that affects their mental health? Because on a personal level, I experienced two different approaches from two high schools. One being very affective and the other one slow to intervene, had I not made changes it would have impacted my son. How do we fix the inconsistencies to make sure that everyone
162is on the same page. DR. Hepburn. yes, thank you for the questions. So simply answer that. Make sure our processes are meeting the needs of kids but also train monitor and continue to support. Which need to monitor and continue to support. how do we evaluate the mental health or stressors that kids experience across the district? I'll let the mental health staff talk about outcomes look okay, I'll start, what I referred to, the behavior is communication. It's a way the student communicates an unmet need. So if we're meeting the needs, the behavior issues are going to go down. That's one way. If we can manage the stressors and intervene appropriately and to your point and research point, academics will improve. Their ability to persist when things get, I think being able to look at some of
163the those. There are some points that we can look at. Such as behavior such as referrals or even our internal our school counseling referrals and just being able to kind of follow students that have been referred are their behavioral dederrals. Weweretheyey struruggling academically and nothth'r're T.T. Were they quiet and des ingaijd -- dis engaged. I think it's kid sfef situational and we have to be looking at all aspects. Okay, great, so I would like to explore ways identifying students that immediate mental health services. Remember when we went to the last sort of meeting. If they don't know, on identifying students and parents. Greater awareness. The survey that we sent out to parents. You know, and how to access in terms of. Survey can give a lot answers on the parents. There has to be better
164ways to capture and able to identify students. I mentioned some parents internal eyes. -- internalize so what else can we do, and then to intervene because we have the great resources, we have the great support, and bringing them to it. So now I would like and maybe on canvass DR. Hepburn, maybe on canvass. We'll continue to improve the awareness of these resources. And I'll say this once more, I love the best, choose the best, whose B.C. Ps. Thank you. thank you. MS. Alhadeff. thank you. Thank you to staff and DR. Hepburn for coming and speaking. This has been a amazing presentation. And one of the best mental health presentations that I've seen. Thank you so much. So my first question is in regards to the talk app and if DR. Hepburn if you can speak
165to. Do we have statistics like so many students are accessing the talk app? DR. Hepburn? MS. Holingsworth. as of today, we have over 70 students who have access and approximately 15 who have been referred for future and deeper services, but DR. Holness must have already had a bird's view, talking about canvass, we have an alert going out, with the alert of canvass, you must have known. I keep hearing this and taking deep notes about how to make sure that we're increasing the awareness of all the services available and really needing to continue on that road show and looking at that road show from different aspects because everybody receives their information differently. so the talk is on canvass if the students needs help or struggling, they can access and fill something out and help will be
166on the way? yes. perfect. So today with the students and in speaking, MR. Sullivan's team will have a lot of video content for students social media post to use. Thank you to MS. Lucekom for you bringing the center for mind, body medicine. I'm glad to hear that we're still doing it but we can probably do more of it. And then one of the things in the slide deck I would have liked to see is an update of exactly where our funding is going to. Right. As school board members, you know, it's our job to make sure the funding is being done responsible and where and what programs it's going to. We need to put more money into more social workers, we need to know where we're going to get that money from. There is a
167redundancy of some type of program. I don't know but if we don't have eyes on the funding and where the money is, then we cannot speak to that. On page 13 of the powerpoint presentation, the terrorists metrics behavioral health screener. I was glad to hear, that we started it and we're doing it in more schools, I think you said 32 schools. Sxl so if you can quickly speak to what that is and then also, our parents needing to opt into this. DR. Hepburn. MR. Shapiro? thank you. Yes, thank you. Yes, so this is a behavioral health screener and students take a 15-minute screener that identifies their level of need. There is five levels of need, the one is something urgent. The second is within 72 and third and fourth and fifth is less urgent. We
168still talk to students and send resources to the parents. So the program started with four schools and increased to ten schools and now 20 and now toup 36 schools. So we're continue to go explore ways to capacity to make sure that we have the ability to roll it out at the schools and have the staff to follow-up. Many students where they can participate as possible. okay, so parents have to sign off that they agree have their child through this screener. yes. and is there a cost to doing this screener? no, at this time. We're in an in kind agreement with that company but that will be finishing after this school year. So we're going to be exploring an agreement to expand it but that will be a paved. Each screener will have a cost. okay,
169so DR. Hepburn I would be interested in seeing what that is and how we can expand that in all of our schools. I think this is only being done at the high school level. high schools and middle schools. middle school, okay, I would like to see what that would look like. And then, the bullying prevention, we need more more is needed. We need to do more with bullying. I heard one of the students say anti bullying week. But that's great but we need to do more to stop that bullying from happening. One of the resources in district four is eagle's haven started after the strategy of margaret stoleman's school, have you start today have conversation with broward health? DR. Hepburn. yes, MR. Acabuzo has scheduled the meeting and we'll have them at the table to
170discuss many of the items that was added to the motion. For negotiations with broward hill. I'm happy that this started but for me, I would really think that you're part of those negotiations. absolutely I've been in direct communication with the ceo. thank you. The immigration support plan. If you can please send that to the school board. DR. Hepburn. that's noted. And as far as focus, they are on it. As I was hearing the conversation with the board and when it was first brought up about associate workers, I was not comprehending, that they were looking into why is this child and what are they going to do about it. It wasn't these manual types of things because focus is sending out those alerts. And parents are not getting them in a very timely manner. And then
171the in school all day, everyday now, that should be promoted now. I don't want to wait until next year. I want that to be put out whether it's, on social media, whatever that campaign is. We need to students in our schools now so they can be educated and we can continue to be an a-rated school district. Thank you. thank you, DR. Zeman. thanks chair. National institute of mental health tells us a lot of really great things they have. System for tracking teenagers and they say that 20 percent of our teenagers have considered suicide in the last 12 months. This is one indicator of the epidemic in mental health that we're facing in particular in teenage women teenage young ladies. I appreciate all the work that went into this to share the practices and the practices
172and the policies and positions that are involved. What the community wants to know is, are we meeting the need? Chair? Are we meeting the need for mental health? DR. Hepburn. yes, we're striving to meet the need with the resource that's we have and I'm collecting as much as feedback from this table and other constituents on efforts to improve. That means 16,000 of our students have actively considered suicide. I appreciate that. And while I listen to students what would be included to get to all of my colleague's points up to this point. And by the way, I appreciate a comment about social workers that was thrown out there, right. The result of a strategy would tell us among the ssis's the suicide prevention coordinator, the school counselor, the family counselors, and the crisis coordinator, it would
173tell us which of those things we don't have out right. Where is the greatest demand and contribution. It would start with a threat or suicide. One of the hugest threats that we have with our mental health is tens of thousands are documented guess. They're living under duers he is that is almost impossible to explain. And we have not had any absentee growth identify be shocked. These people are scared, they're horrified. They're traumatized just by the decisions being made. And I think we would be foolish to ignore that, suicide is another one. Bullying is going on. In ways that we don't measure very well. People do not raise their hand and say they want a checkup from the neck up. Men in particular do not do that. Young men are told that it's a sign of
174weakness. Our teachers are the frontline on this entire battle but what I'm looking for a strategy. It starts with a threat. All the threats that I just described, and I'm not in your business, but I can look at these things for my children and my for the children that I know and I see it the statistic sxz it's a ep dem I can and I want -- epidemic. And how much have we spending than we did six years ago. And some policies that we've changed that allow people to do it during the school day. It's a great article written by jonathan height that said how did this generation become so stupid? And it's a great headline but it's a good point, which is this generation is clearly different than generations before and you might think
175about the advent of technology not just cell phones as a cause of these things. So, chair, what I'm looking for is a real strategy because to MS. Thompson's point, if we have social workers working on absenteism, why aren't social workers working on mental health. This board said every mental health professionals will be fenced off. Chair, have we done that for siss school psychologist, school counselor, family counselor, family therapist social workers and coordinator? DR. Hepburn. without repeating the role, what is the question. have we eliminated the line where we decided a-line ago, to take the line out of all mental health professionals that say they can be assigned other duties not related to mental health? if staff can provide job info what job description came in the fall or last spring I cannot remember. We brought
176positions. I was going to ak if we can do a follow-up. no, no we can't, because the board and I asked this a year ago. Why do we need need to take an action, this should have been done. The board made it clear that we're in a middle of mental health crisis. I hope it's been done. well as I remember, from probably six, however months ago, it was guidance counselors, social workers and school psychologist, family therapists, school social workers and student support specialist. yes. all on page 6, these are the last item from their job item stricken. siss? yes, sir. suicide prevention coordinator? I don't believe that was taken out of that one. school psychologist? yes, sir. school counselor. yes, sir. family counselor. family therapist. excuse me. social workers. yes, sir. crisis coordinator. I don't
177believe that was taken. MR. As ri to. so 8 out of 10. 8 out of 10. well I hope the next two can come next week. What I think the board is asking tactical questions about is are we doing enough? Our job is to approve the budget, if we cannot do enough, we can do what we can to add money where we need it. But we can't and shouldn't be mental health experts, you know, other than, some of us having, you know, been blessed with having great therapist in the past. But we do need to know which one of these ingredients are working and in the greatest demand? Where are our kids suffering where they need a different reaction. I'm skeptical that social workers MS. Thompson should be doing absentee. There is a lot of
178need for social workers to be doing social work. What is the strategy look like? It starts with the need. It shows how we're meet thating rirmentd and then gathers a mountain of area where it says here is where we're not meeting the need. It would involve people like landyn and his friends. What is the receipt of mental health look like in schools, particularly high schools. Where we have tremendous need. And I know you gathered some information about that. But I'm still interested in a mental health strategy that will guide our job, the job of the school board is to set budget and write policies. And in this particular venunu the budgets and popolieses have a big pactct on whatthe opatioions a. We also approved an item last year, that excuse me, a year and a
179half ago to expand the number of therapist by 60. So we'll get a follow-up that I submitted to make sure that those are being spent in a way that we at least have visibilities on. But we need to know whether we spent more money and that there is great demand so we can answer questions about is it more therapist, is it more education of teachers, is it more education of parents, is it sit around and pray to hell that the world changes so we don't have the external threats that are putting our kids through so much. I don't believe hope is a strategy, but I could hope all the time, pray all the time, that things get better. But in the absence of that happening, I believe that we are really in a time where,
180school districts are thinking about substantial increases in resources and practices and policies in this school board being responsible for the money and the policy parts of that, I think needs to play a role. But the descriptions of practices and process and positions is a big part of that but I'm curious about what our strategy is and whether or not there is ways, where we need to either shift resources or reinforce policies so we can get after this. Because this is something that the community knows is a big issue. It is a weird problem because people don't want to self report. They just don't want to walk in and say I'm depressed, I'm anxious, I think I have signs of this. It's still perceived unlike physical illnesses as something that makes you less of a human
181being, you know by admitted. Until which get rid of that stigma, we're going have a challenge getting it perfect but we ought to do the best we can. I look forward to learning more at some point maybe another workshop on the actual strategy and the ingredients that we have to go after the requirement and where we're not meeting the requirement. Thank you, chair. thank you, MS. Fam? thank you so much, MADAM Chair. Firstly, I would like to thank you for coming today and giving us this presentation. And I'm going to ask a lot of questions and I'm going to ask for a lot of data I want to clearer picture and I think the board as a whole would appreciate that as well. First of all, what I would like to say is, in the
182past two years, since I've sat on this board we've always had a surplus for mental health at the end of the year that has been rolled over and we've had surplus for ese students. I want to see an itemization of where our money is spent. I found it particularly disturb thating we had an excess 10 million dollars after covid but that money was not used during that time. So was really disappointed as far as I'm concerned. Moving forward, I'm part of the children service commission and I'm not sure if you partnered with them, you didn't name them specifically but we've been working on children where their being uber but not taken in police cars. I think we all agree that that is traumatic, we don't need data on that, we need to affix and if
183there is a private car service that we can come up, the students prefer that more over than going in a ambulance, they don't want the whole school to be on notice that there is something wrong. I suggest that you reach out to them. I have other questions, one of the things I know you discussed school counselors and you said it depends on the number of students. there is one counselor per 7 one. And then in the middle school and high school, they have a director and then they have additional counselor with them. is director a full-time counselor as well? They track in on 700 students. some direct investigators a case load and others don't have a case load. But there is a director at school level and not counselor who are practitioners not a director.
