001Madam Chair, school board members. Good evening, everyone. I'm going to introduce to you from the Florida school board association, Dr. Deborah Pace will be here facilitating the workshop this afternoon. And online, of course, is the rest of the FSBA team. And I think we see Andrea Messina on the screen there waving at you. So without any further ado, Dr. Pace. I am excited to be with you this afternoon on behalf of the Florida School Boards association. And as Harry mentioned, online we have our CEO, Andrea Messina, Mike Godro, and Dr. Demetrius Rice. I also want to take just a moment to extend a special thank you on behalf of the team to members of your staff, Harry, Russell, Pat, Maria, other members of your team. They have been just so extremely helpful to our team
002throughout this process. They've really gone above and beyond to make the process as smooth and efficient for us and you as possible. And I'm very confident that we are well prepared to have a great week next week when we're interviewing finalists. I'm also happy to report that all 11 of your semifinalists submitted their complete essay and video responses by Monday afternoon, meeting the deadline, which was quick. And I would like to say thank you to each of them on behalf of the team for their diligence in preparing really careful responses and submitting them by the very tight deadline. We continue to be impressed by the professionalism and the experience of the applicants you have chosen thus far. And we sincerely appreciate the time and energy that you all have committed to reviewing each of these
003submissions to prepare for today's meeting. We're going to be using the same process this afternoon that you used to select semifinalists. Each of you has a tally sheet for your use in recording your colleagues responses to the question. Which semifinalist applicants would you like to see move forward in the process? Maria will also be recording your responses live for the viewing and listening public, and we appreciate her assistance with that. I will ask each one of you one by one to identify by number and name your choices. And then we will start our discussion with those semifinalists with five board votes moving to four, then three. I will also ask if there's Anyone else that one of you would like to advocate for being included in your finalist group before we move on and after
004the board has reached consensus on a finalist pool, that item will be brought forward to you for formal action in your meeting. A couple of reminders. There is no magic number of finalists. You have seen a sample interview schedule for 4. Some boards prefer 3, some prefer 5, and we have had finalist pools larger than 5. The final interview schedule will depend on the number of finalists you select, and the real variable is the amount of time that you will have as boards to have your full board interviews and those individual private interviews. Currently, we've allowed 90 minutes in the schedules that we've prepared. 45 minutes is also a reasonable time. It's really up to what you all want. Just as a reminder, the full board interviews are scheduled for Thursday, May 1. The individual
005board interviews are scheduled for Friday, May 2, and we have three meet and greets scheduled next week in the evenings, as the board requested. Once the finalists are selected, Mr. Godreau will revise the schedule and ensure it gets to you and to the finalists promptly. And Mrs. Messina has been working with each of you individually on interview questions. She'll follow up this afternoon with conversation and continue to engage. Following this meeting, we will ask that you start to engage Again individually with Mr. Smitz, your school board attorney, on any contract items that you would like to see included or excluded in a contract for a new superintendent. You'll obviously have time to work through that process, but it is important that you start to have those conversations, have those thoughts before you make your selection,
006and tomorrow I will ask Mr. Russell to send you the current contract. I know that you've seen it, but just so that you'll have it again for your review. Are there any questions before we begin the selection process? So, I don't have a question, but I wanted to discuss with the board something that I've been thinking about. I like the idea of four, but I feel like if we have five, there is, although slim, the possibility that each person gets one vote when the time comes. And so I'm hoping as a group that we can stick to three or four, whichever. But hoping to stay away from the number five, since there are five of us. I don't know if anybody else has been thinking about how many or any of those things, but if
007you do, please pick up. Well, I think our goal should get to be to work to win. Unanimous. You mean like three to four unanimous? No, I mean all five of us have, after a discussion, a Lot, you know, discussion. We, all five of us, get to agreement on one. I mean, I think that there can be more today. No, no, no, no, no. I'm not talking about that. No. But I'm saying that if we have five people and each person votes for a different person, then we have some discussion and we move towards unanimous. Mrs. Messina will be here the day of your selection process for your superintendent candidate. She will guide you through that process. There is generally time for public discussion and then board member discussion before any nominations or votes are
008taken. So there is opportunity for you to begin to reach consensus to avoid a situation like that. Chair Khan. But, Andrea, did you want to add anything else to that discussion before we move on? No, I think you covered it. I just undid my mic in case somebody had a question. I mean, I would be equally concerned if everyone wanted someone different. But a vote of two selected the superintendent. So any number you pick, you can come up with a scenario where it doesn't, you know, seem like it's a consensus. So we want to get to consensus, and I think we've got great candidates, and I don't see any reason why we can't work together to find who we think will be the best new leader. I did have a question about the evening. So
009before, when we had our community engagement sessions, we were asked not to attend. And what would you suggest for school board members at the meet and greets? Should we be there? Should we not be there? Should we. Should it be regional? What? Typically, board members are invited to attend the meet and greets. It's slightly different than the forums, and it gives you an opportunity, particularly if you engage in the one that's in your area, to engage with your constituents as well and get their personalized feedback. You will still have the QR codes, like you received feedback yesterday on what had been provided so far from the community. So you'll have that same information again, but there's nothing to say that you couldn't be there. Andrea, anything else I should add to that? No, but I
010do appreciate there is a distinction between the meet and greets and what we had earlier, which was the input sessions. The input sessions, we specifically requested board members not attend the meet and greets. We believe board members are probably very interested in attending because they want to see how the finalists will interact with the community members, how they interact with, you know, all of the people in the room that night. So we welcome board members. It's certainly not a requirement, but we think it's another data point that can Be helpful when selecting who you want to support in the end. And I do want to point out, regarding the question having to do with potentially being five people voting for five different people, there has to be a motion and a second and a vote.
