001[BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] >> Picture. >> Okay. [BLANK_AUDIO] >> Good morning and welcome. Please silence all electronic devices. The agenda for the school board meeting is published and available at least one week prior to the board meeting. Any member of the public who wishes to speak on an agenda item requiring board action will have an opportunity to do so prior to final action being taken. Please fill out a green speaker request card available in the lobby. During the appropriate public comment portion of the meeting, names will be called in the order in which they were received. Any member of the public wishing to speak to a non-agenda matter of relevance to the school district will have an opportunity to speak at the end of the meeting. Please fill out a pink speaker request card available
002in the lobby. Names will be called in the order in which they were received. Please note that for speakers to address the board on either agenda items or non-agenda matters, their speaker request form must be submitted prior to the commencement of public comment on agenda items. We welcome members of the public to attend our meetings and we respect the public's right to speak to the board. We appreciate your interest in Pasco County Schools. Our vision statement is all our students achieve success in college, career, and life. The thought for the day is from Mrs. Harding. >> Good morning. My thought comes from, today comes from Dr. Seuss who said, you're off to great places. Today is your day. Your mountain is calling, so get on your way. As we celebrate the graduation season and recognize
003the class of 2026, I think that quote captures this moment perfectly. Across our district, thousands of students are preparing or have walked across the stage and begin a new chapter of their lives. Some are heading to college, some to technical school, some to military service, and others directly into the workforce. While their paths may be different, they all share something in common. They've worked hard to reach this milestone. Graduation season is one of my favorite times of the year because it reminds us why we do this work, is what we hope for for every student to get across that finish line. Every graduate has a story, a challenge they overcame, a lesson that they learned, a teacher, family member, or mentor who helped them along the way. So to the class of 2026, just know
004how proud we are of you. And wherever your path takes you, remember to work hard, be kind, and be brave. Your future is bright and we cannot wait to see the difference that you make in this world. Congratulations class of 2026. >> Thank you, nice way to start the meeting Mrs. Harding. Please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance. >> I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. [BLANK_AUDIO] >> Let the record reflect that Mrs. Harding, Mrs. Armstrong, Mr. Hernandez, and Mrs. Bodwin are all present, and Mrs. Roy is an excused absence. If we could take a moment of silence, please, for personal reflection. [BLANK_AUDIO] Thank you. The draft minutes of the May
00519, 2026 board meeting and workshop were provided to board members in advance of this meeting for the review and consideration. May I please have a motion to approve the meeting minutes and workshop minutes? >> So moved. >> Second. >> Motion by Mrs. Armstrong, second by Mr. Hernandez. Any discussion? All in favor? >> Aye. >> Opposed? Motion carries. We have no special presentations this morning, so that brings us to the public hearing on the 2026, 2027 district controlled open enrollment plan. So at this time I am opening that hearing and handing this to the attorney. >> Thank you. This is to announce the public comment portion of the public hearing on the 2026, 2027 district controlled open enrollment plan. Notice of this hearing has been posted on the district website and publication of general circulation in
006Pasco County in accordance and in compliance with Florida statutes. Any members of the public who wish to be heard on the 2026, 2027 district controlled open enrollment plan are asked to complete a green speaking request card that you can obtain from the board secretary or at the entrance to the board room. When your name is called, please approach the podium and state your name and address for the record. Each speaker will have three minutes to speak on the item unless an extension is granted by the board chair. Have you received any cards? Is there anybody here today that would like to speak on this matter? There being none. >> So no vote is taken at this time, so I am now closing the public hearing on the 26, 27 district controlled open enrollment plan. I'm
007moving on to item 4.2 for those of you following the agenda. We're opening the public hearing on the 26, 27 student progression plan. Attorney Meeker. >> Thank you. This is to announce the public comment portion of the public hearing of the 2026, 2027 student progression plan. Notice that this hearing has been posted on the district website and publication of general circulation in Pasco County in compliance and in accordance with Florida statutes. Any members of the public who wish to be heard on the 2026, 2027 student progression plan are asked to complete a green speaking request card that you can obtain from the board secretary or at the entrance to the board room. When your name is called, please approach the podium and state your name and address for the record. Each speaker will have three
008minutes to speak unless an extension is granted by the board chair. Have you received any cards? I've received no cards. Is there anybody here that would wish to speak on this matter today? Okay, that being so, I will also update the public and the board as a part of the rule making process. We had a workshop after the workshop, public input, board member input. We received additional information. What's going to happen is that student progression plan is going to go back to the committee who's going to work on it, look at the language again. And then we will be filing a notice of change and having an additional public hearing on this matter. It looks to be June 16th, 2022. So this will be coming back before the board. And the public will have another
009opportunity to speak. >> Absolutely. >> So I'm going to officially close the public hearing on the 26, 27 student progression plan again. No vote is taken at this time. >> Ms. Fodwin, can I ask a quick question? >> Yes. >> The board will be made, we will know the changes that were made, right? We'll be told the change, okay. >> Absolutely. >> If there are changes. >> If there are changes, yeah. >> Thank you. Superintendent, do you have any off-agenda items? >> No off-agenda items. >> Thank you. That brings us to item 6.1, public comment on agenda items. I do not see any green cards. Do we have any green cards? >> So any public comment provided to us via the Let's Top platform will be made a part of the record. >> Thank you.