184I would like landyn to speak now, he's seeing no. he's going to go after pullman. oh at the end, I have a lot of information I'm going over. In addition to this, what I would like to do is I wanted to see some data specifically. You have on specifically page 13, you have all of these counselors listed and I made a list of them. I'll go over, family therapist, school psychologist, behavior health psychologist assessment team, suicide risk assessment, mental health for crisis and then also, on page 12, you have instructional specialist, mobile response team and I assume there is a baker act team. I want to know how many people you have on that and how many that are working on our school district and how many students they're responsible for? I think we need
185a break down to know if people are overwhelmed and maybe they're under we will manied where they can do some shifting. But we need a whole layout of printout data of saying who is out there and not by name, but by the amount of numbers in the middle schools and elementary and also, the number of clients that they're with the past two or three years. Has that number gone up has it gone down? We need to know where we stand and I'm completely with DR. Zeman here, and support that we get data, oh is he here. He said there is 16,000 students that have attempted suicide. I want some data. I want to one to assess our effectiveness. I want to know -- . Yeah, we will say, I want to know how many a
186ttempted suicide and how many were successful and I want the data to see how many students we stopped and intervened in time to stop suicide. I want these, just somebody that is having a bad day that goes from 0 to 100 and I want to kill myself. I want to know if those are serious threats. Right now we're speaking in broad range, we have to ice light what is going on. And I think that's what MR. Zeman is asking. We have to figure out and get our hands around the problem ourselves to self fix. we're never going to be able to fix it. We want to fix it at the beginning. We don't want to get to the end. I'm asking that we start to acquire data, bring it forward so we know where we
187stand and how why we're there, how we got tl. Okay, I have some other questions for you. One of my concerns is, not just, I know we've been talking about attendance today, kind of flips around to this, because you're saying, that attendance is a problem. I do agree with MR. Zeman, we should have somebody or a team that is committed solely on following up on attendance, that should not be our health workers, they're too valuable. We can have people placing phone calls to do that. What I would like to do is say my concern is, also the financial aspects. We're talking about people leaving the district voluntarily or involuntarily but that is going to impact on us financial. If this district loses state and federal funding, what are we going to do? We might have
188-- this might impact the district, I don't want to be the elephant many the room but this needs to be evaluated. I'll ask MS. Batista to clarify as a school district within the state of florida what we're obl waited dwait -- obligated to do under the law with the kids documented status. so, thank you for that question. The -- so, as a district, we are not able to keep data related to immigration status of any of the students. we know that. right. So I'm not sure what else you want me to add as far as -- as far as institution of learn ining the state of florida, if a kid comes to our door regardless if they're documentedfinger undocumented, black, brown or white, ese, non-ese, what are we obligated to do under law? we have
189to educate every student, every child that comes to our district, that's not only by state law but also the supreme court has decided that in a supreme court case many years ago that every student regardless of immigration status need to be educated. this is a different standard now. We're -- there's more affirmative action to remove illegals going on right now. So, I don't know, I know in the past that this board went against an executive order about masking and then we lost funds. All I'm saying is how are we going to not go against an executive order by -- I mean, can we just look the other way, are we -- because that actual rule says if you're like bilingually ignorant, that's just as bad. people can be arrested, they can be fined. There's all
190kinds of consequences and penalties. Are we going to put our teachers in that position and our staff? Where are we going with this? Are we taking a firm stance as that's it, we're not doing anything, it's not our problem. Where do we stand? I'm sorry, I had a question for general counsel because I was under the impression we were discussing mental health supports for students. Is this line of questioning pertinent to the workshop that we're discussing right now? so, no. well, we're talking about the mental health of students that MAY be deported. I thought it all looped together, so we're not concerned about the students that MAY be deported, their mental health. Rjt that's not what I said. We're talking now about the social security numbers and things like that, not about specifically mental health
191supports for students, soifs just -- I'm no longer chairing soy leave it up to MADAM Chair. I mean, it sounds like you don't want to have this discussion, that's what I'm hearing loud and clear, is that correct? can I maybe make a suggestion that you send it as a request for a follow-up through an e-mail. We're running an hour behind and the students are waiting to go. fine, I just thought this was a public interest question that a lot of people have concern with because DR. Zeman just cared -- just shared that people are scare and had frightened, so I wanted to at least give people an idea of the foundation we're working on. right, but you wanted a follow-up, maybe we can work on a workshop to share what the policy is and have
192a place to ask these particular kinds of questions. I'm not opposed to that. or if you submit the questions, we're taking notes right now, we can provide information and it will be a follow-up, I heard the question if we need social security or if students need social securities to enroll in our schools and we can follow up as far as federal and state laws where we're obligated to educate every student that comes to our door. I would support a workshop on this, definitely. I think it's a great public issue. I will move on then to other things. This is my other questions that I have. and another reason I'm asking that is because that's going to impact school closures depending if with you f we lose a whol lot of students, we have to think
193about that and that's an impact to our community. One of the things I wanted to ask about, I see we have partnered with no place to hate, am I correct. DR. Hepburn. [Inaudible] Can elaborate on that specific partnership. we do have schools designated as no place for hate schools for completing pro social actinviter, peace week, anti-bullying week, we do not use the curriculum associated with the adl. where is the curriculum they use to train them and teach for that period of time on the bullying and where can I and the parents find that the online? the bullying training is available on the equity, diversity and school climate web page for students, parents, staff, it's all there. There is no curriculum associated with no place for hate, no place for hate designation is given for schools
194that participate in red ribbon week for example. Peace week, they'll do kindness week, the kindness club, these are after school activities that parents consent to have their child attend, there's no curriculum associated with it. well, can can I get a copy or the parents get a copy of what exactly students are being shown during these committee meetings because you're saying there's no curriculum, are we talking about nothing? Where can we get copies of what's being shown and taught that the point in time? so, every school that has an after school club, they have to provide a permission tomorrow that talks about the when, the with where and the what is going to be covered in that and ere parent has access to the club sponsor to ask any questions that they have. There's not a
195consistent in every single school, they're doing this for anti-bullying week. Every school is going to look different. There's nothing that we can put up on a website, they would have to go and ask their school. and due to the parental rights, parents have to opt their kids into activities like this, so the schools provide a variety of information that DR. Washington just detailed and they have to sign and consent their kids can participate in that. I know some of the students mentioned a [Inaudible], can I ask in the name of the film and -- DR. Hepburn? and what was shown. thank you. it's not a film, there's a live play about bullying, I have to -- let me find out the name of it. and is that through the school district that was made? I
196think you're referring to the one they were presenting earlier about film? I assume they would have been shown a film. it's a live play, tom's get thing the name of it, again, it's an extra curricular activity that parents consent to have their child consent. is that a live play or where did that origin gnat from? Mensing it's an outside organization that come in and parents consent them being a part of. what's the nail of that organization? Jts I'm getting it for you. I don't support the pyramid of hate, I don't think people should be supported the hate, and if you bring this up, that means you're a hateful person. I'm nonoa bibipporter. anythihing we do outsidof core ininstructional core curriculum, extra curricular activities, be it athletics, clubs, or other student interest activities, our parent ares
197required to sign a consent form for their kids to engage in those activities. We don't allow kids to just participate in something without parent permission, I want to clarify that for the board and the public. I understand that completely but parental rights say parents have a right to participate in the education of their children, if their child's being shown a movie or doing exercises, they have a right to know thabt, that's why I'm inquiring, so please don't shut that down. I wanted to clarify for the board and the public. we're going to move to muz -- MRS. Bulman and then come back to your question. I think that's the last one. Is the curriculum taught in place for hate counselors? there is no hate place for curriculum. okay, I didn't say no hate for place
198curriculum, I said is the materials taught in the no hate -- no place for hate counselors? According to our contract, they come in and teach teachers. They also teach during -- I think it's -- what is it here, I have it in my notes. no work has been done under the contract that you're speaking about, so they haven't come in and done any training of our teachers or anything like that. If that's what your question is. As far as what is happening in our after school clubs, those are broward county public school employers, whether they're counselors, whoever is the club sponsor is the person for facilitating the actinviter that is students do. do you have no place for hate counselor sponsors? we don't have anybody from the adl coming in and doing work with students.