011So you couldn't select a superintendent with just two votes. It would have to be at least three in order for a motion to pass. So, like I heard, and I think it was, Dr. Woltanski, our goal is that you will certainly all agree that this is the next best leader for your district. But we also try to make it really difficult for you by having really strong candidates. And we do ask that you keep your mind open for more than one possibility on who your final choice that you can support would be. Because if you can support multiple people, seeing that they would lead the district differently but all could be successful, then there's an opening where if there's somebody that other board members feel very strongly about, you can kind of come along. So
012through that conversation that night, we do hope to get to where it's a very clear majority, super majority, or unanimous vote. My last question would be, let's just say we got four or five votes for a single candidate and that person is not happy with the contract negotiation and drops out. How did the other two end up feeling, knowing that we were all like, well, you're not the best person for the job? Well, that can be problematic, as you would guess. We have never had that happen in, thank God, the last 10 years. I've seen it happen in other districts where the number one choice negotiations didn't work and then the board moved to the number two choice. That's one reason we try very hard on the night that you do have selections. We really
013very consciously try to focus the conversation on the strengths of the candidates. We feel like it's not. There's no need to damage anyone's reputation, and there's no need to damage the relationship between the board and any of the finalists in getting to the final selection. So we do everything in our power to try to help keep the conversation focused on who you're selecting and why not. I'm not picking so and so for this other reason, which then could also leave the door open if needed. The goal, obviously, would be not to have to do that. Thank you. Any other questions or comments before we move forward? Are we aware if any of these candidates have applied elsewhere? I realize that Florida. We know if they've applied in Florida, but have they applied elsewhere? She said
014she would let us know if for another Superintendent position. Yeah, we talked about that when we brought them up for semifinalists. And let me pull my notes on that. I don't think any of these other team members. You can help me out, but I don't think any of these applied in any other district. There were some in your original application pool that had applied in St. John's but these are. These are not those names. Let me just go back and confirm. I know when we talked the night that you chose the semifinalists, we mentioned which ones those were. Let me pull that. Excuse me. I'm sorry. You mentioned that if they applied in Florida, you would be aware, but if they applied out of state, that you would have to find that information out after
015they made the finalist list. Correct. And if whoever you choose as finalists tonight, then I will specifically ask them point blank and they can tell us if they've applied somewhere else. Speaking with these finalists, these semifinalists, and knowing these of these people, I don't see any that. I mean, maybe some of the out of state ones, but I don't. I'm not aware that any of them have applied somewhere else. But I will get confirmation of that for the finalists once you all have selected them. And I will share with you that I personally followed up with each semifinalist regarding their selection and the next steps in the process. And no one mentioned any type of conflict in those conversations. They were very excited to have been selected by the board to move forward in the
016process. Any other comments or questions? If not, then Chair Conn has asked that we start at this end of the board dais, move down, and then come back to the vice chair and the chair. So with that, if the board is appreciative of that, we'll start with board member dick from District 4. Where went the first time? Number eight. Number 17. I will. I'll repeat it. Number 18. And number 24. That is Edward Turney, Amber Acevedo, Christina McPherson and Darren Burkett. So for the record, I will reiterate that information we have from Mr. Dick. Ed Tierney. Applicant number eight. Applicant number 17, Amber Acevedo. Applicant number 18, Christina McPherson. And applicant number 24, Darren Burkett. Is that correct, sir? Correct. Thank you so much. Next we will move to Dr. Wotanski from District 5. I
017have number eight, Edward Tierney. 14 John Millay, 15 James Taggart. 17Amber Acevedo, and 24, Darren Burkett. Okay, if I may repeat that for you, please, ma'am, we have applicant number eight, Ed Tierney. Applicant number 14, Dr. Millay. Applicant number 15, James Tager. Applicant number 17, Amber Acevedo. Applicant number 24, Darren Burkett. Thank you very much. And now we'll go to District 2, board member Mira Talbot. I have number eight, Edward Tierney. Number 16, Laura Leotard. Number 17, Amber Acevedo. 18, Christina McPherson. And 24, Darren Burkett. Okay, thank you very much. I have applicant number eight, Ed Tierney. Applicant number 16, Laura Leotardt. Applicant number 17, Amber Acevedo. Applicant number 18, Christina McPherson. And applicant 24, Darren Burkett. Okay, moving then to our Vice Chair, District 1, Mr. Horan. I have number eight, Edward Tierney. Number
01816, Laura Leitart. Number 20, Melanie Stefanowitz. Number 24, Darren Burkett. Okay, I have applicant number eight, Edward Tierney. Applicant number 16, Laura Leitart. Applicant number 20, Dr. Stavanowitz. And applicant number 24, Darren Burkett. And Chair Conn. That brings us to you. I have number eight, Edward Tierney. Number 16, Laura Leotard. Number 20, Melanie Stefanowitz. And number 24, Darren Burkhead. Actually. And I have John Millais as well. Number 14. Okay, I have applicant number eight, Edward Tierney. I have applicant number 14, Dr. Jean Millais. Applicant number 16, Laura Leotardt. Applicant number 20, Dr. Stavanowitz. And applicant 24, Darren Burkett. Yes. Okay, according to my records, and I'm looking at this Quickly, I have five board votes for applicant number eight, Mr. Tierney. And applicant number 24, Darren Burkett. Is the board comfortable moving Forward applicant number
019eight and number 24 as finalists? Yes. I'm seeing heads nod. Okay, so we now have two finalists selected. Looking down our list, I see applicant number 16, Laura Leotardt with 03. Applicant number 17, Amber Acevedo, with three. I see none with four. And then you have Dr. John Millais with two, Christina McPherson with two, Dr. Stivanowitz with two, and James Tager with one. So that gives us applicant number eight with five. Applicant number 24 with five, Ed Tierney and Darren Perkett added to the finalist pool. Is the board comfortable moving forward, applicant number 16. And applicant number 17. I'm sorry, we have three. 17. Yeah. Those are the only two with three into the finalist pool, that would be Laura Leotard and Amber Acevedo. Yes. So as long as everybody's okay, that gives us four.
020Can we stop there? That is really ultimately up to the board. You then have Dr. John Millay. Applicant 14 with two. You have Christina McPherson, number 18 with two, and Dr. Stavanowitz with two. So it would be difficult, I believe, to move forward with seven. But it's not impossible. It really is up to the board. I vote for keeping it at four people. You moved that. We keep it at those four. And I'll second that. I believe this is technically a workshop, so the board will take final action. There's no motion on the table. I apologize. But I appreciate your efforts to help us reach consensus today. Those four. I agree. We should limit it to those four. I agree. Okay, That's a majority of the board. So we have four finalists. Applicant number eight,
021Ed Tierney. Applicant number 16, Laura Leotardt. Applicant number 17, Amber Acevedo. And applicant 24, Darren Burkett. Thank you, board members. That was very, very helpful. And again, I appreciate your engagement in this process. That list will come back to you for formal action later this evening. Andrea, would you like to discuss interview procedures with the board at this time? Yes, thank you. I'm going to actually ask Mr. Godreau to chime in on this, but what you will receive, now that we have the finalist names and numbers, you will receive a schedule for the. Actually, I'm sorry, Mike, you sent it earlier and it's attached to the meeting. Correct. I'm going to defer to you on this part, Mike. So let's go ahead. And Mariah is passing the four person schedule out as we speak. Perfect.