010So that brings us to United School Employees of Pasco. Mr. Larson, would you like to speak? >> Yes, please. >> Good morning. >> Good morning. I really just want to take this opportunity to congratulate everyone in the district on their hard work for the 2025-2026 school year. I am aware of the district projections regarding school and district grades, including the possibility of Pasco being in a district for the first time ever, and the projection of not having any D or F schools. And while I've never necessarily considered the state grading system to be the end all, be all way to assess schools or to assess teachers, I absolutely think this accomplishment is certainly something worth celebrating. And as Superintendent Legg said in a video that went out yesterday, credit for this kind of a successful
011year goes out to everyone in every role all across the district. Congratulations. >> Absolutely. >> Thank you, Mr. Larson. Board member committee reports. >> I had none. >> Mrs. Armstrong. >> Yes, I promised an update from the last meeting on the investment oversight committee. And I'm happy to report that Chairman Jeff Woey has agreed to stay on for another term and to serve again in the role as chairman. So we're very excited about that. So we have a full slate of members for that committee. And they'll be looking at possibly some proposed changes to our policy on investments. That's been going back to the committee after legal review. So that will be something they'll look at at the next meeting. Thank you. >> Thank you, Mr. Hernandez. >> Yes, absolutely. Thank you, Madam Chair. So
012I got an update from the foundation, which by the way, thank you, Superintendent, actually joined us at the meeting last week. But I think you guys are going to find this extremely exciting, just like I did. The foundation ended up with 190 scholarships. >> Wow. >> That equated to $430,000. In addition to that, we also have another 25 students in take stock that amounted to $200,000 in scholarships. So we totally, last year, or this year, with $630,000 scholarship for the year. So that's a fantastic accomplishment from the foundation. In addition to that, also the foundation helps supplies teachers. As you guys know, they have a supply store. And they helped 1,875 teachers this year. That equated to another $300,000. So close to a million dollars given back from the foundation to the district. >> That's
013great. >> So I just want to convey that. >> Thank you. >> Thank you. I had no committee reports, but since I am on SPP, a secondary committee, I will have one, I'm sure, next time. Thank you. Dr. Legg. >> Thank you, Madam Chair. Before we begin, I just want to do a brief recognition. We have Troop 148 here in the back. >> Let's do that, Lee. >> If they can stand up. >> [LAUGH] >> Welcome. >> Yay! >> [APPLAUSE] >> They are working on their citizenship. >> They're bad. >> They're working on their citizenship bads. They are from Kirkland K8, Pinecrest, and Waiteman Elementary School. >> Nice. >> So, middle school, I should say. Thank you for all being here today. This is wonderful. >> Yeah. >> Madam Chair, we're going to take a
014little bit of time. We want to spend a little bit of time looking at a year in review. And I want to kind of set us up why we're doing the year in review now academically. As you know, last year we did it about this time, even before graduations. Because it is, our team has put together through Otis and our academic team basically created a software system where we can see our student results really live, live feed. And Friday it was closed. While these numbers are not final, they are projected and they've been pretty close to within one one-hundredth of a point from what we saw last year of being accurate. So we feel pretty confident in knowing what we're going to get next year from the state in terms of our school grades, our
015performance, our learning gains by school. And the reason why we are doing it seems a little quick. It's imperative that we make the changes now based on the data and not wait till the state releases its reports. If we wait till when the state releases its reports, that's the end of July, mid to end of July. Takes a couple weeks to look at those numbers and make the recommendations. We're already in August and if we make any changes in August, and my boat, the train has already left the station, we want to do what we can do now to align ourselves and equip our schools and our teachers and our principals with the tools that they need going into the school year so they can have precision, they can have strategy, they can know exactly
016what their goals are at the beginning of the year and not take that first quarter to make those changes because you lose so much precious time. So we wanted to kind of give the board an overview of what we saw, what we project that will occur. And Dr. Iles gonna walk us through those results. But I wanted to, before she goes in detail over it, I wanted you just to hit a couple highlights. I wanna hit a couple highlights. Several of them that we're really proud of in our teams. And we're gonna take a moment or two to pause and reflect on those. The first kind of point that we wanna really celebrate and point on is for the first time since 2004, we are projecting no DNF schools in Pasco County. >> [APPLAUSE] >>
017That's a point of pride. And it's not about, and I visit our schools, it's not about the letter grain, it's about the students. It's about the students ensuring that we have a high quality education for all students, and it is the first step of the journey. I wanna do a special recognition and just point out that in the history of the recent letter grade formula, they change it every, seems like six, seven years, how they do the calculation. But since the recent recalculation of the school letter grade, no school in the state of Florida from what we can tell has gone from a D to an A. Here in Pasco, we had three schools that went from a D to an A that were projected to go. Golf Middle School, Golfside Elementary School, and New
018River Elementary School. We are projecting going from a D to an A rating. That is phenomenal. That is really phenomenal, the work that went into that area. We also have a school that went two letter grades and they were, it was a big lift and they stepped up to the challenge and that is Chester Taylor went from an F to a C grade this year and they really put a lot of effort in there and really had a significant improvement. Moreover, we had 17 schools that we are projecting that went to an A rated status more than last year, 17 more. 28 schools we have projected to move up a letter grade. In total, we have approximately a little over a third of our schools have improved a letter grade. The reason why I think
019it's important is important to show that our focus is on student achievement, it is on learning. And I'm happy to report from, it looks like for the first time since 2008, we're projecting that Pasco County will be an A rated school district. So we're really proud of going into that. There's a couple key levers that were pulled and we'll talk about that after Dr. Isle does her presentation but she's going to kind of go over the specific learning gains, the specific data points that I think is important for you to recognize. So you understand over the next couple weeks we will be doing some strategic moves to even move the district further but you will have some context by which we are making those strategic moves. Dr. Isle. >> Good morning. >> Good morning. I