199Rjt does that mean the same thing, the adl, there's no place for hate counselors? we don't have any place for no hate for place counselors. has was my question. Thanks. okay. MS. Bulman? so, I would say my colleagues have asked most of the questions I had on my list. I can't stop thinking about the kindness club and all of the awesome presentations from the kids. I think you guys did a a fantastic job putting that together and, you know, we had talked before this meeting about making sure how one of your goal iss making sure how the kids have some kind of connection to school to someone at their school, that's so important for your mental health and I think you did an excellent job illustrating all the ways you're working on accomplishing that, so
200I think that's fantastic. This is a very heavy lift for any organization and the vastness of this is demonstrated by everybody's follow-up questions and all the concerns they have but, I mean, I think that you guys are doing a great job. You understand what the task are and you're working in that direction so I really commend that, and I would just leave you with one thing because it's been mentioned more than once that the mental health crisis is really significantly precipitated over the past ten years. And DR. Zeman mentioned I think we agree on this, you know, technology plays a role in that so it's kind of a question of -- are we trying to fix a problem when you kind of know what the problem is but we're not addressing the actual problem of
201the technology that's causing the problem and trying to put a band aid on that. I don't have an answer for that but I do think that maybe looking at that a little bit more deeply and how we can kind of address the actual technology and what it's doing for our mental health would be something to look into. but thank you very much, thank you to everyone who is here and thank you for all the time of being prepared, it's like you're in congressional hearing committee. I'll be quick because I know we're running behind and I'm excited about our next presentation. I have a lot of feedback on this topic and I wanted to make sure it's all captured so I will share it with you all off-line in the sake of time, but I have
202to acknowledge in front of the board the collaboration that alana and I have with you all and your team. Very few things go through MRS. Washington, I would be wrong if I didn't recognize that and her commitment as well as a former student advisor, MS. Winter, so they're an amazing team and I have to just say that when we do school visits and in my personal school experience, we see that our students are thriving in their connections with one another, our students work together, our students love each other no matter what barriers. We don't teach students to hate one another, we -- in fact, it's the opposite. We teach students to collaborate and be kind to one another and I'm grateful for the initiatives you all and your team have implemented at the school based
203level and I'm looking forward to additional continuous improvement, thank you. MADAM Chair, this will be very quick. I haven't gone yet. And we're -- one minute. not a repeat? it won't be a repeat. we've already cut into the student advisor's time. I have a couple of question and is some comments. How are schools selected for the ssi's, they say they have ssi's in 50 plus schools, how are they selected? we have ssis in 56 of our schools including sti school and is we looked at a variety of their discipline data, their attendance, their sra data to identify the schools that would be best to start with our ssi first year. since it's data driven, is there like a cutoff where you decide or was it because we had 56, so if we had 60, would
204you -- would you camber -- is there a cutoff for that data, how do we know if we need more I guess is what I'm trying to ask. Does the data drive it or the number of employees we have is my question. it's not a hard stop on the data. It was a fluid selection process just utilizing a variety of data points. We have 40ssis, they're just located many 56 schools, so there's a total of 40 of those positions. gotcha, okay, perfect, thank you for that. My other question is the -- so, when we took a travel on the day in the life of a high school student and I'll say one thing before I ask my question, I really appreciate the fact that you had them hold up the signs and stand there because
205it was a visual that was important, when we talk to students, they always say they want someone to talk to. As you had people stand up and I'm sure that was intentional, I'm seeing heads nodding back there, but it was a visual for us and I hope for whoever was paying attention to see how many places students can speak with an adult, so that was really, really good to have, but our secondary student as he travels -- the very first thing, he lands in a life skills class. What class is a life skills class? I mean, I know they have them specifically in the ese population but I don't know what that looks like in a gen ed population. some of our schools have various elect tiers, some of them are tied to life skills
206and wellness, if you would like the hear more, I'm going the defer it to MS. Daze. there are some schools that have electives where they are supporting students and teaching them the competencies that we suggest in regards -- this align to our mental health resiliency lessons such as the self-awareness, self-management and so forth, the fiver we mentioned and making sure students are developing the resiliency skills to help them as well as help their peers. thank you, and a follow-up, could you just send to all of us a list of the electives that that would fall under, just so we have it. okay. thank you. And I'll say I really appreciated the student who spoke about the resiliency lessons and how it tied to technology as board member bulman just said because those are really important
207things. When you hear life skills or when you hear resiliency, you might not have initially thought of technology, so that was really interesting to me because that is a life skill in today's world and knowing how to not get scanned which I wish I had learned before taylor swift tickets went on sale, and, you know, so I think that was really, really important. I also agree that we're not doing enough for bullying and not for lack of trying but it's just a huge, huge problem as we've had a discussion about, so I think we need to continue to do that and you've mentioned this already but I'll just repeat it and it's been said a number of times, when we sat with the students and asked how would you like to get information, they said
208from canvas, they have to log on there every single day and actually parents said through e-mail, but it's important to make sure that we're sending out alerts that way on things that we want to make sure students are aware of. And I really appreciate this. I sit on the children's services council and the bbhc, so this was really, really important to see how those dollars and what we talk about in other meetings, how it rolls out in broward county public schools and I'm just going to do a shameless plug, on MARCH 2, at plantation middle school, we're hosting a healing through the arts which will include a lot of the mental health resources that are here and students will be bringing their art to show how that works, so it's from 9-2 and I would
209invite -- MARCH 1, I'm sorry, I keep getting days mixed up, the saturday, MARCH 1, plantation middle school, 9-2. Thank you so much. So, I know that we asked could we have two additional workshops, one is on mental health strategies or additional mental health things, and thep also the immigration concerns that were brought up, so if yu eel please make sure those come for ward and did that cover what you wanted? Okay. DR. Holness, you have 30 seconds. thank you, MADAM Chair, I will get it done in 30 seconds. I would like to direct the superintendent through DR. Fulton to brick back to the board an update on the implementation and success of policy revisions to the job descriptions of all mental health professionals where we voted to strike out and other duties. Secondly, I
210would like to direct the superintendent to look up any other mental health professional areas we left out such as suicide prevention and crisis intervention and any others that we MAY have missed to bring those job descriptions back to the board for further revision, to include removing and other job duties from those for a future board meeting. okay, so I'll just -- as i have heard over and over again, one board member can't direct the superintendent to do -- so, how can I do this? you might suggest a follow-up on that or we -- if you want it to be a directive -- let's take a consensus on that, I think DR. Zeman also mentioned this and I think this is important. all those that would like to direct the superintendent, just -- hold on. we're
211not voting. Giving a thumb's up. that's not what it sounded like, okay, but I would like the speak on this. okay, go ahead. so, I do not think it's a good idea for this direction. I think we have sat here for a few hours, DR. Hepburn is aware of what needs to be done. You know, this is in his purview to be able to go through job descriptions and bring back what he feels necessary to the board. I think that we are going down this roller coaster of having to vet out so many different policies and job descriptions that need to I think come -- it eat f's coming from us, I know that's our job as policy but the superintendent based on what he sees going on should direct -- bring it to us
212to then have to look at but I think this is not a good idea. MADAM Chair, MAY I speak? DR. Holness? okay, I would like legal counsel to guide us. If I can during a workshop ask for consensus on a direction to the superintendent as we are and as we're equally weighted as board members to take actions. MS. Adams? you can ask each board members for their thoughts on it to reach some sort of consensus. so I'm asking now that legal has said I can do that, I'm asking for consensus to have the superintendent update the board on the implementation and success of policy revisions we've made to mental health professionals in striking out and other job duties and secondly for the superintendent to bring back the job descriptions or to bring the job descriptions
213for suicide prevention and crisis intervention professionals and any other mental health professionals for further revision. MRS. Rupert, agree or disagree? disagree. okay. MRS. Alhadeff? disagree. MS. Thompson? agree. Er I disagree. ms. Leonardi? I agree. I want the kids to come back too. I agree. MRS. Fam? [Inaudible] okay. [Inaudible] DR. Holness? [Inaudible] correct. so where are we, do we have consensus? Okay, and I would just say I believe a follow-up does what you're asking for, so I'll ask for a follow-up on these things and we've asked for these things to come back at different workshops. DR. Fulton? so I want to thank the student services team for an amazing job today to prepare tog come back and bring this information for the board and the community but I want to thank our stars of the day,
214the students, for giving us a good job on their lived experiences on how these services support them every day. and I agree, thank you, all, for your time, your effort. [Applause]. It was a fantastic presentation and please bring the students back when you come back, we really enjoyed them. thank you so much, our team wants to acknowledge part of our presentation highlighted the help is here initiative in n that we want the make sure every single student has one trusted adult so we have a gift for each of you, so that you have the same shirt that many of our counselors, our ssis and our administrators wear, so that our students can see that you are another trusted adult and that you support students' mental health. We appreciate you. thank you so much and we're
215going to take a brief recess so that the student advisors can get ready for their presentation. Thank you all for coming today. (Meeting in recess). thank you, and thank you -- welcome back to the board would've shop. The next item up is student advisors' update on student engagement. I now hand it over. so, good afternoon, school board members, district staff, superintendent hepburn, our colleagues across the district, our honored guest widths us today, I'm valerie wanza, the chief and strategy innovation officer for the district. One of the highlights of the division of strategy and info basing is to support the work, the advocacy and the activities of athletics and student activities of which the student advisors work in concert with MS. Brown, the director, as well as MS. Santiago, the department liaison, and I will say
216as the 1987-88bcasc treasurer and sga pr t from miramar high school it gives me pleasure to work with these individuals and we look forward that alana and brandon will guide us through today. thank you, chair hixon, vice chair leonardi, superintendent hepburn and our 250 thousand peers, my name is landyn, I have the distinct honor as serving in the broward county school board wre, the 50th and 51s the t student advisor tos the school boardfinger I'm grateful and excited to be here to provide an update ton work we have been doing in engagement with our peers. good morning, my name is alana barrera, the alternate student advisor to the school board, today we'll walk through through our speak up, speak out session and is the feedback we've received from students so far, then we will look
217at the highlights from the student advise have I committee and then we will request a board proposal for the school board discussions. So, who are we? Each year the broward county association of student councils holds election for the student advise sore tos the school board following the guidelines outline ined school board policy 1330, the student receiving the most vote iss elected as student advisor and the student receive thing second most votes is elected as the alternate student advisor. However, the role is shared responsibility. Both the student advisors take you on different tasks and responsibilities which include representing students at all school board meetings and workshops, appointing a team of 13 student from all over the district to school board mitt recessing, conducting our speak up, speak out session and is implementing various student engagement initiatives
218through our student government association. We recognize the importance of equitably representing our peers. We also recognize each student in the district has a different school experience. In order to address this gap and ensure we're accurately representing all of of students websinger have launched a districtwide speak up, speak out effort in our traditional high schools, technical high schools, combination schools and our center schools. We would like to take a moment to express our appreciation to our high schools in supporting this initiative. Our principals have been open to hear framing student and is they have sparked sessions. Each session follows a framework, well, bet and her next. What is going well on campus, what could be better and we ask student tos share their ideas for what's next sdp what they would like to see in the