022Thank you, Maria. So the schedule board that you are receiving is right now. It's called a sample schedule because we have not inserted the names because of course we did not have the names and we won't have them until you vote. After the vote is completed, we will actually insert the candidate names into the schedule. And this is the schedule that we will follow next week as the candidates that are any out of town candidates arrive on Tuesday all the way through Friday's interviews. So Tuesday the candidates. Has everybody received it? I can't see the board right now. Yes, everyone has a copy. Okay, thank you. So on Tuesday, out of area candidates will arrive on Wednesday. We have set up a full day for them which will include breakfast tours of two schools in
023the Upper Keys, which would be Plantation Key School, followed by lunch and then a tour of Key Largo School. We will have dinner for the candidates and then a community meet and greet in the Upper Keys at Nelson Government center from 6 to 7:30. And as Andrew mentioned earlier, of course the board is invited to that meet and greet. So that will conclude Wednesday. The out of area candidates will be staying in Marathon at the Fairfield Inn at Marathon. So that will be kind of the home base the entire week for them. Are there any questions on what will happen Wednesday? I just Would make sure. I think you're already working on it. But if you're going to go from Plantation Key School to Key Largo School, you want to go lunch north. And I
024think the original plan is to go south. And that's not a good idea in this, this construction time. Yes, you're absolutely correct. Mr. Russell has already made some change of plans. We used to have it. We had actually originally a lunch destination there and he told us to remove that because he is working on a different plan because of construction. Thank you. On Thursday are the full board interviews. And those interviews will be at Marathon High School in the media center. They will start at 8:30. So from 8:30 to 10 is the first candidate, followed by 10:30 to 12. And those are hour and a half sessions in front of the board. Community will be there and we will have QR codes for for them to give feedback. There will be a lunch for the
025candidates and FSBA team at Marathon at the Bistro from 12:15 to 1. The full board interviews resume at 1:15 to 2:45 for the next candidate, candidate C. And of course again we'll put the names in when we send this out tomorrow. And then the final full board interview will be 3:15 to 4:45 for candidate D. There will be a dinner provided at the Bistro, again there at Marathon high school for FSB and finalists from 5 to 5:45, followed by the Marathon meet and greet which will be held at Marathon High School media Center from 6 to 7:30. And that will be the community meet and greet in that area. Any questions on the May 1 Thursday? And before you ask any questions, let me also say each board member is going to get an individualized
026schedule that you can use to make sure you know where you need to be and what time you need to be. Because everybody's schedule will be a little bit different, especially on Friday when you have the individual schedule. So I will email each of you your schedule with your name on it saying this is where you need to be at this time on this day. So you're not going to just go by the schedule that I'm reading out now. Although it will absolutely be the exact same time frame, but it'll just be unique to your exact events and activities. Are there any questions on the May 1 Thursday? So I have a stupid question. How do you decide who's A, B, C and D? Yeah, we'll do it by the same way we did it
027entire way through. And that is their application number on when they actually turned in their application. So Mr. Tierney will be A, Laura will be B, Ms. Aceveda will be C. And Mr. Burkett will be D. That's correct. I'm sorry. I was going to give a piece of information that some of the people might be interested in is to know that key west won 11 to 5. Oh. Is that the regional Semifinals? Congratulations. That is exciting. Sorry. Quarterfinals. Yeah, that is exciting. Move into Friday. We will leave the hotel, drive the candidates to Key west, to the district office in Key west, have a breakfast there for them, and then the one on ones will start beginning on Friday at 9:00. I don't have room numbers yet. I'm going to get those from Mr. Russell
028tomorrow. For what room you'll be in, the candidates will rotate to you. Now, Mr. Horan, we know that you have a different schedule. Congratulations on your daughter's graduation. So we will have a separate room for you where the candidates will go in and actually do a virtual interview with you. So you can see how your interview is kind of separate from the other four board members. So from 9 to 10 there will be a block from 10:15 to 11:15, and you can see how the candidates will rotate through. There'll be lunch at 11:15-12 for the candidates in the boardroom. Then we start back 12:15 to 1:15 is another block. And 1:30 to 2:30 and 3 to 4. Mr. Horan, yours are a little different because of your virtual situation, but you can see your schedule
029down below. If there is no candidate scheduled for you at that time block, you are free during that time block board members. And that's the way it works out. With five board members and a virtual interview, there's going to be some blocks that cannot be filled. So you're able to get some things done. Emails and such, or whatever your pleasure is. We'll have a dinner for the finalists and FSBA team at the Beachside Resort, which I'm told is fairly close to the district office, followed by a community meet and greet at the Beachside Resort. So the candidates will be able to stay there for their final meet and greet. And then that night we will return the candidates to the Marathon Hotel at Fairfield. So that's the schedule for Friday, which looks very complicated on
030paper, but we will be there to make sure that everybody is on time and getting to where they need to be. We'll be hustling people through. We'll look like we're conductors at a train station, trying to move everybody through to make sure everybody gets where they need to Go. So we'll make sure that works. But are there any questions from what you see there for the schedule on Friday. I don't think anybody has any questions. Thank you so much for your work and your help. Thank you. Andrea, did you want to add anything about the interview process? Yes, actually I do. Thank you. I do want to let you all know that once you have taken your official vote tonight, at your board meeting, all of your semifinalists will get an individual phone call, either
031from Mr. Godreau or myself. We will continue to work and deal with all of the details of the comings and goings of your out of town applicants and even your in town applicants. We want to, you know, they're going to be included in the process and treated just exactly the same as all the other finalists. We're really excited to come down there next week and spend this time with you. And I do want to remind you, I do have the interview questions that two of you have selected, but I'm waiting on the ones from the other three. And if I can get those, I had asked for them by tomorrow, but if I can get them at least by Thursday, I can prepare those worksheets for the interview so that I can prepare them and
032print them before I head down there early next week. It's an exciting time. I know your community's going to be excited. We will have another QR code for feedback from the interviews that get live streamed and also from the meet and greets. So there's going to be a lot of data points between today and when you make your selection meeting. Our goal is to make it hard for you by having some strong candidates. And I believe that the four that you've chosen are going to make it difficult for you. So we look forward to it and we're excited. Board members, is there anything else before I turn it back over to Chairwoman Conn? No. Thank you very much, everyone. Appreciate all the work. Thank you. Are we ready to go? Mrs. Connor, would you like
033to take a five minute break? Does anybody need a five minute break? If not, let open the meeting. And I just want to start by saying this meeting was moved to Marathon due to the construction. And while in some level it's not fair because Dr. Waltanski as well as other people who live in the upper keys aren't getting their meeting when they're supposed to, we have all of the staff that work and live in Key west as well as our IT staff who many have to travel. And it was more of a question of the needs of many to the needs of the few. The plan is, however, to make sure that we make up the Coral Shores meeting and perhaps we might even have two in a row. We'll see how the schedule goes
034with trim notices this summer and budget meetings coming up. I'm not sure exactly how that will work out, but I apologize for the change. And Dr. Woltanski, I know you were inconvenienced and so a personal apology to you as well. Well, I'm hoping that the next regular board meeting can be at Coral Shores because we have not. Coral Shores has not had a chance to weigh in in person on the superintendent search. And it wasn't just me. All these people here have driven from the upper keys. Their kids are getting their gems. And the real issue is that this is an 18 month project and it's going to disrupt for a long time. And I think everyone from the upper keys is on their last nerve over it. So we know how hard it is,
035but we do it to get to the grocery store, to get to our dentist appointments, to take our kids to dance class. So we can't. It's not just the inconvenience of a few. It's transparency and our devotion to having our school board meetings in all the regions. And so since we chose our semifinalists in Key West. And we're choosing our finalists here. I think it's only fair that we choose the superintendent up in at Coral Shores. That works for me. I was just hoping to get further along in the school year so that other traffic isn't as heavy in the construction area. So I don't see why that would be a problem at all. All right, so let's get a ruling from Mr. Schmitz. We just add that to our action items, make a motion
036to have the meeting in Karlshores. Okay, Perfect. All right. With that said, Mrs. Conn, thank you so much. We are ready to begin our meeting with the pledge, and Mrs. Acevedo will ask some of our gems to come forward and lead us in the pledge. I pledge allegiance to the Flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one Nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. And I do apologize, Mrs. Conn. When we met, we weren't. We. I didn't think we were going to be able to have our gems come down. But as you can see, we were successful in asking them to come forward. So thank you all so very much for making that trip. We're all afraid of it, and we know you guys
037do it all the time, and we thank you because. So we're all really excited to recognize you and to have you here at this meeting. So thank you. Thank you. Thank you. There is one other thing with the agenda, which is action item number three, which is our surplus furniture from Key West High School. And I believe that went on on Friday. But with that said, there are no other changes in the agenda, and I recommend approval. So moved. Motion by Mr. Horan. Second by Mr. Dick. Any discussion? Any no votes hearing? None. The motion passes. Likewise, Mrs. Conn, I recommend approval for the April 8th school board meeting minutes, which are attached. I'll move approval. Second. Motion by Mr. Dick. Second by Mrs. Talbot. Any discussion? Any no votes? Hearing none. The motion passes.