020just want to start by acknowledging that in order to have academic success, it does take everyone as stated by Superintendent Legge. I also want to recognize Superintendent Legge and the board for putting this direction as a priority and also I want to recognize that it takes both the academic and the operation side to make it occur. And I'll just give you some examples of that quickly and that is the pod walls were from operation. Additionally, we have new schools that typically the principal is involved in. We've asked the operation side to pick it up because that principal needs to be focused on instruction. We also had a strategic move to make sure that our opportunity schools had teachers in the schools that were getting additional supplements and that's something that had to be worked out
021by the operation side as well. There's many more examples but I want to make sure that I acknowledge that. Additionally, I want to state that the data that we're going through, it's the reflection of the incredible and dedicated work that our leaders, our teachers and staff have done this year. I will agree with Mr. Larson in that teachers are putting in a lot of time and effort and it is paying off. I'm hearing that their feelings are we put a lot of work in, it's been hard work, the students are also putting in hard work and it's paying off. And so ultimately, as Dr. Leich stated as well, it's not about a test score but it is about student success and it is about making sure that doors are open for our students. I also
022want to recognize that we have seen gains both in Pasco County and the state as a whole and so when we go through this data, you're going to see the impact at both Pasco County level as well as the state level. I'm going to go ahead and just start with the overall district trend information to start with. This is how the district grade is calculated. There are 12 different elements to it and I will again echo the sentiment that the superintendent stated. We really do need to think Bob Leffingwell and his team because this data would not be available without him and it has had a huge impact on our system. And so ultimately, if you look at the last line in 2026 and you just look at our proficiency areas, their grade, ELA, math
023and science, you will note that all of them had hit 60% proficient or higher. That is the first time that we have had that happen in some time. Additionally, you will note that one of our focus areas was middle school acceleration. You will note that it went from 63 percentage points in 2025 to 2026, 82 percentage points. This is the result of our focus on making sure that students that had a level 3 in seventh grade math were placed in Algebra 1. I know that you got many emails in regards to that and ultimately what I want you to know is that we maintain keeping 95% of those students in place and gave them an opportunity to be successful on that assessment which led to that point increase. I also want you to note on
024this slide, I have included the percent tested for each year. The system is able to go back in and look to see what is the percent tested that we have had for the past three years and for each year we have hit 98%. We definitely strive to make sure all students are tested but ultimately we know in some respect some students are not there. They don't make it to make up days. But historically we have tested the same percent of kids as we have in the past. You will also see that in 2024 our overall point percentage was 59%. 2025 it was 62%. By the way in 2025 in order to receive an A as a district it was a 64% that was needed. In 2025 a 65% was needed and you will see that
025we are estimated at a 67.1%. Additionally we have 1% of our students not included in this data and that is the students that are taking the Florida alternative assessment. That data will be brought in in June and we will see some tweaks on it potentially but even with a 1% we can still see that we are definitely above the A rating. I'm going to go to our proficiency pieces and look at this information by the subject area and the grade level. We are going to start with K-2 ELA proficiency. It is important that we look at this because we have to understand where we are at presently so we know where we need to go next. We have had a focus in K-2 on UFly in our classrooms. You will note that on this slide
026to the left in blue is Pasco County's data. To the right in red is the state's data. You will also see that 2024% proficiency is included, 2025 and 2026. If you at any point see a number in red on the Pasco County side that means it is below the state average. So again if you see it in red it means it is below the state average. What you will note through K-2 ELA proficiency is that we are above the state average in all of our areas and in general that is 3-4 percentage points. We have maintained being at the state average or above for the past several years. I'm going to go ahead and move to the third through 10th grade for ELA proficiency. I do want you to know that there was a focus
027increase in adding reading text to our students curriculum and that included best text. It also for elementary included the use of New Zella which is a nonfiction science text in elementary to support the reading as well. And so you do see some red numbers in Pasco right now. What I want you to make note of is look at the number of red numbers which means they were below the state in 2025 and compare that to 2026. And so ultimately what you will see is that all of our grade levels in ELA, third through 10th or at 60% proficient or higher with the exception of fifth grade. The fifth grade cohort was 2% points below the state and ultimately overall as a whole though we have seen an improvement in ensuring that our students are being
028successful on those benchmark standards. I also want you to note when you look on this, so if you look -- if we just look at that fifth grade cohort, if we go back to when they were in third grade in 2024, they were at 53% proficient in 2024, 2025, they were at 54% and at 2026 they were at 59%. So that cohort overall has grown over the years. I also want you to note that with your 2026 data, in all cases it's a higher percent proficient than what we had in 2025. And so you see cohort increases, you see grade level increases across the board for ELA. So we're going to go to K-2, math proficiency. I do just want to remind you that we made substantial changes to math last year. If you remember
029we did a new math adoption, we also brought out a new progression for math placement. And so you will automatically note in K-2, automatically we are in the mid to high 60s for proficiency in K-2 math. You will also see that's a big difference from last year where we were below the state in kindergarten and first grade. We go on to third through eighth. You do see a lot of red in this area. And so I want to discuss this a little bit more at length. And I'm going to do so by going to the next slide which actually shows some growth. So third through fifth grade overall, while they are below the state, I want you to notice the growth that they had for each of the years. Third grade had a growth of
030four points whereas the state had a growth of three. Fourth grade had a huge growth of 13 points whereas the state had three. And then fifth grade had a growth of two where the state had five. So you can again see that the fifth grade cohort has been a bit more of a struggle for us this year. But overall while we are still below the state, we are making growth towards being more successful. Additionally you'll see the state has gone up as well. And so we're trending in the direction although we have not met it as of yet. In sixth grade I want to talk about the middle school curriculum. So sixth grade you will see that we went up one percentage point from last year in sixth grade math. I want to remind you