219future at their school. Following each session, principal ares provided with a comprehensive report that synthesize it is feedback we receive from students. Now I will turn it over to landyn to share an update on our progress with these sessions. thank you, alana. The data the provided on the deck is as of JANUARY 8, 2025. The publishing date for this workshop. Since then, sessions have been completed at northeast and south broward high school and two sessions are scheduled for later this we're at deerfield beach and piper high school, bringing our total completed sessions to 19 sessions. Each board member has been provided a smaoet on the speak up, speak out sessions on their district with data that is updated as of today, so that is the most up to date data on scheduling sessions in your
220respective district. It was prioritized based on when the last session was complete at the school and our previous engagement with students at the school. We thought it was imperative to prioritize the schools that have never had a speak up, speak out session and hear from students that we have not heard from in the past. Our goal is to complete 36 sessions by MARCH and we are on track to reach that goal. We thank our high school principals for their support in makeing this happen. A major priority for alana and I is to make sure we speak to a diverse cross section of students that represent the diversity.The school but also diversity of experience. As of date, we have spoken to over 500 students at our visits. The combined data from all sessions is shared on
221the deck. This anonymous survey to capture student data is optional, not all student at schools have provided responses. It is also important to note our sessions feature of a variety of student who is are representative of the entire school population. Our sessions do not just include students involved in student government or club officer, rather a wide range of students on campus. On this slide, you will see six trending topics from our sessions completed in the first semester. Our intention is to provide the board with a year end comprehensive report of feedback from our sessions starting with mental health support. Students have shared the need for more awareness about mental health resources available to them. Thanks to collaboration with the student services initiatives vision and director from mental health service, we are in the process of
222form ago student work group that will provide valuable feedback on the various services the district provides. We know great strides have been been made in mental health but significant improvement is something students would like to see. Shift tog safety and security, there was feedback implemented this school year including metal detection. Additionally we regularly hear about campus security operation and is we are grateful for chief lossan know for their support in addressing concerns that students raised to us. Moving on to programs, students have shared great feedback about course offerings on their campuses including programers they believe could be sunsetted and programs they want to come to their school. As part of the second phase of redefining our schools, we are looking forward to collaborating with the strategy and innovation team and DR. Wanza to develop a
223districtwide curriculum survey to students that includes site based leadership teams. In the area of clubs and co-curricular activities, at many schools, we hear feedback about the club approval process as well as varying ak says to clubs. We've had productive conversations with DR. Hepburn and finance and business operations in this area and we look forward to potential streamlines in the process of club approval. Moving on to school climate we caner hear about the need for clearer explanation of policies included in the code of student conduct, in the words of our student, complexity creates confusion, so we look forward to collaborate witching staff to create a clearer way for students to understand the policies they are expected to follow. And finally, one of the most important areas of feedback we hear, student voice on campus. At almost
224every school visit, we hear the need for students to have enhanced voice on their campus. Students are not necessarily looking for a say in the school operations but watt rather an opportunity to freely share feedback with their administrators. With the support of DR. Hepburn we caner are in the beginning stages of developing a comprehensive student engagement plan that will empower our schools to regularly hear from students about their experience. With all that being said, I will turn it over to alana to provide an update on our student advisory committee. each year students are to elect their school board's district, this year 20 students were elect today this committee including representative from district wide student leadership organizations. The committee which meets five times a year has provided meaningful insights to DR. Hepburn on various topics, in
225SEPTEMBER, students had an opportunity to provide feedback on programs in their school as a PRESIDENT Of the redefining our schools initiative. In OCTOBER, students were challenged to talk to their peers and answer the following question, what do you want the superintendent to know. Finally in NOVEMBER, students met in small groups with members of the student service leadership team to provide feedback on the district's mental health initiatives. At each meeting, students will submit questions to the superintendent and staff provides solutions to various concerns that students collect from their schools. Each board member will be e-mailed with the contact information for their district representatives on this committee. We would like to also take an opportunity to introduce the members of this committee joining us today. If you are part of the superintendent student advisory committee, please stand.
226[Applause]. We thank you for your time and effort and amplifying student voices across the district. Board members, we encourage you to meet your representative in the committee and hope that they can serve as another vessel of student voice. Finally we are grateful for the board moving forward with the quarterly joint student and school board discussion, following the consensus reached at the DECEMBER 10 workshop. We have drafted a a proposal composition for this discussion. With one middle school and one high school student representing each school board member's district, additionally we will work with our center schools to ensure there's representation from their students with two center school students participating. Quarterly, we will produce a district wide alert to students inviting them to participate. Parent approval will be required for the participation. The group of students will
227change each quarter and our intention is to ensure that a group of students accurately represents the make-up of our district and knows they can honestly share their inbi. Look forward to receiving consensus on this proposal from you all before moving forward. on behalf of alana and I and as well as the student leaders joining us today we caner are grateful for the opportunity to present to you all on the work we have been doing. I would be remiss if I didn't take an opportunity to thank the superintendent, a great entrance, good timing there, to thank the superintendent for his commitment to hearing from us and as well as members of the cabinet and especially DR. Wanza for provideing ongoing support and mentorship to us, that is something we are extremely grateful for and we thank
228you for your time. MADAM Chair, we'll turn it over to you. thank you, thank you so much for the great presentation. Now it is time for public comments, so we'll go through those. Jc leon, first up. hello, I'm jc leon, I represent south broward high school, I serve as the PRESIDENT There as well as bcps vice-PRESIDENT, being a leader has been one of the most rewarding experience ins my life, I learn ted value of team work, communication and making a real impact on my school and community. Organization like bcpc that played a big role in my life. The students advisor tos the school board has also played a huge role by sharing important update and is giving us a voice and decisions also affecting you guys. Bcpse has had a chance for us to grow
229as leaders by showing us a great impact how we can represent the great broward county school district. thank you so much. Next up is lily reed. okay, good afternoon, everyone, my name is lily reed, I represent western high school where I serve as the PRESIDENT And I represent us as the bcac, it not only allows me to meet staff but to hold a seat on the student advisory committee which allows opinions are given directly to the people who make the choices that affect our everyday lives, one of the topics I was lucky enough to bring up was mental health. I've been passionate about assisting students with their mental health and get gsh get tog speak with the people that can help us. They can truly make the change they want to see. thank you so
230much. Next is donny vo. my name is donny vo from coral springs high school, I'm the treasurer, I was able to connect with so many different students from all over the county and help raise the membership which I met so many leaders who had people come to them and ask about. The student advisor to the school board have played an immense role in changing my school because after they came to my school and spoke to us and received the feedback and they went to our principal and spoke about it, there has been changes and improvements. I would just like to say that as an officer at my school too who is very involved and among the student body. thank you, josh collins? hello, my name is josh collins, a senior at south plantation, I've had
231the honor of being part of the broward county association for student councilor board for three years. Being a part of these organizations have made an impact to my school and my community. At the meetings, students have a voice to speak with board members s anandr. Hepbururabout issues d concerns we see r hohools anand at bwaward cocounty. At one of our first meetings, we were given the chance to talk about class ins our schools and what courses we want to see in the future. We were able to learn what classes were at other schools. I can't wait to see our input implemented at schools. I want to give landyn and alana a huge kudos infringing broward county students information and are always very informative. awesome, thank you. Next is marly brooks. you could go to that
232one. hello, everyone, I am marly brooks and I serve as the sga PRESIDENT At piper high school, one thing I love about the student advisory committee is how optimistic our advisors and our leaders are. DR. Hepburn has done a great job at understanding and hearing and supporting everyone, all of the students that attend these meetings are very ambitious and very dedicated to the work that they contribute to their schools. I just wanted to say that a big, big thank you to alana and landyn for their support, their constant communication with us. You guys are doing a great job and I support everything you guys are doing, thank you. [Applause]. thank you so much, it seems to be a common theme here. Kevin herrera. good afternoon, I'm kevin, south plantation high school and I'm with the
233bcac. I wouldn't do this before this position, with my advisors help and with my council and my partner steven, I feel like I've groan as a leader and I can help other people become leaders like me and I want to say thank you to my bcac board and to all my friends that helped me through this, thank you. thank you so much websinger will finish our public comment with hayley swickle. I'm hailey, I represent coral glades high school as the broward county association of student council secretary. Throughout this journey of being secretary, I've been able to create meaningful connections with many students and schools across the entire county. I've also been able to grow my leadership skills allowing me to thriver under pressure and hold myself accountable in many situations. While being secretary of bcac,
234I've had the pride to hold the secretary position within my school. This has allowed me to take what MAY seem like a small issue at my school and bring toit the county level and learn the issues within my school were at other schools as well, at a speak up, speak out session, we listened to different pathways there are at other schools. Without the help and guidance of landyn and alana, this session would never have taken place and these problems MAY have never been solved. For that, I owe them a big thank you. Throughout this past year, my passion for leadership has soared and I can't wait to continue this leadership to my senior year. Thank you for your time. thank you to all the student speakers for coming out today. Next we will go to
235board discussion and we'll start with MRS. Alhadeff. thank you, great job, listen -- landyn and alana and all the student who is are here today. This is an amazing presentation. My first comment is on page 5, I love that you prioritize the schools that didn't have a speak up, speak out session. That was a great idea, great strategy. thank you. my question on the metal detectors, you said you received positive feedback. Was that through a a survey, was that testimonials, how did you quantify that statement? through the chair? landyn? thank you, we in the original discussion which I think was maybe in MARCH or APRIL of last year, we conducted a survey through our county student government organization, it was a pretty small sample size where we received overall very poz tier feedback prior to
236implementation and that at every speak up, speak out session, we asked student about the metal detector program and the overall consensus from students is they're feeling like it's been a smooth implementation and they feel safer because of this. I'll note at some schools, we hear about some improvements that can be made with the metal detection and we regularly shared that feedback with the principal as well as with the safety and security team to try to alleviate those concerns. okay, awesome, and I would also just say it would be great the share that with DR. Hepburn too. yes, through the superintendent, we share that information. perfect. On page 7 under clubs and co-curriculars, it says that students have barriers and club approval process and access to club, recommendation to create a districtwide process for project approval.