038And now Mrs. Acevedo will lead us in our gems presentation. Thank you. If we could have board chair, Mrs. Khan and Superintendent Axford come forward, please. And at this time, if we could have our gems all come up here. They are all recipients from the the science fair state level. So, ladies and gentlemen, if you'll come up here and join the superintendent, the Board chair and I will share a little bit about these outstanding students. First, we have Mikayla Aguiar and Ainsley Golden. And again, I do read some of this because when it comes to science, these kids are incredible. They are first young scientists to compete at the state level from Ocean Studies Charter school, making them pioneers and women leaders. Both of them are eighth grade. McKayla and Ainslie won third place in
039the state in their environmental engineering category in the junior division. Back in March, they performed an experiment to design a simple filter to remove microfibers from washing machine water in order to eliminate microfibers from entering our ecosystem. They then evaluated self designed filters and the filters were made from stockings, pool nets and loofah material. They evaluated the results to see which one would remove the most. Congratulations on identifying a concern for our marine ecosystem and developing a simple filter to help remove the microfibers before they enter the water system and being recognized at the state level for all of your dedication because this was no overnight experiment. So congratulations to Mikayla and Ainsley. And next we have Jacoby Gutierrez and Carlos Charlie Smith. And this is the second year in a row that this dynamic
040duo has represented Monroe county schools at the state science and engineering fair. And each year, interestingly enough, with a different project. They're seventh graders from Treasure Village, Montessori. And this year, these gentlemen competed. Oh yes, I'm sorry, yes. Let me get to that. There you go. Thank you. Thank you for bringing that to our attention. This team designed a prototype that uses a motor to effectively and semi automatically clean solar panels for maximum energy efficiency. The boys traveled to Miami to visit a solar panel producing business to learn how the panels work. And then they designed their prototype. They were successful at designing a solar panel cleaning apparatus resulting in nearly the same energy output from the panels as continuously and manually cleaned panels. For the second year in a row, these gentlemen received special
041recognition for their scientific research and their innovation. So we want to present gems for creating great educational moments to them as well. Congratulations. All right, everyone, look at the for the picture. And again, the time and dedication that you ladies and gentlemen have put in is truly recognized. Yes. Look at the paparazzi crew. Thank you. Thank you to the parents and the school that support them as well. I don't want to take over, you know. Maria, do we have anyone here to speak? We do not have anybody registered to speak. Okay, then let's move on to the consent agenda, please. Thank you, Mrs. Kahn. All items listed as consent agenda items are considered routine and non controversial by the school board and will be approved by a single motion. There's been a separate discussion of
042these items prior to the meeting and there are no requests to pull any of the items. With that said, I recommend approval of the consent agenda move. Second motion by Mr. Horan. Second by Dr. Woltanski. Any discussion? Any no votes? Hearing none. The motion passes. So we're going to move to reports now, and I'm absolutely thrilled about this particular report because we're going to have our audit opening coming. And then each time they open an audit, they interview everyone for fraud, waste and abuse. And one of the questions that they ask is that, do you have a system for explaining fraud, waste and abuse to everyone? And I'm thrilled to say that because of Dr. Charlene Wright, we are going to have an excellent system for reporting not only reporting fraud, waste and abuse, but
043educating people on their responsibilities as it relates to fraud, waste and abuse. I saw her do this presentation for the principals and it was really, really effective. And it's something that we all can be proud to say that we do have training on this and everyone knows, and we were training before, but this is a formalized process. So, Dr. White, thank you so much. Board Chair Kahn, board members, Superintendent Axford, thank you so much for this. From the state of Tennessee, I have to. We called it fraud, waste and abuse. In the state of Florida, it is waste, fraud and abuse. So if you see that I've done it anywhere wrong, please let me know. I've tried to correct it everywhere I possibly can. But we have done this presentation to send it to you,
044send it to the Audit and Finance Committee, presented it to senior leadership, been to principals, office managers, going to present it to the finance team actually tomorrow. So anywhere that you see that this needs to be presented, please let us know. It's not that anything has happened at all. It is just a preventative measure that we would like to follow. We will include in HR documents the annual documents that everyone signs. We will sign off on this as well. But trying to do some training this year to expose everyone to fraud, waste, fraud and abuse and waste is really, you know, it's what I try to tell everybody. I'm not so worried about the technical terms and knowing the difference in these, but waste is really not a violation of the law. Waste is. Maybe
045when you walk out of your office, you don't turn off your light. Maybe there is a supplement that is done. Peer supplements are done sometimes and then that peer leaves. But the employee is still getting the supplement, every penny through a budget cycle like right now we're looking for. Right? So that's more what waste is. Fraud is a deliberate misus. Abuse is really when there is a violation of the law. I shouldn't say that. We've got way too many attorneys right here for me to say something like that. Right. Okay, here's your questions. In the United States, which type of fraud occurs most often? Is it corruption, asset misappropriation, or financial statement fraud? We all cheated and read the presentation. That was so bad. Oh, I had. I was doing the presentation one time, and
046everybody can see the answers on the left. But it's asset misappropriation. And really, what's on your balance sheet, that's your assets. What's the main asset? Cash. They're messing with cash. They're doing something wrong with cash. Examples of fraud. This was simply a woman was in a car crash and they got her benefit information, diverted funds. It was only $13,000, but somebody faced 20 years in prison. So it's not so much the dollar amount, but what your intent is and what you're doing. Another example, and the reason why I did this one, is they falsely inflated the number of students in enrollment. How easy would that be to do? But you just cannot do something like that. The fines there were over $500,000. Happened in 16. It took about five years to discover it. Okay. I
047did. Really? Okay. So where does fraud occur most often? It's private companies. And it's because you felt good about that, didn't you, Being able to answer that question, didn't you? But it's because they don't have as many guidelines. They don't have as many rules and regulations as public companies. And, you know, they're. I guess they're earning their own funds, so, you know, they don't have the guidelines that we do. But I would question the total amount that might be. No, that's very true. Good point. Value is much more in government. Yes, sir. Where fraud happens, this is a little blurry and a little. But even in government, it's about 18%. It's too much. Any little piece is too much. What is the most common fraud scheme? I give myself away on that one, too. But