031that this year we put all of our students level two or higher in our advanced sixth grade math. And so even with pushing higher math on students, we were able to maintain our percent proficient and actually go up by one percentage point. We're still two percentage points below the state in that area. It gets a little concerning as you move forward if you just look at the numbers and you don't know the story behind the numbers. And so our math progression had some major changes last year in the sense that if our sixth grade advanced students were ready to move on, they went into the eighth grade math course. So if we look at that sixth grade cohort that was at 57% proficient in 2025 and we actually moved to the eighth grade math course,
032you will see it's at 66% proficient. That's really the track that they took and so we are seeing an increase overall with that. So even though you go from sixth to seventh, you will see it would have been at 57 to 38. It's a little bit different for us with these numbers because the students that were placed in the seventh grade math course were level one and level two students. So the success with that is that 38% of the students were proficient and they were not proficient previously. And so you really have to be able to look at that and understand that. And then you will also see with our algebra, we have implemented that we want all students in middle school to get to algebra. We also put every student that middle school acceleration
033where they made a three in the seventh grade math, we put all of those students into algebra and overall even though the algebra includes both ninth grade and middle school, we saw a six point increase in algebra. It was one percentage point below the state. But it's showing that we gave kids the opportunity and they could do it. Correct. That's what I... And so we have geometry and you will see for geometry, we are above the state level with 57% proficient. We go on to the science area. What you will note, we're going to go ahead and start with the fifth grade. You will remember that when progress monitoring one came out, I was very concerned about the data and what it showed. At that time, progress monitoring one, we were 10 points behind where
034we were in 2025 for progress monitoring one. Which would automatically say that for the 2025 data for fifth grade science, you could easily predict a 39% based on that progress monitoring one data. Ultimately, the curriculum team was asked to relook at and revamp the science curriculum. What we recognized at that time is that our teachers were asked to adopt two new adoptions both in science and in math and it was a heavy lift. And so we did provide lesson resources and it was up to the teacher whether or not they wanted to use it. Overall, I will state that the teachers responded positively to having that provided to them. And ultimately, while we're below the state, we have definitely closed that gap in being closer to the state and we are significantly higher than last
035year. I will also state that in the past with science, you could oftentimes see a dip in science and it was not necessarily focused on as much. And I believe it was stated earlier by one of the board members, but we do focus on all subject areas. We do teach them all. We need kids to build up their academic success so that they can be successful later. Additionally, for eighth grade, you will see we are above the state in that area. And for biology, we had a proficiency of 74% in biology. We go on to social studies. You will see that civics had an 83% proficiency and U.S. history had a 75% proficiency. And for both of those, we are above the state average. And now I'm going to get to some of the fun
036stuff overall. It's important to know where you are as a district to see the trends overall when all the schools are grouped together and how we're performing. But ultimately, we've had a lot of success with schools this year with overall 47 schools receiving an A grade. So we're going to go ahead and we're going to start with our opportunity schools. Our opportunity schools, as Dr. Legg stated, have all raised to a C or higher. Yes, you can. And Madam Chair, if you don't mind, I wanted to take a moment and just say how important this was. This was probably one of the most important objectives that over the last 18 months that we focused on was ensuring that all students, no matter where you live in Pasco County, you have an opportunity to go to
037a high quality school. And that's, you know, and that was kind of our first and foremost priority. And I want to thank the board and the team for allowing us to do some structural changes as well. As you know, last year we realigned how we organized support to our schools. We divided the county in half with our assistant superintendents in East and West, middle school and high school. But then what we also did is we had a specialized team that just focused on opportunity schools. That was what they did, laser focused on the schools in order to give them support. And I just thought it was appropriate at this time, just for a moment, to recognize them. They were behind the scenes doing the work, helping support the principals, the teachers in the school to
038help really kind of correct the ship in terms of these opportunity schools. If we could just have a moment, I would like Dr. Rafalski and the opportunity team just to recognize them. Dr. Rafalski led the effort with our opportunity schools. And if you don't mind, maybe you could just introduce your team real quick on the opportunity schools and their roles. [Applause] >> [Inaudible] [Applause] >> [Inaudible] [Applause] >> Thank you all. >> Thank you so much. [Applause] >> Obviously, it's the principals, the teachers, the custodians, the security, everyone working together. But sometimes our team, the team members get, they quietly work behind the scenes. I just want to take a moment to say thank you to them. That was a huge objective. But the work's not done. I mean, we're not disbanding the band. So we're
039looking at what's the next challenge before them for next year. And they're going to be back for an encore. So -- but I wanted to recognize that. Dr. Raunes. >> In addition to the opportunity schools, we did have 29 schools that increased a letter grade. We did have five schools that went down a letter grade. I do want to also speak to the organizational piece in that the school assistant superintendents, by them having the direct alignment with the curriculum executive director and having a curriculum team, what it allowed is it allowed for schools that were struggling to receive additional support from our traditional school superintendents as well. And so truly, as I started off talking about it being a full focus on academic success, it has taken every team, every district staff member, every school
040team, every teacher, every leader to say we're going to be better this year than we were last. And ultimately, it has paid off. I do have overall -- the overall grades as a whole. This does not include charter schools. But a couple of points that I want to point out is we have 38 As this year. 17 of those are improvements from last year. In the B area, we have 12. Seven of those are improvements from last year. In the C area, we have 32. Five of those are improvements from last year. Additionally, while it's not recognized in the school grades, overall, we had a lot of schools that bumped up their letter grade but stayed within the same letter grade. Two that come to mind are Gulf Highlands and San Antonio Elementary. San Antonio