237Can you expand on that. through the chair. landyn. there's a standard practice bulletin when it comes to this. This is speaking directly to not automating, digitalizing the process. We hear at schools the process varies from school to school which the standard practice bulletin allows because it's not -- everything works differently at different schools, so we've had initial discussions with members of cabinet to address this and see if there can be a more consistent process that would be helpful for administrators. I don't know if I forgot anything, DR. Wanza? that's great. And I would be interested in seeing that come forward. And you spoke about each board member having a representative. I'm assume hating was on our paper that was handed out to us, emani and emma, can you raise your hand if you're here. Hi.
238Well, I would love if we could schedule a zoom meeting and so I can learn what your experiences are. My last questions is the students here are very engaged and involved, how do you connect with students that are shy and they're not so engaged and involved? through the chair. landyn. thank you. absolutely. I can tell you as part of the reason being very -- part of the reason I ran for this position was because of my frustration with the lack of student advisor and your typical involved student. Alana and I have made it a shared commitment that when we visit schools, we ask principals to give us a very holistic group of students that represent everything from your student body PRESIDENT To the student that came right out of internal suspension. So, our principals have
239been supportive in that effort, I think at every sexier we can confidently say it was a wide array of students but to your point, there's still more work to do to ensure we're talking to -- I don't want to say the normal student but the student that comes to school and leaves, right. So, we're working with our high school principal tos build that up within our sessions because we can get some of the most authentic feedback out of them. perfect, well, amazing job, thank you to everyone would's here today. thank you, MS. Alhadeff, for your support. thank you, MS. Thompson? hi, I'm so immensely proud of landyn and alan ma and everyone in the background as well, you are not only the leaders of tomorrow, you're the leaders of today and what you fie f
240guys are doing are making an amazing impact to your schools so thank you so much for hanging out with us, sorry, we ran behind, it's pretty typical. can [Inaudible] Wave if you're here, hi. Super excited about this, I wish that was something I knew we had before as little representatives from our high schools, so that would be have been great, now we know and that's awesome. And I want to ask for some feedback, not only from our two student advisors but -- we can't do that. How can we as board members engage the students? I know you keep your speak up and speak outs as a student focused activity but I do think other than just asking for your opinions, at least myself would like to take it upon myself to reach tout to the
241students in my district to get their feedback and have more of a pipeline between myself and the students. What would your recommendations for us be? through the chair. so, that is a two-phased answer. The first answer is hopefully by getting consensus today on the joint school board discussions that MS. Leonardi initially brought up, we're hoping that is a group, while we love these group of student that is are here, we are hoping that it is a group of students who represent an authentic and honest look at the district, right. So, that's number one. number two is we're working on next school year with the support of DR. Hepburn to bring more school based feedback activities, we see in our yearly survey the percentage of students stating they have a voice on their campus is far
242below 50%. We want to make sure we're enhancing that and we're hoping through next school year, we'd be able to grow that and I don't know if alana has something else to add about that. so, a follow-up, what can we as board members do and take some of the responsibility off of you guys? I will say your support and -- first of all, your support in a conversation like this forum and regularly share what we're hearing but also I think it's more what can we do to help you as well and I think connecting each board member with students in their district to be able to have discussions is something that would be a mutually beneficial relationship. and I'll give a quick answer, I know MS. Leonardi and I and there MAY be more people
243who do that have been holding student virtual town hall tos get that, so that might be something you would be interested in and landyn and alana have been awesome to help us get that up and running. Next up is MS. Leonardi. thank you. And I don't know if you were asking for consensus but obviously I support the quarterly joint student and school board discussions proposal that you have in the presentation. I just want to first start off by saying that today has been lovely with the amount of student involvement we've had. I want to hear from students this much every workshop and board meet ifing that's possible. I think that would be amazing. I want to shout-out for everyone that's here as a one semester sga sponsor, one semester speaking to the level of work
244that is involved with that. I know that you guys work really, really hard and you're super dedicated, so thank you all for being leaders in your schools in our school district. One of the proposals in the presentation, how do you think we can communicate clearer expectations around the code of student conduct? absolutely. And I'm going to jump one moment because I totally forgot to mention something, to board members supporting the work we do and the work that schools do, seeing on-school campuses, the after school activity that is happen, sporting games, the different events where we recognize students, as well as going and speaking to students at schools through their clubs like human relations council or other events happening tat school, that's the best way for you to support student engagement. I want today make sure
245I mentioned that. To your question, MS. Leonardi, we found the code of student conduct is way too long and we recognize the need for a longer document to be able to stipulate all the rules. What we e would like to see is a one or two page document that students are able to easily go to and say dress code, I can't do this, this, this and this, or cell phone, I can't do this, this, this and this, rather than maybe the one or two students you're looking at that will go on to the website, do a search in the code of stuntbacker student conduct document and try to find that information. We have video ins the past that have supported that but I think an easy to look at one pager is something that students
246would find very beneficial. got it, thank you, so life a cliff's notes? exactly. awesome. So, I hope that our staff can take that and run with it. I also think maybe some like short social media videos might be helpful, so thank you for clearing that up. And to your point about coming to see after school activity and is extra curricular, please invite me, I will come, where my schedule allows. I love the idea of the quarterly principal advisory meetings and I'm wondering -- I guess I have a larger question I think, MRS. Thompson asked some of these questions as well about how we can get -- how the board can get the feedback shared in these different forums, so I'm just very interested in hearing what -- the general feedback from the principal advisory committees,
247and I also am wondering like how we could use thought exchange, different way wes can get that feedback, but I think MRS. Thompson -- I was going to ask how can school board members uplift student voices more and I think you've spoken to that. thank you. Next is DR. Zeman. thank you so much, chair. I was going the ask what MS. Leonardi did about the student code of conduct, so thank you for sharing that. I appreciate that's what you meant by it rather than other things. To that end, you know, there's a pretty healthy investment in apps on our website and apps available through other technology that allow people to get some critical things. Today we had a long document reporting back on a very critical settlement we started 25 years ago, it's 53 pages,
248that's long, but two pagers, there's a lot of student and is non-student ins the community that would like to know how we're doing, how we're making progress, what the next things are so I'm hoping there's more than just a student kind of version of that but we start to get more executive summaries for the things so that people can read that and then decide do they want to invest the time to go further. Also just one quick participatory thing in the back, raise your hand if you represent someone between districts 1-7. Do you represent a school board member, any district? I think most of you, right? everybody. I will invite all of you to a teams meeting and debbie could do the same since countywide people didn't seem to get listed on landyn's list, I
249will assume all of them and we'll invite you and have a good discussion about kind of what you see and some ideas that I had as a former student body PRESIDENT In fort lauderdale high school ten billion years ago and I look forward to that. Thank you very much. MADAM Chair, if I could just address something really quick? yes. it's going to be in your e-mail, we wanted to make sure the -- we wanted to make sure you get the full list, it's over 30 name and is e-mails that you would be easily be able to click it rather than seeing a document where you would manually type it in. Both county wide members will be receiving that feedback. thank you. MRS. Bulman? thank you, chair. Always impressed with alana and landyn from the time
250that I've been coming here which is not very long and before observing, I mean, it's just amazing what you guys do and how you have contributed to our school district, so thank you very much. Thank you to all of you who are participating. I can't stress enough how important your leadership is. We have the benefit of experience, you have the benefit of vision and so please continue to contribute in this way as you move forward because it is so impor to all of us in our community and I praoesh you guy and is the extra time you're spending on this. Nt I have the privilege of having alana in my district along with madison, davis and zadane francis, is he here, so I'll -- right on, thanks. So, I'll be arranging to meet with you
251guys, so thank you for your service and just one question, I love the idea of having the open lines of communication, I think you guys have done a really good job of creating a forum for that and something that I have as a parent I guess is a lot of feedback from my children about thing that is are going on at school, teachers, things like that, is that -- I don't really know how to respond to that because you're kind of getting one person's perspective maybe or a couple of people's perspective and hearsay but I think if you have enough people giving similar feedback, then you can address things that are going on in the school, so is there anything that you have on the horizon for -- to address something like that, you know,
252issues that might be happening in the school that if you had enough supportive evidence of it, that you could probably bring in a nice manner forward to the principal or whatever, do you have any suggestions for that? landyn? as part of our effort for next year, we are working with marketing right now to be able to develop a landing page where students can kind of understand how to voice their concerns, right. There's different processes especially bh it comes to addressing something regarding an employee, there's a process that student haves to follow, right, so we want to be able to empower students with that information because we can only go to their school once during the year, right, and maybe when we come at that time thth's t whwh theyeye cing an icissue in a asasoooo
253we ntntto open th up I do want to give a shout-out to a lot of our principals that provide regular opportunities and open door policy for student -- student and is we are looking forward to see more of that continue. thank you, keep up the good work. MRS. Rupert? thank you, I want to say something that probably is going to surprise people, you're going to find an irony of this, I'm a type a personality, I'm betting a lot of you are secretly type a personalities but my experience and I'm a little older than you, just like many decades, when I experienced high school, it was everybody rowing in their own boat, we're all looking to get somewhere but rowing separately in our boats. What I see here today is you gushes brought a cohesiveness into
254this organization and I for one am super thankful for that and if you're in district 7, can you raise your hand. Hi. two of your represent I fevers were not able to make it today, I'm sorry. I'll write them a note, no. Anyways, I look forward to speaking with you. My number, quick, write it down, (954) 292-2270, that's my work cell. Yeah. I look forward to it and I'm open to all suggestions and conversations and really just to hear more, so thank you so much. thank you. . Er thank you, and I'll land the plane here. Just very quickly, thank you so much for coming today, the theme from all of your peers was that landyn and alana have done a fantastic job, thank you so much. [Applause]. we did not pay them to say