048again, it's asset misappropriation. This is similar to what you're talking about here. It happens over 80% of the time. It's asset misappropriation, but the dollar amount is much smaller. If you look at financial statement fraud happens less than 10%, but the impact is almost $600,000 per incident. Basically saying the same thing here. But where you really want to work on is you don't want to have. You don't want to be in the place where all these three circles cross one another. So that's why in finance, there are so many processes, procedures, policies that you have to follow. Segregation of duties. It's just critical. Common fraud. One of the main themes in this slide is cash. It deals with cash so many times. What are the three elements of the fraud triangle? And it's motive, opportunity,
049and rationalization. I really like this slide. This seems to hit home with everyone that have seen the presentation. Tough world that we live in right now, right? Financially, extremely expensive down here. And when people have an opportunity, you know, they get it in their mind that, oh, it's okay that I do this one time. Okay, maybe I'll rationalize and do it again and again. But then, you know, you've got that motivation, too. But when people get in that circle, it's just a bad circle to get. Get caught up in. How long does it take? 12 months. What do we do about every 12 months? It's our audit. Our audit. The common theme here is documents. In almost every one of the instances, the method has something to do with documents. How is it discovered? Tips
050and confessions. And if you look at the top two numbers, they're really hard to see here, but that is almost 70% are through tips. So tips was extremely important. The other thing here was, how can you report fraud? How can I let somebody know? Can it be in confidence? Do I have to say who I am? What information do I have to provide? Over two times higher. Do you discover fraud if you have some type of format that they can give a tip? When someone knows about waste, fraud or abuse, those are just warning signs. What's the best way to prevent it? And it's the perception of detection. And that's the whole reason why Superintendent Axford really wanted this done. Just talk about it. Even want the finance team to talk to me about, is
051there a situation where I don't feel comfortable doing this and this. Is there a place we need to do segregation of duties? We're a very small district, so when you can't have segregation of duties, then that's when you have to have mitigating controls in place to overcome being able to do anything like this. Which department? Yikes. I'm in two of those. But it usually is accounting. Accounting knows. They know the processes, they know where the holes are. So that's why in a role like that, you just have to be extremely careful. What is the most common reason to commit fraud? And it's dissatisfaction with the employer trust. I've said this a lot this week because we've had budget meetings. Hope is not a strategy. I can hope and be positive all I want to, but
052I've really got to have some good strategies. And trust is not a control. So these are really good ways items to implement prevention and detection. I really like prevention controls. That's to stop it before it even happens, Detective. You got to have that too, to find it if it has already happened. This was my best effort at an accountant being creative. So this is the recipe against fraud. It's really cute. I hope you'll take the time to read it. I'm not going to sit here and read that whole recipe to you. But it was the biggest thing is, you know, really a gallon of common sense. It's just listening and thinking things through. Okay. The other thing I want to show you. Can I. Website. Oh, I have to take the mic. Yuck. Okay. Went
053through this a good bit as well, too. When initially when I was working with them on the website. We do have within departments. You have finance departments. You can get to waste, fraud and abuse there. You can also go through staff and go through staff resources. But we have worked really hard. Oh, we're already there on the very. Can I get to the front page of the website? Can I go back? I have control. Yeah, but which one? I don't get nervous doing presentations at all. Okay, so on the front page, we have waste, fraud and abuse. So what they can do, it's so much better. So thank you. This is continual improvement to make things better as you get feedback. But they can go in. Y'all are welcome to put this phone number in
054your phone. It's a text line, and I get the texts currently right now. So it's all in confidence with me. You know, if I need to go to the superintendent or come to the board, then we can do that. Then we also can. There's a form they can fill out. And so the form, they can tell us as much or as little information about what happened, who they are, why they feel uncomfortable, and then we can pursue it. That's awesome. Thank you. Do we have any questions from the board? Okay, so I only have one question. I've been talking about an internal auditor. Can you explain to everybody how that differs from the audited or the auditor that we get? In the state of Tennessee, we, no matter what size our school was, we had
055to have an internal auditor. And what an internal auditor did for us was truly, when you had situations like this that needed to be investigated, they would help do that. They were internal. But there was still an independence there that they had. It's not the independence that you have with state audit, but great resource to as you have areas that you need somebody to go investigate, see how it works. Can we be more efficient? That's what we use internal audit for now in the state of Florida. I had looked into this previously. I think Austin was the one that led me there. It's off of dollar amounts. So we're too small of a district that you have to have an internal auditor. But we could have an internal auditor if we decided that was a
056position that we wanted to fund. One of the things too that internal auditors did was, or I would suggest is some type of risk assessment. That's something else that state auditors ask about. And we used to go through a risk assessment with. We went through the organization chart. Every area had a risk assessment. I think it does it annually right now. Right. So worked with Galen last year on purchasing. You know, where do you have areas of concern? What controls do you have in place? And it really makes you look at it and say, do I have enough controls in place for the amount of risk that we have in this area? So internal audit is a great tool to use. I just keep looking at everything that's come out for the county, and I
057just would feel better if I knew there was somebody independent who was auditing each area of our school district. So it's definitely something I'd like to look into. I don't know what the cost of that position would be. I also don't know if that person could have other duties. I under the understanding that an internal auditor doesn't report to anyone except the board. Is that. Who would an internal auditor report to? Only the board? Yeah. You get to hire three people. Superintendent, me and the auditor. And I just. I think it's something that we as a board should think about. Obviously, now is not the exact right time. Right. But I would, in fact, like everybody to think about that to make sure that we are doing things the way we need to and covering
058all the things that aren't looked at by an external auditor. Well, I would tell you we had an internal auditor for about three years, and I would not be in favor of it at this time or in the near future unless things are changed. Because one, we do internal. We do have an external auditor, you know, independent auditor that goes to school audits. So that's where a lot of fraud can take place or misuse. They don't have those strong controls. And so we do have that done as Far as what's coming out of the district office in the, in the accounts, there's at this time I see them to be controlled enough. I will also tell you the state auditors learned how to do audits very differently when they came down here and hit the