041Elementary, I had text Scott Atkins when his ELA scores came out because he saw a huge improvement there. And he literally texted back to me and said, "I've got to hit 60 in science." He was at 56. And so it's just -- for leaders, they've been working hard and have been really doing everything they can to push academics within their schools. I will also state that when I talked to Paul Lipinski, who is at Cruz Lake Middle School, what he stated to me is an interesting statistics. I went back and I verified it. He said it's been 14 years since a title one middle school was a B school. Wow. It's another success most definitely. And then I will ultimately end with the goal is always progress. And ultimately we've had progress and we still
042need to push that moving forward. >> And Madam Chair, and I just want to kind of thank Dr. Ile for her leadership in this. It takes intentionality to move it forward. I just want to say thank you to her and their team for doing this and all the assistant superintendents. But also I'd like to just put on the end of what she said there. We're not done. And I say that as something that we have a lot more to do. And while I am very optimistic with our scores and we're pleased with year one, but if you look at the number of C schools that we have, we have too many. We have too many. And our goal is to decrease that by moving them up. There are many of these schools on here that
043we feel we can be moving them up. And we will have, we are doing strategies. We're looking with our teams to see how can we assist in improving those academics in those areas. You know, I'll kind of say the quote, and it's a little, you know, half full quote, but it's true. It's by C.S. Lewis. And it says, "Sometimes the reward for doing one task well is to be set with a harder and a better one before you." It was a job well done this year, but we have a lot more work to do. We have a lot more work to do. And it's not because of letter grades. It's because every student in every school deserves a high quality education. So you know, while we were able to achieve a couple of our objectives,
044we have a lot more objectives to go. But that's kind of the update. You're going to be seeing some strategic moves over the next two weeks to address some of these areas that we want to do. But the reason why we're doing them and doing them early is to allow that time to implement before August. Dr. Legg, if I may, I do have some remarks I'd like to make, but I appreciate all the data. I appreciate the way it's going to be used for future plans. And I've been calling a couple of principals, and they have overwhelmingly said how helpful it is. One of them yesterday said, "Colleen, have you seen that dashboard? Have you seen how helpful it is with their planning all year?" They've been laser focused, but this year it was a
045lot easier for them to do it. Having that, so that is amazing. So thank you. And I want to congratulate the team, everyone. Our leadership, this leadership team has been extraordinary, and the entire Pasco County family. It's a tremendous accomplishment and a big win for our students, our employees, and our community. I had every confidence that we were going to see great strides this year, and these results reflect remarkable progress. As we review this data, I know we all recognize that behind every data point is a student, a teacher, a school leader, a support employee, and a family. And these results represent countless hours of hard work, dedication, and a shared commitment to helping students succeed. And I am grateful to everyone who played a role in making this happen. Recently, we've spent a lot
046of time discussing the data and how it reflects, relates to staffing. And one of the most significant changes we've seen is the reduction in our teacher vacancies. At the start of the 2022-2023 school year, before we had the salary referendum, we had 314 teacher vacancies. At the start of this year, that number was down to 55, which was more manageable. But this is not -- this is more. This is more than just filling positions. It's not about just filling positions. It's about having highly qualified, certified teachers in every classroom every day working with our students. And teacher quality has a direct impact on student achievement, and I believe that the salary referendum has helped us attract and retain the talented educators that our students deserve. I want to thank the voters of Pasco County for
047supporting the salary referendum in 2022. Today we're seeing the results of that investment. These gains didn't happen by accident. They happened because our community chose to invest in the people who make student success possible. While we should absolutely be celebrating today, we also know our work is not finished. We must continue building on this momentum. We can't afford to go backward. So as voters can consider the salary renewal in this November's election, I hope they look at these results and recognize the return on their investment. Investing in our teachers, our staff, and students is one of the most important investments we can make for the future of Pasco County. These results show what is possible when a community comes together to support its schools. I hope our community continues that commitment by voting to renew
048the referendum so we can continue raising achievement and creating opportunities for our students. So thank you all so much. I second all your remarks. Madam Chair, I have no doubt we would not have been able to achieve this as a community if it wasn't for the voters believing in education. I believe the people of Pasco County deeply are committed to education. I think you couldn't have said it any better. This is a direct result of the investment of our community into education by doing that. We cannot afford to go backwards. Our kids deserve high-quality education. This is a direct result of us being able to recruit high-quality teachers. We could not have done that without the voters doing that. So well said. Thank you. Are we making our comments about this now? We're waiting until
049our board member report because I also had comments on this. Go ahead. I think go ahead. Okay. Well, I'm reiterating some of the things that you said. This happened because thousands of people came together with a shared commitment to our students and I cannot even begin to describe how proud I am of our hard-working teachers, students and staff. Our teachers have poured their hearts into their classrooms. This happened because support staff, administrators, families and students showed up every single day ready to do the work. And this happened because people believe that every child deserves the opportunities to succeed. As it was quoted in the newspaper, this is one of my favorite quotes that I read, "I believe the kids just needed to know that we believed in them and that they're capable of great things.
050They can do it and this is proof." Thank you, Superintendent and to your staff for your leadership and for your hard work. And this kind of echoes what Mrs. Bodwin said, "This success reminds us that when we invest in our students, support our educators and work together towards a common goal, incredible things can happen. The progress we celebrate today is proof that what can happen when we keep students at the center of every decision." So I'm just so grateful and thank you to all our teachers and everyone involved. Yes, thank you. We have no expulsion recommendations. That is nice. That's great. Yeah, it brings us to the beginning. Consent agenda. Any board member? Madam Chair, if you don't mind, I think Mr. Shibley still has an update. Oh, I'm so sorry. I turned my page.