255that. we know. they did get free lunch, maybe it was their bribe. Wefrjt have seen you in action, we're aware. The end user of what we do are all of you here and it was amazing to see so many student ins this board room today. I do also wish that that happen every single week because it reminds us of our why, we sometimes get bogged down in adult behavior and it really is about all of you, so we really appreciate -- we know you had to MISS Class today, some of you MAY not have minded that but it does make an impact, but it is important and you have made an impact coming here to speak to us today, so I want you to know how valuable it was to see you here and sharing
256your thoughts with us, so we appreciate that, we look forward to the student discussions that come forward and I want to say to the adults that also allowed this to happen because there is a field trip process that allows the students to get here that adults have to go through, so thank you for the support and the work that you do with our students. The more we can git -- get from our student, the better we can do. We'll end with MS. Fam and then we will wish you a great day. thank you, MADAM Chair. Thank you, everyone, for coming today. It's really, really great, the things you've accomplished, the things you put together and working as team as you do, especially at such a young age, as MRS. Rupert said, she was going through
257the experience, everybody was in a boat rowing by themselves so it says a lot about the level of maturity, how successful you're going to be and your future endeavors and you should all be very, very proud of yourselves. I have josh, zoe, blake, and I'm going the take you out for the best pizza you've ever had. So, I want you to know I really like my principals, each and every one of them, I think they're very approachable, it's very fortunate, and they're good at what they do and they have the best interest of the student sos I think district 6 is very fortunate. I do have one question though, I'm wondering, and I'm going direct thu through the chair to landyn, is there any way we can make this group more inclusive because I have
2587 high schools in my district and there's only three high schools represented, so I wonder if you as a group ever considered expand sog at least one person from every high school has a voice, that way you're representing the district as a whole. landyn? thank you, MRS. Fam, for your comments. District 6 has the largest am of students that represent on the committee because I serve as the student advisor and lily serves as the sga PRESIDENT, regarding the people, regarding the students, we don't -- no board member's district has a representative from each school in their district. This is elected as a subsection of each board member's district. So we don't have a representative from each high school that makes up a committee with w the student, that's something we can look at. that's not
259in place. please, do so, I have three people from western high school, I have 7 high school ins my district, I would wrath aerz we were discussing earlier that we bring on the w et so we have more representation from all of these schools because I feel confident that any one of you could represent your high school, that we don't need three, and I would like to get other voices there. Thank you. and if I can, I just want to make sure I'm clear and thank you for what you're saying, there's one student from western that was elected to the committee televising's two student that is were elected to the committee from district 6 like every board member's district, south plantation high school and western high school, it was cypress bay high school and western
260high school televising's additional seats on the committee from members of the broward county association of students which happens to have three student from district 6, as district has one of the largest number of high schools in the district, so that's why there's that so many from western but we absolutely hear the call for a greater variety of schools and we're hoping that next year maybe that's something we can look at. certainly expand or other alternative ways, but I think it would be great to have more voices. Thank you. thank you, MS. Fam. and I just realized we did vote as a board to have the joint meetings but you're asking us for some consensus for the proposed composition and since we have many times in the past taken consensus, that's what you we're going to
261do right now waoeshltion go through the proposal here is at our joint student discussions, there will be one middle school student, one high school student, two center school student and is there will be an application process. I will go around as MS. Adams suggested to take consensus from each board member that we're okay with this proposal that they have so that they know what to do moving forward. I'll start on this end, MS. Fam?Frjts yes. MS. Bulman, good? I want to be clear on what we're voting on. we're not voting on anything, it's on consensus. can you read it. it's on page 9 of the proposal, so one middle school student, one high school student, two students from the center schools and there would be an application process and they would change every time the
262students come to us, thank you. I'm fine with the proposal. MS. Thompson? yes. MS. Alhadeff? yes. DR. Holness and MS. Rupert? yes. and MRS. Leonardi? Okay. Great. So, we look forward to the first discussion that we have. thank you again so much for coming. MADAM Chair f we MAY, I would like from MS. Brown to thank -- as you mentioned and MS. Leonardi, some of the adult sponsors who got us here today and made sure, we want to personally want to thank one of our chaperons, MR. John sullivan. he's done a great job: I I want to express my thank you for your support, without it, our department could not function as it should nor could our student advisor sos we gravely appreciate you and yes, certainly for the one who was cry yet behind
263the scenes and truly boot on the ground but allows our students to lead and speak for themselves, without intervening, and that is MRS. Senia santiago. [Applause]. She did a phenomenal job and for all the sga sponsors at each of the schools, we appreciate them and we do have one here from plantation high school, she looks like a student herself. . Er and from western high school as well. ask -- and from western, yes. [Applause]. she would blend, we appreciate all your support and cooperation, if I could quickly, I need to reiterate what landyn said about the support that is needed by you coming to the school, for the co-curricular act tits a, after school, it is what draws our students into our schools as we're talking about increasing our numbers ask that is where you
264will have true engagement with our students, when you come to them on their home turf and see them in their co-curricular activity and is interact with them or the spectators, you will definitely hear all student voices, so thank you again for your cooperation and support. thank you, we're going to take -- thank you, sorry, DR. Hepburn? if I MAY, a point of privilege because I wasn't here for the opening, so I certainly want to thank landyn and alana who I call MR. PRESIDENT and MS. Vice-PRESIDENT. MADAM Vice-PRESIDENT -- PRESIDENT And MR. Vice-PRESIDENT. you're going places, I guess that would make the rest of the advisors house and senate. We certainly appreciate all the contributions, you know, one of our efforts is to ensure all of our faculty and staff in broward county schools feel the
265importance of student voice, your contribution is from our student asks if we can listen to them, we can figure tout problems and solve the problem, if we can listen o the ones who are the one that is are going to be impacted by any decision that we make at the district level or at the school level, so we certainly appreciate your advocacy, we certainly appreciate your leadership on your campuses. Keep pushing us to do better for you. All the feedback that you provide to us is certainly a gift so we can accelerate faster to meet your needs x the continuous needs as other students are coming behind you as well. We depend on you to learn about what's going on and the nuances in our district and continue to make those improvement sos I appreciate
266all the things you do to support us as system, support all the headers of our school and is support our district leaders to continue to support you day many and day out, thank you. thank you, and we're going the take a recess, if you don't mind take ago picture with us, we would love to celebrate the fact you're here. thank you, everybody. (Meeting in recess). thank you. The next item for the workshop is policy 4000, student progression policy. Staff did a great job in the presentation they SEPTEMBER to us, I'm going to go straight to public comments and board discussion. First up for public comment iss jackie lescum. hi, jackie lescum, coral springs, I wanted to bring up two areas of -- highlight a couple of areas you MAY want to pay more attention to
267in here which is on page 5 where we're talking about k-5 students, there is a category called number 8, digital tools. And it states that curricular for students in pre-k through grade 5 must contain instruction but allowing them to attain progressively high levels of skill in the use of digital tools and am -- application and is that language has been struck through for omission, and make available materials, and software to people with disabilities, I felt that was an odd thing to be taking out and my inquiries into that went beyond yesterday's 1 P.M. Deadline for written comment which is why I'm here. [Inaudible] Told me there's a senate bill 240 that removes some of the language around digital tools with students for disabilities. I would suggest that doesn't necessssily y an wewe have to --
268in owoward, it w wou be ni to have explicit language still in the policy. She also said in reference to digital tools with a capital d and a capital t, that was remove framed the k-5 segment of this policy or proposed for removal because it is a micro credential like an industry certification that doesn't apply to elementary, however, digital tools, capital d, capital t, is just the name of the course, it doesn't mean we should be remove our commitment to providing digital tools with a lower case d and t, or digital materials to students at all levels so I think some of the language that has been struck out relating to the industry certificateion, we have swept along in that proposal to also remove language around digital materials generally and student access to them. We
269should be providing all students instruction that allows them to attain progressively higher skills and the use of digital tools and applications and I would suggest maybe in that language, it just needs a closer look before anybody agree tos strike it through. It seems a bit of a gray area in terms of how the language is phrased maybe but I think everything that's being struck through is too much to take off, thank you. thank you so much. Next up is trudy jermanovich. [Inaudible] while viewing the people progression plan requirements, I was pleasantly surprised to find that grades on report cards will finally be taken into consideration as proof that students have met requirements for promotion. I believe this as positive step to bringing the teachers' expertise back to focus. Aalong with teachers and parents all over
270social media applaud this change to count the 180 days of effort for each student. Thanks to DR. Hepburn and the curriculum staff for finally implementing this change. It was stated doctor there are some things that need to be changed ask jackie and I seem to tag team everything we do, I had many of those things in my written comment, but after listening to the ccc report this morning, we know that we still have inequality of technological resources for students. I'm concerned about the removal of requirements for teaching the use of technology and learning basic life skills, such as typing, word processing, use of a spreadsheet or presentation software. I believe these skills which should be taught to every child and not something which is a school based decision. There were changes in elementary students for
271computer skills as she said, and it went from required to optional. Digital tools were also red lined which she discussed. I have a question for everyone in the room. please raise your hand if you've ever read an entire book on a computer. I knew there would be a couple of you especially people who were there. However, how many of you have read a book on a tablet or an ipad or something like that? You're asking students to read books on a computer which is very difficult to do. Many of you here use tablets as you're doing your work. The use of correct technology is important, for instance, when you move to a total use of online textbooks, every child should have a tablet. My ipad has about 100 books on it. And documents. We need
272to go with the future and unfortunately, you have a technology department that is not dominated by teachers. It needs to be, go back to putting teachers on the technology committee in good numbers, not just to say, oh, whatever they say up top is what we'll do because we have done in this district a real disservice by only testing on computers and making kids hate them especially first graders taking tests on computers. Please, make the educators make the decision. thank you very much. Board discussion? Anybody have anything? DR. Zeman? [Inaudible]. MS. Rupert? you can go ahead. thank you so much. I understand the state law, chair, and could you tell me what changed in the state law for grades k-2 in terms of their standards for assessing -- completing a grade successfully? DR. Hepburn? staff? MS.