059jackpot. So they're doing a lot more when they come down here and do their internal audits, their audits, yearly audits, they're so thorough. It's ironic that Mrs. Kahn brought that up tonight because obviously it's a topical concern, but you know, the legislature is moving away from internal audits in favor of, you know, that, that state audit. I'm not saying it's not something to look into, but I just noticed the legislation today that they're moving away from auditing and I guess they're trying to save money. It's a high priced position. Yeah, well, and it's required for a certain size of school districts. Right. Well. And that's where, you know, on my own I'm used to risk assessment being done and the five areas that report to me we're going to go through risk assessments. So those
060are the areas that are open to waste, fraud and abuse and just, it's just a thought process now. It's a long process to go through and everybody only has so much time. But we working with state audit, that's what we are going to do this next year for this audit. So thank you for instituting the fraud hotline. That's amazing and should be a big help to anything you might have to do. I know it also adds a lot of work to your plates. So I do appreciate that and I guess we see what the hotline looks like before we make any kind of decision. Okay, but you know, right now funds are limited. Yes, but it's just something I wanted to put out there. I know we have the auditor coming next week and, and
061that's kind of what got the, the gears grinding in that direction. So thank you so much. But please feel welcome to test that line. I'm going to try to test it once a month and make sure it's working. But it's working currently. Thank you. Thank you. Moving on, do we want to sue legal? We're on track to have the report on the ball field by second meeting in May. We have obtained, I'd say about that many documents, contracts and bids that are relevant to the inquiry. So that process is ongoing. There is a law that's being circulated in Tallahassee right now regarding affordable housing. It is another local government preemption it doesn't directly involve us, but it is a preemption of all local law regarding affordable housing development. It provides for more height. It provides
062for. It's much like live local, only much more preemptive. So anything that restricts affordable housing in any way is preempted to the state. I don't know what impact that's going to have on us because we've all put in our bid that it has to be done the project we want. And, you know, the code is up to the people that are doing the development. So it's not directly impacting us. I don't think it will. The opening of the bids is tomorrow. As usual, I call everyone before these meetings and I field questions and I believe I answered all your questions, but I'm available to answer more if you have any. Me? Yep. So, Dirk, there's only. There's not a second meeting in May, so It would be June 10th would be. All right, it'll be
063the June meeting then. Yeah. And as Dirk said, there is the opening of the bid tomorrow. And the bid committee is Amber Shaffer. She's the president of the Key West Chamber of Commerce and had a construction company for about 15 years. All keys Construction. Brian Barrosa, who's the City manager. Patricia Neyra, who also has a construction company and is working in business right now. Brian Greene, who's building 8,000 affordable housing units in the UK but has built many different projects here in the Keys, and Debbie Batty, who is an expert in homesteading properties. So I think it's a great committee and we have, at this point, no change from when I spoke to you last. There are nine people who have applied, but they haven't submitted yet, although I understand from the team it's typical
064for them to submit at 8:00, you know, at the last minute when the bid is due. And so although 68 people have downloaded our RFP and we're waiting to see, you know, what happens tomorrow morning at 8:00. So they're going to meet tomorrow at 10:00am and then they're going to do interviews with the folks who have done completed an application on May 7th. They're going to select on May 8th and bring it to you on June 10th. So it's going to be a busy month for that team. So since there's an entire month between the selection and our board meeting, I'd like to personally, I don't know if everybody wants one, but I'd like to get first who's applied and Then I'd like to get their selection prior to the board meeting. So once they've
065made their selection, I'd like to look that over so that we don't fall into some of the same pitfalls. Yes, thank you. I just like to make sure that of this selection committee, we don't, again, similar to what Chair Khan says, have a situation where we're lobbying for this group, because that became seriously problematic where an unbiased selection committee member was actually out there presenting on their behalf. I don't want to see that. Yes, I'm total. In total agreement with you on that. And I'm sorry, Madam Superintendent, when the responses come in, you're in what they call the cone of silence for 30 days. So any information you get, which you can have, but it stays to you and the committee. So. And that's. There's legal reasons for it, but you're in what. What's called
066the cone of silence. So just keep that in mind when you do receive information. It expires in 30 days or upon the award of the bid. Maybe we could just put that at the bottom of the email to remind. Everybody when it comes out. I'll do that. Thank you. And that's it for me today. Okay, then, board members, since we started at John for superintendents, let's start with you for board reports. Nothing much to report. I did have the opportunity to attend. Stanley Switlick's poem Poetry slam. Poetry slam. Thank you. I couldn't think of the word. And it was fantastic. Fifth grade class had amazing poems and they read them and they were very proud of them and it was a. Very exciting event, so I really enjoyed it. Great attending. That's it. Congratulations to
067Coral Shores Marathon and Key West High School. For the first time ever, all three district champs. Hopefully this is the beginning of many to come, but great job all around. I. Mrs. Axford asked me to talk a little bit about the legislative session. And it's not that much different than the last time. My understanding, you know, it's budget season now. Yesterday it was unclear whether they would be able to finish on time. The House and the Senate are still $3 billion apart in their budgets, but they were $4 billion. So that's what you call progress. All of both budgets still include cuts to AP and ib, and there has been a lot. And dual enrollment performance funding. There has been a lot of contact to legislators about that because families are not happy about that.
068You know, the big issue with the budget is that the K12 budget is that there's 60,000 new voucher students who never attended public school. So when you fund, when you. The fefp, the funding formula is designed to estimate the number of students. And that number of students didn't used to change very much because seniors would graduate and kindergarteners would come in. And so when you're talking about $100 increase for each student, well, you really only have to fund that extra hundred. But when you talk about a student getting a voucher who has never been in public school, they were not funded before, so you have to fund the whole $9,000. So this year, the budget, 14% of the students funded by the budget are getting vouchers, and they're getting over 70% of the funding increase.