051I skipped everything else. We were so happy. I thought we were just so excited by Dr. Ile. I'm so excited. Usually she's the last one. I'm sorry. I skipped all the other assistant superintendents. It's because we made comments. We went out of order too. The superintendent did call up Dr. Alford. Mr. Shibley, I'm sorry. And just to kind of piggyback a little bit, today was the day that we wanted to bring the board a recruitment update and kind of send the links on in HR in terms of where we are for the '26-'27 school year. HR has pretty much made that full transition into the recruitment efforts for next school year. I did want to highlight that as of their final staffing report for '25-'26, the district was down to 47 classroom teacher vacancies, and
052that represents less than 1% vacancy rate for that group. We are confident that that is more reflective of just the standard turnover that you see in a large organization than really an indication that we have any systemic vacancy issues there. Transportation recruitment is continuing for both the summer and the upcoming school year. They actually ran a recruitment event in May thinking about the fact that we're trying to hire in May for people that won't start working until August and had a great turnout and great results even for a May event. >> That's great. >> Yeah, those efforts are continuing. Focusing both on district-wide and also those geographical and job-specific targeted events. So they're trying to hit both of those areas. HR is also assisting student services in ESC with screening and approving ESC teachers and
053ESCIA candidates for the available positions that we have. And once we can get a clearer picture of the budget situation for next school year, we will go back and look at some of those targeted areas, specifically the self-contained ESC classrooms that still seem to be the pain point in terms of recruitment and retention of teachers. So that will remain our focus. As Mrs. Bodwyn mentioned, I would be remiss if I didn't connect the successes that we've had to hiring and retaining staff to that salary referendum that has really allowed us to improve salaries beyond the traditional salary schedules that we have approved. I did place on the dais for all of the board members a copy of this year's hiring timeline, including the hiring activities for next year that actually started back in February. >>
054Oh, that's great. >> So a lot has been happening to this point. Back in April, we did actually institute an instructional and SRP freeze so that we could review next year's allocations and begin the summer transfer processes. I'm happy to report that the instructional freeze has been lifted. All of the teachers that required placement have received their placement, and schools are rapidly in process of filling any remaining vacancies they have for next school year. The SRP freeze has been lifted with the exception of five areas of assignment that HR is still finalizing and we hope to have that process done as well. I know we're going to be talking about allocations a little bit later in the board meeting, and I know there's always concern when you are approving a fewer number of allocations than
055you had in the prior year that folks are going to be without a position. But we are strongly confident that based on the situation that we're in right now that anyone who wants to continue to work for Pasco can continue to work for Pasco, and the few that are still on those placement lists we hope to have resolved soon. And so with that being said, I will kind of turn to the agenda items that we have unless the board has any questions. I know Mary is here. I think she's in the back, so I would be remiss if I didn't acknowledge the hard work that she and her team do all year long to try and keep us staffed up with those high quality employees. >> I know we all appreciate the efforts and see
056the work being done, and I'm glad that the teachers are all placed now so they can go into summer break and know where they're going to be next year. >> Absolutely. >> Thank you for working on it. >> That's always our priority is for folks to try and leave knowing what is in store in the upcoming year, for sure. >> That's important. Thank you. >> There is an addendum to item 11.1 that has been uploaded into the agenda for the board's consideration. In addition, there are two additional items that I have in the packet. 13.2 are the district and school allocations for next year. As I referenced earlier, there is a reduction going into next year, but this reduction is really reflective of the change in student population. I believe the board is aware that
057we have been trying to keep up and make those adjustments to allocations as we've seen student numbers fluctuate so that we're not trying to make large adjustments or multi-year adjustments in a single year. So these allocations that are being presented to the board are reflective of the current year formulas which are identical to the prior year formulas. So we didn't really change any of the staffing models or formulas that we used to staff classrooms. We simply plugged in the new student enrollment projections and modified the staffing formulas based on enrollment projections. So all of this was expected and as I mentioned, those folks who were impacted have been or soon will be placed in other positions within the district. I also want to point out that if you look at those staffing formulas, you will
058see that reductions are across the district. They are at all levels of the organization. It does impact teachers. It does impact non-instructional. It does impact administrative. So there are reductions at all levels of the organizations. It's not just school. It's not just district. It is really spread evenly and proportionally across the system with those units. And finally, we had to make some slight corrections to the allocation formulas. It does not actually increase the budget or the district's liability. It actually just makes sure that the formulas are reflective of what is in current allocations. So nothing was actually added or deleted. It was just updating those formulas to make sure that they are precise with what has been going on in schools and what we anticipate to happen in schools next year. Thank you. Thank you.
059Ms. Taylor? Nothing today. Thank you. Thank you. Deputy Superintendent Coon? Nothing this morning. Thank you. Dr. Iles, Deputy Superintendent Coon. Yes, I'd like to ask Melissa Musselwhite to come to the podium. This past year, we've had student Congress that has focused on the importance of preventing vaping. And she's going to talk a little bit about that as well as our community partners that are here with us today. Good morning, Madam Chair, Board members, Superintendent Legg and Attorney Meeker. We are proud to highlight the Escape the Vape initiative. It was a student-driven effort focused on increasing awareness and prevention of youth vaping across our schools. Some of you may have attended student Congress this past year, and you would have seen that take place. Joining us today, we have our partners from Tobacco Free, Florida, including
060Aspen Wellful, Area Director, and Jewel McNaughton, Community Engagement Manager, who has collaborated closely with our student support programs and services team to empower this work in our schools. We are also excited to have some student representatives here today. We have representatives from Wendell Quinn Technical High School, Angelina Academy of Innovation, and there may be a couple others that might have snuck in with the team, and you'll get to meet them. Additionally, we have a teacher joining us from Wiregrass Ranch High School, Nat Finkel, and she facilitates, I'm sorry, he facilitates the student Congress and will help share firsthand experiences and the impact the efforts have had among our schools. So at this time, I want to invite Jonathan Chason up to senior supervisor of student support programs and services, and he will also invite our
061partners and student representatives up to share some more information. Thank you. You guys can come join me. All right, well, thank you. We're excited to share some of our alignment and work we've done in schools this year. We tackled the strategic goal, which focuses on understanding vaping, and not so much from adults, but really empowering students to take ownership of educating their peers on the dangers of vaping. And there's a couple different ways they do that. One of the ways is through student Congress. Another way they do that is through our SWAT clubs, which is students working against tobacco, and we'll have the students talk about that. They're working a little bit. And then we'll share some of the highlights of SWAT and student Congress this year. So on that, I'm going to talk a