273[Inaudible] Is going to the answer that. aim on? -- am I on? the state has that as the requirement to add math to grades k-2, specifically in grades k-2. terrific. Do you know what the staff is recommend hating we add k-2 for those standards? Wefrjts are recommending they have three option, the first is a level 2, is tekd is a level 2 and the fast math or the fast star math, it's called star math in k-2, fast math in three and above, a level 2 in the already diagnostic 3 or record guard grades that come from assessment, projects and class work at an average of a d or higher. terrific, and chair, that will be new for our parents, right? And so there will be some degree of a requirement to start sharing that information
274as soon as possible so that parents who in broward and statewide have been predominantly, presumably, excuse me, have always been focused towards third grade where swre the first progression standards set by the state. Do you know what our plan is for sharing that information with parents? DR. Hepburn? staff? yes, once this board approve we'll be sharing with teachers for our pivot memo and through our regular channels of communication with teachers as well. . Er how are we going to do it with parents though? wae we'll be sharing it through our local communication through schools, through their updates, their nightly events, parent interim reports, report card meet advising so forth and interim. terrific. And chair, will those standards be applied k-2 for promotion or are they just standards for performance? DR. Hepburn? DR. Cohen? It is
275k-12 for promotion. terrific. that's going to be a lift on the communications side and I know that and maybe my colleagues and I will even help as much as to believe to spread the word when we go out and talk just to make sure parents are aware of that. Second issue is that if I'm correct on slide 11, staff is recommending adding math, science and social studies standards for promotion to fourth grade, is that correct, chair? DR. Hepburn? DR. Cohen? that is correct. thank you very much. I think that -- that's for all grades. yes, I appreciate that and I'm just focused on 11 as an example. I think that those kinds of changes will kind of reveal the competence we have in educating our student ins broward county traditional public schools. Chair, that is
276voluntary standard that exceeds the state level, is that correct? DR. Hepburn? DR. Cohen? yes, it taoes statutory requirement, yes, and we've added some additional components as well. We were fortunate enough to have conversation widths our peer district and is levels set as well, so yes. let me try and ask it a different way. The state mandates level 2 or above on fast p m-3 for promotion to fourth grade, it says we have to have standards for math, science and social science as well but we've defined those broward county public school staff has done that for the second, third and fourth criteria. that is correct. Thafrjt's awesome. And I think again, you know, from a competitive standpoint, we're saying while the state stet standard and said this number for that standard, we're going to go beyond
277that in setting what the actual specific standard is for the other three categories, we still have good cause criteria, there's still the whole student approach, it's very clear in our policy. I think that there's an opportunity to market that and to communicate that to people so they understand that we are not shooting for the state minimums. We're shooting for what's best for the students and best for the community and we're challenging our system because we're so confident in their performance to do above and beyond. The only one that kind of sticks in my [Inaudible] Because I was originally in favor of -- and I'll get back to hilarity, I believe grade level is our expectation or our standard even if it's not used for progression, but why, chair, do -- how do we justify to
278the community that a student who doesn't get a 2 on fast, doesn't get a 2 on I ready but get assinger d and above on ready is good for progression. DR. Cohen? tiets same criteria we use on [Inaudible] And high, so in order to make sure we bring voice and equity to use that soft term, we want to make sure that the level playing field se -- is equal. Let me just try and say that back, chair, that would be equity across grades by saying that a third grade student and an 11th grade student would both be assessed, that you would passing if you got a letter d on the scale and I've read not extensively but a good bit about the pros and cons of holding people back in grades and I appreciate that
279is relent -- real, I'm just concern wed ear telling the community that someone would has a 1 on fast math, and a d on a grade, broward county says should go forward to the next grade so I'm going throw that out. The point that I think is maybe worth considering in adding to this policy is to set either an expectation sentence or a standard sentence in the policy that says it is broward county public school's policy that the standard for educational excellence is to be at grade level or above. And I'm not asking anymore for that to be in the progression standards but I do believe that we want to tell students and parents and teachers and educators that while progression is something with pros and cons and we want kids to have the opportunity,
280you know, a child held up in third grade gets third grade again, and their growth is what it isfinger but a child that goes to fourth grade that got there without exemplary scores on standardized tests is now being challenged by fourth grade and oftentimes will rise to that challenge and we have a lot of evidence that failing to progress students by itself isn't a panacea for a long term educational achievement for a whole bunch of obvious reasons but I still think it's important for broward county schools to say our standard is grade levelfinger we MAY progress kids at 2 or even a 1, 1, or a d on their grades but our standard is to get people to grade level in order for us to define educational achievement or educational excellence, so I'll throw that
281comment out, but I believe deeply in standards and expectation and is I believe in a poz tier look on things that stretches people and says this is what we want but I know one thing for sure, that is what the community wants. The community doesn't want 12th graders graduate witching d's on their report card, they want people to graduate by their end of the experience with us at grade level and they recognize for them to be successful contributors to our advanced economy, the standards for cognitive achievement are higher than they were a generation sxag substantially higher than they were two generations ago so they're afraid of us saying we have to figure out to do better than we've done many the past. One thing to think about can we gate standard in there that our
282standard or expectation is to perform at grade level, t ur. thank you, MRS. Rupert? thank you. I had a question on page 16. There's two scenarios, are you asking -- excuse me, through the superintendent, is staff asking for which scenario that we will hone in on? DR. Hepburn? go ahead. on slide 16, MS. Rupert, scenario 1 is the standard of where we say we want everyone but if board had an appetite to increase the rigor beyond the state statute, we include a scenario 2 and said if you had a desire to look at beyond third grade reading and we're using third grade as an example because that's the grade level that retention can start. If you had a desire to look at third grade reading level 2, math level 1, level 2, that would essentially
283equate to about 7126 students all together, if we wanted to keep it where most districts have it, it would be using our numbers, 3058, then you see the other additional slides, the breakdown by demographics. and thank you for that, really it's the next two slides, 17, 18, as you go down in our subgroups or at risk student, it's horrifying and I think every year, except the last two years, I put in the superintendent's evaluation, these very same subgroups because we were woefully not reaching them, so really my question and not to be answered today would be are we going to be singing specific best strategies to reach the subgroups. What I would like to see is just a little -- I hate to say what everybody else has been saying about a breakdown of it
284but what are we doing to help increase the passing of our particular subgroups, I'm looking nar and I don't want dwrou go into major pages of it, nothing like that. looking at these year after year, I'm exhausted for the parent and is the student ins our community because we've made certainly terrific gains in the last two years, very much so, but we still have a lot of work to be tone and -- done and I would I would remiss if I didn't say that. At some point, let the superintendent guide you in this area but I think it's important for us to make sure if it's particular reading program or whatever we're going to be using is that we need something that's going to work and not two years from now but right now. Thank
285you so much. thank you. Anybody else? No one else had their hand up. Okay. So, are you asking us on slide 16 to kind of give you a consensus? yes. as to whether we want scenario 1 or scenario 2? yes. okay. So, we will again take a consensus, we're missing some people. But I'll go this way, MS. Bulman? the -- if I MAY, MADAM Chair, I want to make sure the board members are clear on their understanding of scenario 1 and 2 before we ask and we leave this room and something's implemented but there wasn't clarity, I want to make sure everybody has clarity on what the options are. DR. Cohen, if you want to give a high level view of what's 2, what's 1, what's 2, why the numberers are different. sure. So, in
286scenario 1, if we align our promotion criteria to the state and other large districts, those are the number ifs we used the same number from last year which are are a total of 140 14 thousand 254 third graders, of those 14 thousand 154, 3058 students scored a reading level 1, that's the criteria, that's the standard, that's what most districts are using. The state gives districts flexibility to adjust the standards if they wanted to in policy and make it more challenging for students. So, beyond third grade reading level is the option 2, so if the board wanted to choose third grade reading level 1 and third grade reading level 2, they could. Or they could choose in addition to that third grade math level 1 and third grade reading level 1, so we gave you all
287of the breakdown of what that would look like, so if you wanted to have a composite of one or two or expand it to a level 2 for math and reading, you could do that and so what we would be asking you is based on scenario 2, are any of those in addition to third grade reading level 1, you have a desire to add, is there an additional expectation or would you like to keep scenario 1? chair, I have a question for clarity if you don't mind. go ahead, DR. Zeman. thank you so much, my reading of the draft policy was that it was going to be at least as drafted -- so math is included in there, in the actual policy that we're bringing forward because that's not what the statute says. roger that,
288let me say the numbers back if you don't mind, DR. Cohen. Ta means that 3 thousand in last year's data, got a 1, another 2200 roughly got a 1 on math, third grade, so under the drafted policy and again this is interesting data because this is saying that when we were emphasizing ela for progression,n,ririt, 3 3 ththsand still l didn't get ththe, the y,y, e e 0000 math is but math wanted a focus of progression at this point so we MAY assume once it is equally, if both are used, that number MAY be less under a prediction, right. more or less, yes. thank you, but without that shift, 5200 or so students would -- under that criteria not be in the category for progression, they could still progress because they got a d or high
289and her they could also progress because of the good order, that's what I think is currently drafted, 5200 under the old scenario would not qualify to progress based on the fast scores? if I can clarify, to provide some additional clarity, I don't know if you can run the data real quick because some of these students MAY be duplicated, so a student MAY have a level 1 in reading and a level 1 in math, so -- I thought these were additional. it wouldn't be a total of over the 5 thousand, it MAY be 3500, it MAY be close to 4, so I'm positive many of those students are duplicates if we do reading and math. Go ahead, if you have the duplicated number. good afternoon, richard balm, direct tofr testing and research. Educational analysis research, so
290it would add an additional 600 student tos the 3 thousand. So, d almost 3700 students approximately. right. That would be the additional level 1 in math and -- reading combined. yeah. gotcha. Thanks, richie. sure. please forgive me because I just got confused. So, we are -- the statute is now requiring math as well? yes. so we have to add math? yes. okay. that's the policy we're bringing forward. so scenario 1 where we only have reading -- we really need to have math as well. yes. Tfrjt question is whether we want to have it as level 1 or a level 2. or 2. right, so if we want to elevate it. And when we're talking about a level 1, are these kids that we're not using any other criteria to potentially advance them, like, or it's
291just -- so, what are we looking for the real numbers of the people that are not going to advance? so, these are two different questions you're asking, so -- goit first -- I got the first one thing. whatever decision we make as a board, it could be 3500 students but from those 3500 students websinger go for what the plan is for good cause promotion, for example, with third grade, you have if you go to slide 11 as an example, you see criteria that teachers can use to provide additional remediation or support, so they can look at grades, they can look at portfolio and a different alternative assessment for good cause, that number typically goes down and in third grade in particular, those students have the option of going to summer experience and they can take