069And that's what's happening to our budget. And the House is. Is tired of getting the messages about AP and dual enrollment funding, which. That performance funding is being cut in half, $292 million across the state. And then they say they're putting it back in the base student allocation. But then what happens is in the past, you pass dual enrollment or you pass your AP class, and the following year your school got money to keep those programs going. And so what they're doing is taking money that was being generated to keep those funded money, those programs going, and giving it to everybody, including kindergarten and private schools and kids who are not in advanced classes. So it's a problem with the formula and they're aware of it and they're. So the two different budgets either give
070an increase of 0.95% or an increase of 1.5%. The FRS requires. So the House budget has about a $50 per student increase, and $25 of that is going to. To FRS, the required increases in FRS. So it's bleak. And I think Dr. White figured out for us it's about a 2.3% decrease. Am I correct? We're in the hole about $2.7 million. Yeah, it was. It would take a 2.3% increase for. Monroe to just stay flat, right? Yeah. So it's challenging. What the biggest hope right now is that they, if they can't get the budget done, that they signee die. They end session for policy on a week from Friday. I think it is and or is it next Friday? It's anyway that they end policy because it. And then come back for a budget session
071because if they. There are some bills out there that are still moving around. If they don't get passed, then they become part of the bargaining chip. So then it'll be like well, if you pass this bill, then we'll give you this on the budget. And we don't want to be, you know, trading policy for money. Right. Other than that, I went to see Moana Jr. This past weekend, and Luis's daughter is fantastic, by the way, and so are all the kids. And it is, you know, it's another one of those things that Key Largo school is doing. They have a drama club, but any school in the Upper Keys, kids can come and try out for it. So I believe there were kids from all four schools that were in that. And it's, you know,
072it's very impressive. They have a motorized boat that goes around and great staging. And it was all done by the kids. All the backstage work, all that was done by them. And I saw the most amazing performance last Saturday, and it was the understudy performance. They let the kids who had rehearsed to be understudies get to have their chance on stage. I've never seen that in a school performance before, and that was just really great, too. But there's Friday night or Sunday afternoon. Everybody can still catch it. You can still catch it. It is so great. And when those kids sing about how they have everything they need on this island, but still the sea calls them, it just feels real. It was really good. Well, I've been to plays and baseball games up and
073down the Keys the last couple of days, and I don't even remember which one was where. Okay, so they were all good. Okay, so we'll see. And then, of course, then we have graduations coming up, and when that means it's. Yeah, I'll vouch for him. He was at several things because I was there with him. It's just. There's a lot going on, so. And, you know, you try. And then I have other things that. Beyond the school district. So it's really. It's getting very hectic, and then this whole thing here is going to add to it. But this is all good. It's all good stuff. So. And let's hope that, you know, the district. I think the district is going to come out this year with even better grades, I think. So whoever takes over
074is going to be handed something that's even on its way up. So. Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you. A few things. First, I want to encourage the public to please make use of the fraud hotline. Occasionally, we all get those phone calls or texts, anonymous emails, so on and so forth. Now you have a way to report it to the people that need to know. So thank you. I want a shout out to Laura Leotard. I love the fact that you're doing a DUI simulation. I think we should be doing that in all the area high schools because it can be scary, it can be fatal, and it can change your life and not in any good ways as far as the baseball programs go. Congratulations to all our high schools in the
075district. Go get them. Let's bring some titles home. I'm very excited about that. And then finally, Pat, we have somebody finally in the job of Islamorada manager. So I'm hoping to get some good news updates regarding Founders Park. Me too. I saw him at our rotary last. Week and that's exactly what we discussed. Perfect. And when do you think we'll get an update? When? When he gets his feet under him. He says actually gets to start the job. I think he started it. Okay. He said he was going to meet with some of the local interested parties this week. So I expect I'll hear from him soon. If not, I'll reach out. Okay. If we could possibly have an update on both Founders park and Rex Weech at the next meeting. And if the report
076is I need another board meeting, then that's what the report is. Absolutely. Thank you. And I think that's all for board reports. As we go to our pending items, I discuss with you what's going to happen tomorrow with the the bid committee. We do have Erin Williams here with us who's going to give us an update on our Department of Justice grant. So Erin, thank you so much for coming. And she's going to give you just a brief update on how we're going to use that million dollar. All right. I'm going to go through what the grant is going to entail. As Superintendent Axford mentioned, it's just shy of a million dollars. It's a three year grant through doj. We know that our Yale students are coming in with a tremendous amount of stress. We
077know that there's a lot of risk factors going on there, too. And with that in mind, when we have any student that has risk factors, a lot of stress, it's going to cause some impact on their academic performance. So we want to mitigate that as much as possible. We know that we're going to target specifically Horace O'Bryant School and Key West High School. They are the two schools that consistently have the highest number of EL youth with, you know, only a million dollars. Say only. But, you know, it really goes fast. In three years, we needed to concentrate on the schools that had the highest need. So those are those two there. The what? There are a couple things going on. The research shows that when we're dealing with an influx of EL students, we
078want to make sure that we increase their own social and cultural capital. They need to understand the way school runs. They need to feel comfortable in the school environment. They need to understand how to navigate education in our country. The other part is our teachers. It can be quite a challenge having 50% or more of your students not to be English. So we want to make sure that we increase teacher efficacy in teaching our EL students. So the research shows that in order to do that, it's really a three pronged approach. The first part, we need to make sure that we have prep classes for our EL students to increase that social and cultural capital. We need to make sure that we provide training to teachers. But then we also need to make sure that
079we address that chronic stress and the trauma and other risk factors that our students are coming into our schools with. So that model is what we based the activities for the grant on. This is a breakdown of the funding. If you want a more detailed breakdown, I can certainly give that to you. The bulk of the funding is going to be to hire two new teachers. There's going to be, which I'll go into that in just a minute. We're going to also have a couple parent liaisons that hopefully will work with our parent educators that do an amazing job already. But we want to make sure that we have parent educators, or, excuse me, parent liaisons specifically for those two schools to bridge that communication gap between home and school. We'll also do some pretty
080intense training at both the HOB and Key West High School. So that'll be the. The bulk of where those funds go to. So as far as the activities go and what we're going to use the funds for, I mentioned we're going to hire a couple teachers. So we're going to have a couple classes at Key West High School and a few classes at HOB specifically. So we will have a teacher that speaks English and Spanish. We hope we will find a teacher that also speaks English and Haitian Creole. We know that's going to be a challenge, but I believe we can find that person. What we're going to do is have them go back and forth between HOB and Key West High. So for example, if we've got the Haitian Creole speaking teacher will be
081a couple blocks at Key West High in the morning, then they'll go to HOB in the afternoon and then the Spanish teacher will flip flop that. So we'll have four classes going at both schools every day. So we'll be able to handle a good amount of students with that intense level of support. We'll have an EL task force similar to what we had over the summer. It's going to be a smaller group, but we want to make sure that we're paying attention to the impact these teachers are having, the impact that the classes specifically are having on the students that are enrolled. Because obviously our goal is to have better academic performance, certainly better attendance, better discipline, et cetera. We will also have telehealth. This is a big one. As you guys all know, in