062little bit about SWAT and allow some of my partners here to share some of their own personal experiences. But SWAT is a statewide youth organization. Again, we're trying to empower our youth to stand up and do something against vaping because we know this is a massive issue in our communities, in our schools, and they own this initiative. So with that, I'm going to have Jewel introduce some of our students who are with us. And Jewel is one of our community partners who helps run our SWAT clubs. Good morning, everyone. Good morning. Thank you for having us. I have Kaylee DePaz. She's with Wiregrass Ranch, and she's been with our SWAT club for three years. So she's my senior speaker. Then we also have Nate Finkel. He's at Wiregrass Ranch High School. We have Coach Greg
063Finkel, who has been facilitating the SWAT club at Wiregrass Ranch. We also have here Caitlin Graham. She's over at Angelina Academy of Innovation. And her two youth, we've got Quinn and Chloe, right? So you've got one. Come on, Kaylee. Come on, Kaylee. You know your group. Kaylee's giving you the chance to talk a little bit about SWAT and what she's done over her years. Good morning. So public speaking is very big for us in SWAT. Kaylee has gone through really big training a couple of months back, and I just pushed her up here because I know she can do it. No pressure, Kaylee. No pressure at all. I know. I'm chill. I'm chill. I'm good with a bigger group of people than I am a smaller group. I just don't really know what I'm talking
064about. I guess I'm just talking about what I do. Okay. So I would say at least twice a month, my school goes down to our cafeteria, as you can see in that picture. It's not a lab rat day. We just inform our students. We have some candy just for them to listen to us talk for like two minutes. And a lot of them go bring their friends. They're like, "Let's go get candy. Let's go get candy." And they end up learning a lot of different things. And we also do, what's the seatbelt thing? Battle of the Belts. Yeah. They do that as well. What I will share is Kaylee has become my leader in Pasco County. Don't let this fool you. She has done amazing things in our county regarding SWAT. She comes with me
065to the east side whenever we go to the east side at the Boys and Girls Club, Zephyr Hills. Kaylee is that individual that comes with me. She brings me everywhere. Next we're going to have Nate is going to share a few things about when he's done at his school. Good morning, everyone. So at my school, which is Virogas Ranch High School, I've been serving as the president of our Students Against Destructive Decisions Club. We've been attending the monthly, quarterly Student Congress meetings going over things relating to the Escape the Vape campaign, which is just something that we wanted to join in, like an adjunct link to all the other great things that SAD is already doing. We work in coordination with Ms. Jewell and SWAT to put together different creative campaigns to spread the message
066about fighting against vaping, which is obviously becoming a very big issue in our schools. That includes what we chose to do, which was a short film, which was just a very creative, fun thing that we did. I got to direct it. We had a couple. We had help from our theater teacher. It was just a very short thing that we put up. We put it up on Instagram, social media. It was a detective film, and they were looking to stop the vape, which was like a villain in the film. Then, obviously, there was also the educational aspects at the end of the video, things like that. We accompanied that with a graphic design contest. So we actually got people in the community active in it, gave some prizes for people to make posters sort of
067things, or graphic designs to have online. We distributed those to spread the message farther, get kids involved personally. As a whole, we wanted to target certain areas of the school where vaping was important, like a big deal. Obviously, the bathrooms were the biggest thing. You would see in the video, you find the villain in the bathroom, and then he kind of escapes, and then you find him in the halls, and things like that, things that were obviously relevant. We took into consideration while we were making the projects. This is also something that we definitely look forward to continuing. Obviously, I'm going to be graduating this year, but sad is very involved with this program and with SWAT as well at our school. We hope to continue that in the future for sure. Thank you, guys.
068Thank you for your effort. Just building a little bit, explain a little bit for Student Congress this year, we challenged all our middle and elementary schools to create campaigns to raise awareness against the dangers of vaping and really empowered them to come up with their ideas. So at his high school, they had a wonderful video that was shared out, and some others will talk about what they did at the middle school and the high school level. Good morning. Good morning. My name is Chloe. This is Quinn. We are members of the SWAT club and Student Congress at Angelina Academy of Innovation. Today, we'd like to share what the SWAT club and Student Congress mean to our school. The SWAT club is more than just a club. It's like a project that makes a difference in
069our school and community. This year, our Student Congress project was called the Escape the Vape. We took everything we learned at Student Congress and brought it back to our SWAT club and our peers. At Angelina, we created our own anti-vaping campaign to educate students about the dangers of vaping. We encouraged our peers to make healthier choices by not vaping. We are proud of the knowledge that we gained from Student Congress and how we're able to use it to help support the people at our school. Thank you for listening. Thank you. Thank you for your work, everyone. And with that, we can see some of the pictures of some of the different projects that occurred throughout the district that we're very proud of. And we're going to continue this work into next year, also folding in
070mental health, social media, and its involvement with, of course, vaping as well and all the other dangers that are online that allow. So, again, thank you for giving us this chance to share some of the hard work. Thank you. We have a question from Mrs. Armstrong. Yes. Really, it's a comment. I just can't say enough for the student groups like SAD and SWAT and everything that the schools do. The peers, you have the best track record of influencing other peers. So I just go back to when we were trying to make all our schools smoke-free and SWAT and the other team groups really stepped up at that time to make that happen. So I just have all the faith in the world that you're going to be able to do the same thing with vaping.
071So thank you for all your hard work. >> Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Thank you. [ Applause ] >> Mr. Dunn is trying to get a picture of everyone. [ Inaudible ] >> Thank you for your continued work. [ Inaudible ] >> Hi, can you go in the center? >> There you go. >> I'm good. I'm good. >> Thank you. >> Thank you all. Have a great summer. >> Appreciate it. >> Have a great summer. >> Thank you. >> Okay. Now I'm back on schedule. I turn the page too soon. I apologize. So again, we have no exposure recommendations which right now brings us to the consent agenda. Does any board member have anything they want pulled from the consent agenda? Okay. Then I need a motion to approve the consent agenda and all
072consent agenda items including agenda or revisions as recommended by the superintendent. >> Move for approval. >> Second. >> A motion to approve by Mrs. Armstrong. Second by Mrs. Harding. All in favor? >> Aye. >> Opposed? Motion carries. It brings me down to, wow, all the way to number 70. We have no items removed. We have no miscellaneous action items. So we are at number 17. So Mrs. Harding, would you like to start with your board member report? >> Sure. Yeah. I don't know if I thought of the day but it's here. Graduation season has officially arrived and last Thursday Pasco County Schools kicked off our first graduation of the season and I had the honor of being there to celebrate. I know Mrs. Armstrong was there as well. Marchman graduated 160 students and it was