292another assessment. When they come bark the following yore, there's an open window where they can take an assessment within the first two week and is go on to the next grade level. There is good cause promotion level to move those students beyond the statutory test. so, when we're looking at the test grades websinger ear not necessarily looking at the number of students that are not going to progress? correct. that's just a baseline, okay, that's all I want to know. Thank you. okay, so if we can -- MADAM Chair, I have -- hold on one second. So, just to clarify the question we're asking is, it isn't really scenario 1 versus scenario 2 because you have to include math, so you're asking us do we want to make progression a level 2 or higher as a
293opposed to a level 1. thank you for clarifying hating because that wasn't really clear. DR. Holness, does your question go to this or can I get the consensus first and then go to your question. no, consensus would be depending on my inpaout just like the others gave their input. I didn't know if it was about this particular idea, so go ahead. yes, it is. So, it appears to me that if we increase the promotion criteria for third grade to a level 2 passing for math and reading, correct, then this MAY result in more students being retained or it could potentially result in a lot more students being retained considering that we're dinging math dinging -- adding math or the state is requiring math at a level 1 and reading at a level 1. What we're
294voting on here is either to choose scenario 1 or 2, 2 being we're increasing the requirement for promotion at the third grade level. Am I understanding that correctly? it's already out of 2. So, do you want to increase it to a 3? okay, if we increase it to a 3, this would then possibly increase the number of students? yes. ta are being held back? correct. so, I am not in agreement with increasing it to a 3 because now we are potentially going to have a lot more of our students being retained at the third grade level. I think what we should more focus on is looking at the initial fast tenting ets -- testing data and implement action plans so we don't have to to have our students retained. I think that would be the
295better approach. I would much rather go with the state minimum requirement, I think if we changed this to a higher requirement as district, that's going to have more students being held back and I don't think that's what we want. just because it sound -- what you said sounds different than what you said before, so I thought we were adding level 2 but you're now say weing ear at level 2 so we're adding it to level 3. That's not what you said before this. I want to make sure we're all having a discussion on the right information. So, MS. Hollingsworth? so, just for clarification right now for state statute is you have to score a level 2 to be promoted, so that's the level 1. What the ask is is that if we want to say
296you have to score a level 3 for promotions tha, would include level 1 and 2 which to DR. Holness' point could encrease the amount of retained students, that's what's on the floor. I think that makes more sense. so, MADAM Chair, can I just finalize? sure. okay. So, I'm glad that was clarified because we would have been voting on a consensus that would increase the requirement to be promoted that will potentially and likely result in a lot more students being held back. I don't that's what this district wants, so I would ra ert go with what the state has in place and we as a district need to look at our fast p m-1 data and work with the students we currently have under the state requirement to get them promoted, I think we're trying to
297reduce the kids being retained as opposed to increase that and if we go high were the requirement, it's going to increase students being retained so I don't think that's what we want to do. just to reit tait a couple of things, we're note voting, we're taking a consensus because we're in a workshop. This is going to come back to us to be voted on so I want to be clear because we've been taking again consensus for years, I don't know why it got so co-mingled here recently, but we are allowed to do that. We're take ago consensus to ask do we want to keep it as what's now a state requirement of level 2 or do we want to increase it where to be promoted, you would be a level 3. We're going to go
298around the room, you can say keep it or go to level 3. That will be the con sen sensus and then the policy will come back at a later time. DR. Holness? strongly keep it at level 2. thank you. MS. Alhadeff? I just want to state that I have no issue with us getting consensus earlier -- I needed to express how I felt about it, I had to give my input on it. That's the difference. Keep it. MRS. Thompson? keep it. I vote to keep it. MRS. Leonardi? keep it. DR. Zeman, keep it? yes. MS. Bulman? [Inaudible]. er MRS. Fam? [Inaudible]. it's grade level. DR. Hepburn? no, level 3 is the achievement score from the fast test at the end of the year, it's not comparable to a letter grade, so a level 3 for
299some of our tests that are needed for -- like for 9th and 10th graders and I forgot what a grade level in mid -- mild l school for proficiency sake, whether you're at proficiency or approaching proficiency, it doesn't have any correlation to a letter grade. [Inaudible] it's approaching, it's getting there. But the state currently only requires that a student scores a level 2 or above to get promoted to the next grade, if they score a level 1, nr's certain things we need to do and put in place to give students alternate options to demonstrate the level of learning for that grade level. [Inaudible] okay, thank you, so it seems like the consensus is to keep it at what's -- I'm sorry, I forgot to come back around. MRS. Rupert? Keeping it at a level 2,
300so the consensus is moving forward to keep it at the level 2. Did you have any other questions for us? yes. Just my proposal to add a standard that say ins our policy not related to progression but that our standard in this policy is for people to perform at grade level. I just want that sentence in there to communicate to all our educators and our parents even though we progress people, but I think it's important to tell the community even though we'll progress people below grade level proficiency, that is what our standard is. DR. Hepburn? fo go ahead, DR. Cohen. we agree with you, so we do have a document similar to what miami-dade does, they have what is the expectations for grade level standards and so we'll include that bh we bring policy back.
301terrific, then we don't need consensus. Thank you, sir. thank you, okay, thank you so much for that item and we are moving on to the last item which is rule development school board policy 5070, enrollment and withdrawal. I'm -- again, you did a great job of sending us the information so we're going to go right to public comment. Do we have public comment? he went to get the paper. do we have ten seconds? sure. I wanted to offer a perspective on us getting consensus, on my experience on boards, we get consensus for what the staff will bring us back to vote on, that's why it's not a vote, all we're doing is giving direction to the staff and saying look, there's a consensus to do 73 instead of 62 or whatever we're getting consensus on,
302that's what they bring back to us to vote on, it's totally legit, every board does it but it's not to mraik a decision, it's to give direction for what staff to sho bring forward, I want to feel good about what we're doing. thank you. And our public speaker is DR. Trudy jermanovich. my name is DR. Trudy squer man -- jermanovich, this is rule development as we had last time, I wanted to point out that I don't believe that the public has any idea what rule development means, for instance, I had to search frantically to find when we ear going to have the rule development community meeting for the last policy which is going to be next week at 6 P.M. And I don't think anybody and maybe you're going to be sending out to community
303members in some other way, but I don't think anybody know that's even going to happen, i don't want dwrou do the same thing on this one. If you're going to do a community meeting, you need to inform the community that you are changing policy in some way that gets them to understand what you're doing and on this particular policy, this MAY be even sometime for you to -- I mean, a lot -- MS. Fam's questions from earlier are in this policy, so I just wanted to point that out as well. thank you, DR. Hepburn? she'd like to speak as well. you have to have been signed up. thank you for the comments, we had a concern and there was a change mid stream we learned about as well as people in the audience on the
304last board meeting, we're trying to pivot accordingly while trying to stick to our guidelines of when things need to be posted for policy, so we're making -- we're turning the ship around trying to move in that direction from what we learned in the last meeting. thank you. Okay. I will go to board discussion. Is there anybody that has any discussion on this item? Okay. mrs. Fam? thank you, MADAM Chair. The one thing I would say on page 6, if you look, maybe it's not page 6, hold on. I'm sorry, page 5, it talks about the updated definition of address and residence and it says more than 50% of the time, and then also down here, it says if they reside somewhere more than 50% of the time, a lot of the divorce decree says 50%
305for each, so that might put you in a sticky situation where you might say, you know, pursuant to a court order or something where you don't have to make the decision where this child lives more because right now you're just saying someone has come in and kind of proved it up on their own, and I've seen that a lot, 50 and 50 kind of thing, so you might not want to land there. But your choice. DR. Hepburn? I'm going the let MR. Mr [Inaudible] Address that because we deal with the parent issues all the time, the same scenario, 50/50 shared time. thanks, DR. Hepburn, I wanted to clarify these are legal revisions that didn't make the edit the last time so the policy was voted on but there's some definitions of terms that the legal
306department updated so that's the essence of why we're here. Yeah, I appreciate the feedback, MS. Fam, and we added that in -- the legal team added that in based on the statutes but I'll bring that back for a conversation. pursuant to court order of something, something like that because someone has control over where that child goes. thank you. Thank you, MRS. Fam. I agree, I was a psoudo guidance counselor for a long time, the kids get caught in the middle, we found that with the bus issues, they're get ago bus half the time so I think as a district, we need to look at that because it's part of the reality our students live in so I would concur with that. Alright. Anybody else? Okay, thank you so much. Okay. At this time, do any
307of my colleagues have anything to bring to the board or student successes to share? DR. Holness? thank you, MADAM Chair, so, I am excited to announce my plans for this year which I call a day in the life of our employees, through our broward county public schools, during this initiative, I will assume the daily roles and responsibilities of various essential positions within the district including teachers, professionals, facilities personnel, food services, staff, bus attendants, clerical staff and other invaluable staff. My goal is to gain a deeper understanding of the daily work and challenges faced by our dedicated employees. While also highlighting the hard work and commitment of those who contribute to the success of our district. Tomorrow I eagerly anticipate gaining firsthand insight into the essential work of the facilities personnel at broward county high school.
308MRS. Alhadeff. the boys soccer team won last night, the district finals championships against boco roton high school. great job. I would have two things, one, just want to give a shout-out a lot of them left torx the ese department, on friday, they hosted a very phenomenal in-house resource fair for each other where they were able to collaborate and share resources and best practices and I have to say my favorite presentation was the slpot's and pt's, they had a taylor swift theme, they had all the pictures, the nine pictures but it was just a great opportunity for people in our ese department to talk about what they do because their services overlap and they don't often get that opportunity and they were very excited and did a great job many the presentations that they did. I
309would also just like to say today begins the 17 day lead-up to the 7th year commemoration of the FEBRUARY 14th msd shooting, I would like to ask everybody to take a moment over the next 17 day tos think of one of those victims each day and realize the loss of at pepeon to their famimily eir community d to the worlrld a whwhe.E. Ananyou. MRS. Fam? thank you, I would just like to say tomorrow morning, swiller be at the mentoring across broward partnership breakfast, if anyone here is interested in mentoring or getting more information about that, I will see you there and I hope everyone attending the id expo program this sad, it's fascinating where toppers and students combined contribute and they come up with innovative ideas that we can use in the district and it's
310really creative and original and it's definitely worth the trip. So, thank you. okay. Anybody else? Okay, the scheduled order of business for this school board workshop of the school board of broward county, florida has been completed, seeing no obligation, I adjourn the meeting. have a great day.