082our district or in our county, mental health resources are fairly scarce compared to the mainland. But one of the things we've been lacking in is having licensed therapists that actually speak Spanish and speak Haitian Creole in particular, but also ones that take Medicaid or no insurance at all. So through the grant, we're going to have a good amount of money, about 50,000 a year for the next three years to put towards counseling for students. It is telehealth, but they will have licensed therapists that speak their native language. So I think that will be a game changer for a lot of our students. We're going to have the community liaisons, which I mentioned before, that work closely with our parent educators. We've actually already named a couple those our parent educators who already speak those languages
083are going to do that in addition to their job duties. So the EL task force will outline how those responsibilities will be different from their current responsibilities. And again, what we're hoping for is in the short and long term, we want to decrease those risk factors. We want to improve overall well being. We know if we can do those two things, we're going to see positive educational outcomes in terms of grades, attendance, discipline. Okay, that was it in a nutshell. Any questions about this grant? My only question is, this is coming through the Department of Justice. Are we seeing students already in our EL populations that have just gotten here in the Department of Justice or under the purview of the Justice Department? Are we seeing these acts of violence? Are we just trying to
084avoid them by instituting these protocols? It's a pretty even distribution in terms of race ethnicity that are involved in djj. That was part of the research that I had to do in applying for the grant. It's an even distribution. But what we have is the students that are coming over from other countries, for example, that have experienced gang violence, you know, natural disasters, Et cetera. Their level of risk seems to be higher than those that are native to the country. Certainly not saying we don't have other at risk students. But the key here is try to mitigate those factors for prevention. Thank you. And I know you do a lot of work for us in terms of grants, so I just want to give you a shout out for that. You do get us a
085lot of money that we need and wouldn't otherwise have. So thank you very much for all. The work you do. Thank you. Appreciate that. Has the number of new students slowed down? Yes, it has. And that was one of the reasons we made an adjustment to this grant was to account for the fact that it has slowed down. And we want to make sure that we're using the funds appropriately and they're going to go to the most amount of students. So that was part of the reason for the delay because we did make an adjustment in the grant from a center based program to being specifically at the school doing, doing classes and integrating that way. And then is there any, like what happens if, I mean, is there any idea what's going to happen
086if temporary protected status for the Haitian community is lifted this summer like they say it's going to do we have any idea what that kind of impact is going to be? From my understanding, that ends on August 3rd. If it's, if that, if that stops. Your answer as good as mine. I mean, I think there's so many unknowns right now with legislation and what's happening. One of the things that I mentioned with our executive leadership and we'll talk about with our EL task force is that we need to remain flexible. So as things happen legislatively, as things happen in terms, even with grants at the federal level, we need to be ready to act quickly and come together and come with solutions. So at that point it'll be. That's one of the functions of the
087Yale Task Force will be to respond to those changes as they occur. Thank you so much. Any other questions? How exactly does the grant work at the end of the three year period, is this a one time opportunity or. Do you have the ability to apply again? Most grants, they are continuous grants, meaning that they continue to offer them every year. So the question would be at the end of three years, does Congress have, are they going to continue funding for another year? So in 2027, I believe when we will be done with our three year period, if they still have funding for the grant, then we would reapply, hopefully get it. But it's going to be up to Congress and that budget. And so it's a wait and see. But if the availability is
088there to apply and we're seeing success, that's really important to me, that we see success with it, then we'll certainly reapply. Thank you. Any other questions? Thank you, Erin. Thank you. Y'all have a good evening. At this time, we are going to recess the regular meeting. Yes. So I just wanted to mention, Mrs. Kahn, we're going to remove charter schools from the pending, and we will remove the Department of Justice grant from the pending as well. Okay. So that will leave affordable housing, Tommy Roberts, and the Coral Shores Athletic Field. Thank you. And so now we will begin the public hearing. Do we have anyone to speak on our first reading job description from the public? Nope. Terry, can you just. Yes. So this job description is the updating that we've been doing and bringing
089these job descriptions to you. So it really just. It's not a new position, and it simply goes along with what the job duties are. So we're kind of working and updating the job description. And what was the name of this position before? Director of Maintenance. Same name, same name. Okay. Just updating the descriptions and the duties. Thank you. Okay. Since there's nobody to speak at our public hearing, I'm going to reconvene the regular board meeting for our action items. So I believe. Dr. Pace, are you going to do that item or just read the list? I think the way we did it. At the last meeting was there was a motion by the board, and they verbally articulated the names, in this case of the finalists, and then they would take their vote on it.
090So if someone would make a motion, then. John, you want to make a motion? I'll make a motion that we approve the final candidates for the superintendent's position. And those candidates are. Edward Tierney, Laura Le Tart, Amber Acevedo, and Darren Burkett. Motion by Mr. Dick. Second by Dr. Woltanski. Any further discussion? My only discussion is congratulations to our four finalists. And if there are any or no, no votes, then the motion passes. All right. And action item number two. I recommend approval of the recommended adoption of K12 science and personal Financial Literacy, the materials for school years 2026 to 2030. This is not a budget. This is simply approving the materials themselves. So moved. I'll second. Motion by Dr. Waltanski. Second by Mr. Dick. Any discussion? Yeah, I have some discussion. The products are fine.
091I think they align to the current standards. We're finally buying. We're buying our financial literacy curriculum. Now, and there's a bill moving through that changes the financial literacy challenge. So if you want to talk about waste, it's having people purchase products and while they're changing the standards, you know, it's. We haven't even had the classes for a year and they are already changing what they want kids to learn in it. And anyway, is this an adoption we have to make today? Yeah. Yeah, please. Yeah, we're making this adoption. Come to the microphone. We can always add the new things if it passes. Those bills haven't passed yet. But it's just, you know, a frustration with the way that the system works. And it is a frustration. I'm sure Sarah, Dr. Adams can comment on it,
092but. But, you know, with the math textbooks, we pasted a section in because the math textbooks were inappropriate a couple of years ago. So. Sarah, do you want to comment? Yeah, I actually spoke with McGraw about this today, and it's not, you know, it's every district with this situation. So we are. I'm having my budget meeting actually tomorrow with everyone, but we are looking at different alternatives to just ordering. And I'm not. I told them I'm not going to commit for five years no matter what. It's just not responsible. We do, as an avid school district, have at our fingertips probably what we already need for that coursework. So we're going to look at that as well. But we did want to look through the standards, look through the materials and have, you know, have
093that opportunity to get familiar with them. But I'm 3,000% with you. I'm very frugal with money and very wise with decision making. When I was your literacy coordinator, we gap yeared twice. We had wonderful scores. Even with that because they were changing standards. So if you're in the middle of changing standards or adopting new coursework and also adopting materials, the likelihood of those materials being aligned is. It's not there. So we can still go forward with the recommendation and still not buy. Thank you so much. That's why I mentioned it wasn't a budget. Thank you. All right. And then lastly, wait, we need to. We need to. We move. So any no votes? Hearing none. The motion passes. And then lastly, our tentative add on. Not lastly. We've got one more after this. We do.
094Oh, we change the meeting date. Thank you so much. So, action item three. We are going to approve the surplus classification for tangible personal property and removal from the inventory. And I recommend approval. So moved. Second motion by Dr. Woltanski. Second by Mr. Horan. Any discussion? If anyone wants desks and chairs. And there's a phone number on the on the link to the agenda rationale item. If you want some of those products yourself, call the number and you can see how you can figure out how to do it. Just one caveat there. If you're a current employee, you really can't do that. Current employees are not able to do business. So. But anyway, members of the public, of. Course, I'm sure they'll explain that if you call. Any further discussion. Any no votes? Hearing none.
095The motion passes. And now lastly, I recommend a change from the meeting on May 6 from Marathon to Coral Shores. So moved. Second motion by Dr. Woltanski. Second by Mr. Horan. Any discussion? Any no votes? Hearing none. The Coral Shores High School additional meeting will happen on May 6th as we choose our superintendent. Thank you.