073a beautiful ceremony filled with so much pride, excitement and hope for the future. One of the highlights of my night was seeing my not so little third grader, Alex, graduate. I was also so incredibly proud to celebrate our Phoenix Ryse students. Two graduates are moving directly into careers in cosmetology and HVAC and a little bit of background on that program if my peers don't remember. But those students, there was five this year and they get to go into the different programs at Marchman and kind of test the waters and then they apply. And then if they don't get -- they don't get accepted into the program, they get put on the waiting list and we help get them employment somewhere. So it's a really great program. This was the very first group in this program
074and I've been honored to serve such a -- to play such a small part in their journey. So watching them walk across the stage was truly inspiring. So congratulations to the class of 2026 and I can't wait to see all that you accomplish. I also had the opportunity to attend the Lecuche Elementary School's fifth grade celebration. It's always such an honor to go there. They always do such a beautiful job at making this day so special for the graduates and their families. They have their little fifth grade celebration and they have lunch for the families. And this year they had it at the Boys and Girls Club so they could have more family members and community members come. So it was big. It was quite -- it was beautiful. So I want to thank them
075for always including me. Congratulations. I'm so proud of you and I know that you can continue to do great things as you head off to middle school next year. That's it. >> Thank you. Mrs. Armstrong. >> Yes. As Mrs. Hardy mentioned, I did attend the graduation for Marchman Technical College. And it's so fun to see people graduating, adults graduating from these programs. That's really going to give them a brand new career. And the reasons for doing it vary so much for wanting to step up for their children, wanting to step up for their families. I also had the pleasure of presenting four different scholarships for Rotary. So that's just to go to remind us of all our community partners out there that do provide scholarships for our students. So it's -- we want to say
076a big thank you to all of them. And also just a big congratulations to all the graduates. Please don't forget your roots. Please come back to Pasco. And also please remember to appreciate your families that helped you get to where you are and the best of luck in the future. Thank you. >> All right. Thank you, Madam Chair. Okay. So as we wrap up the year, I want to thank everyone at the district, first and foremost, for their hard work, dedication to each other, to the students, and our district as a whole. I also, since unfortunately I'm not going to be able to attend graduation this year, I do want to send a quick message to our graduating class. I want him to dream big, work hard, stay humble, and never stop learning. The future
077is yours to shape it. So congratulations. And I know that there was a lot of discussion and acknowledgment about, you know, our letter grades and what they have accomplished and what we all have accomplished. But although as it was mentioned several times, it's not about the A letter, as the superintendent mentioned it, you know, going from D through A to F to C, that's a huge accomplishment that should be celebrated and admired. A lot of hard work obviously got into it. As Dr. Ayo mentioned, you know, it is about student achievement. It's extremely proud to be part of this district. And quite honestly, I'm extremely proud of each and every one of you for your accomplishment, your leadership, as well as everyone that got involved, because this is not an easy task and you should
078all be acknowledged that and you should be celebrating. So thank you. You've earned it. Lastly, I love the vision, by the way. The goal is always progress because that's true, right? Can't stop. Progress is what defines it. And as the chair mentioned, this is why the salary referendum is absolutely huge. It's not just about us. It's about, you know, our children and quite honestly, it's about our future. So thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you, Mr. Hernandez. Thank you, Mr. Dunn, for having these pictures. I really like it. I appreciate it. So this is such a wonderful time of year. The last couple weeks have we all been going to lots of events. We celebrated the outstanding Land O'Lakes High School International Baccalaureate, class of 2026, at their senior commendation ceremony on May 21st. The students
079and families have a lot to be proud of. I also got the opportunity to attend the Growler Awards at Cypress Creek Middle and also went to Cypress Creek High School the next night. And that's where student athletes and coaches were recognized for their accomplishments. I also had the pleasure of spending time at Warrior Grass Elementary School last week. The kindergarteners and first graders were doing projects about sea animals and making Father's Day cards. The fourth graders were participating in Market Day. And the reason I'm saying this is because, you know, we've all -- and I know I've really banged the drum on learning up until the last day of school, and there was learning taking place, so I was very pleased to see it. The fourth graders were doing a really cool project. They were
080participating in Market Day. And that was a culminating activity of weeks of work. They had read a book that inspired their entrepreneurial spirit. Families worked together to create a product to sell. They made a marketing plan. They advertised. They determined a price. And then they made adjustments on the price because I said, "Why do you have prices crossed out and change?" And they said, "It's based on supply and demand." When they had people coming through if it wasn't selling or it was selling fast, they made adjustments. So on Thursday, they had set up those shops to sell their products, and then they got to go shopping with the money -- not real money. It was money they earned by displaying different attributes, like having good attendance, having positive behaviors, among other things, good grades. So
081it was a great day of learning by doing, and the students were engaged, and they were happy to be there, and the teachers were saying, "Everyone's in school. I only have one absent." And she made a point to tell me they only had one absent, and that student was out of the country. But all the rest of them were there. So we also celebrated, which is what I was originally going there for, the fifth graders, where they had a special luncheon to wish them continued success in middle school. I also got to spend the last day of school at Pine View Elementary. They were hosting a senior clap-out for the Land O'Lakes High School class of 26 students who had attended Pine View L. And I know that several of our schools do this across
082the district, but I believe it's the first time we've done it at Pine View Elementary. So this is a new tradition, and it was very nice, and the leaders -- the Pine View leaders set up treats, and they brought out old yearbooks for students to look through. But what I think that those Land O'Lakes High School class of 26 students liked the best was they all wanted to -- they ignored the snacks, and they just wanted to go visit their teachers. So they were going -- they said, "Can we go visit our teachers? Can we go --" So that's really what they wanted to do. And then at the end of the day, I was able to join the teachers and staff at Pine View Middle to send off the students and wish them a
083happy summer as the buses pulled away. So that was a nice way to end the year. Yesterday, I attended Pasco eSchool's graduation ceremony. It was fantastic. So congratulations to the 2026 Ninjas, and I'm looking forward to the rest of the graduations taking place over the next several days. To our teachers and staff, as you head into summer, I want to give you a huge thank you. You've celebrated victories. You've tackled challenges. You've lifted up students when they needed it most, and you created memories that will last a lifetime. The impact you make reaches far beyond the classroom, and our community is better because of you. I hope you take this summer to relax, recharge, and do the things that bring you joy. You've earned it. Is there any other new business? Attorney Meeker. >> Nothing
084here. >> Oh, good. We don't have any. I'm happy to hear that. That brings us to public comment on non-agenda items.