School Board Meeting @ CSH 02-24-2026 @ 5:00 pm - Feb 24, 2026

001School board meeting, Mr. Superintendent. You have somebody for the pledge? Yes. Good evening. The pledge will be led by Ms. Liv Madrigal. 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. I'll do it. Okay. The first thing on the agenda, we have to designate school board members for some individual assignments. The selection of the super board representative and alternate on the professional service advisory. I think I would recommend that the chair be the representative and the vice chair be the alternative. And this way you can do that every year because those people normally will change every year. Is that okay with everybody? It's fine by me. That's a done deal. Do we have

002to have a vote on that, Dirk? Yes, please. Okay. Are there any. No, Hold on a second. Do you want us to make. I don't think we need to make the decision that it's the chair and vice chair that can be like our protocol or whatever. So I'm going to make a motion that Mr. Dick is the representative and Mr. Haran is the alternate. Okay. Second. Any discussion? Are there any. No votes. Hearing them, then the representative and alternative are set. Okay. At this time we call to order for the adopt the agenda and format. I recommend the board adopt the agenda as presented. So moved. Second. Any discussion? The agenda is adopted. I recommend the board approve the minutes from the February 10, 2026 school board meeting. So move. Second. Any discussion on the

003minutes hearing none. The minutes are approved. At this time, I'm going to ask Deputy superintendent Acevedo to help us honor some extraordinary individuals. Thank you. Good evening. If I could have the superintendent and board chair, Mr. Dick, come forward tonight. We have several amazing gems to award. Because there are such great things happening in the Monroe County School District, I would like to begin by calling Vanessa Gabriel up, please. As Vanessa comes up, I'll tell you a little bit about her. Vanessa made Coral Shores history recently, becoming the first female and the first ever Coral Shores hurricane to win a state championship in women's weightlifting. Competing at the 2026 FHSAA Finals in Lakeland, she captured not one, but two state titles in a single day. Earning the double distinction of state champion. Vanessa claimed the

004Olympic division, state championship and the traditional division, setting personal records in both the clean and Jerk at 200 pounds and bench press at 185 pounds. This year also marked her fourth appearance at the state finals. Also a school record, her performance showcased extraordinary strength, discipline and determination. Quality she brings to every aspect of her life every day. True to the standard that students are. That athletes are students. First, Vanessa maintains an impressive 3.95, 4 GPA while taking six Advanced Placement classes. Congratulations, Vanessa. Your historic achievement. And you just signed with whom? Oh, she just got into the University of Miami. Oh, Mr. Russell must be beyond. So congratulations again. I end with. The entire Coral Shores community is so very proud of you. Congratulations on all of your accomplishments. Oh, yeah. Come on. There's a

005lot of excited hurricane fans out there today. I am sure. Bright future for Vanessa. Congratulations again, Vanessa. Next, I would like to call up Wyatt Myers, Kaden Holmes, Colin Dunn and Mars Shen from Plantation Key School. If these young men would come forward. As we celebrate CTE Month in the month of February, we would like to recognize Wyatt, Kaden, Collin and Mars as gems for their outstanding achievement and dedication in the career and technical ed program at Plantation Key School. They're joined here by Ms. Hart and Principal Taylor. As 8th grade students enrolled in Digital Information Technology, they have already demonstrated exceptional commitment to academic excellence and professional growth. Each student successfully earned the WordPress Essentials Industry certification, mastering key skills in website design, digital publishing, online communication and content management. Achieving IT at a

006middle school level reflects their initiative, advanced digital literacy and readiness for future opportunities in technology, business and entrepreneurship. Wyatt, Kaden and Colin consistently rise above their peers through their strong work ethic, focus and understanding of the importance of technology. Mars further distinguishes himself by earning four additional U Certified industry certifications, demonstrating exceptional drive, curiosity and mastery of advanced concepts well beyond middle school. Expect together, these students embody the spirit of gems. They strive for excellence and they represent the very best of our CTE program. So let's give them a round of applause. Congratulations. Thank you so much. Congratulations to all of you. All right. And next, also from Plantation Key, I would like to call up Liv Madrigal, who led us in the pledge. Liv, come on up. It's with great pride that we recognize

007her for her outstanding dedication, talent and leadership in the musical arts at pks. And would her music teacher, Kat, please. Garbro, please come up. Over her three years as a PKS band student, she has distinguished herself through numerous high level accomplishments including selection to the FBA Florida Bandmasters Association Seven Star Honor Band, the FBA All State Honor Band. And she has served two years as an all county honor band member. She earned a superior solo rating and at the Solos and Ensemble Festival. She's now in her second year performing with the Keys Community Concert Band. Demonstrating maturity and musicianship well beyond her age. Liv has also stepped into a leadership role as a student conductor during the winter band performance. And she's already begun preparing for high school marching with the Coral Shores Marching Band.

008Her continued appreciation for the musical arts combined with her drive makes her excellence to uplift others and makes her an outstanding gem and a true credit to the Panther community. Congratulations, Liv. Thank you so much, Ms. Taylor. You can stay because we are also going to recognize two Plantation Key teachers, Amanda Erickson and Brandy Smith. They are exemplary educators whose leadership and dedication have significantly advanced UFLI implementation at pks. As we shared with you earlier this year, UFLI has been very successful in our early education classrooms. Amanda, a kindergarten teacher and one of the earliest adopters of UFLI, has played a pivotal role in the program's success over the past three years. She is widely regarded as an expert supporting school wide implementation across the grant, modeling, sharing best practices and guiding PLCs. Brandy, a

009second grade teacher, has embraced UFLI with exceptional fidelity and enthusiasm. During a recent visit, the UFLI team from the Lastinger center praised her instruction as implementation done to perfection. They encouraged other educators to observe her classroom beyond her own outstanding teaching. Brandy has mentored two new teachers on her team, ensuring consistent, high quality literacy instruction across the grade levels. Together, Amanda and Brandy embody the true spirit of gems, creating great educational moments. They are passionate, committed and deeply invested in elevating literacy instruction for all of our students at PKS. And with them is Ms. Monica Worsley, the literacy coach at PKS. So congratulations to Ms. Erickson and Ms. Smith. Again, kudos to all of the Plantation Key recipients. And now we're moving on to Key Largo School. So we have Assistant Principal Ms. Tiffany Saveda

010with us. Mr. Pace is not feeling he's feeling a little under the weather. So first we would like to call up Darwin Horn. Darwin is an exceptional 8th grade student whose dedication, skill and academic rigor have set him apart at KLS in his first year of CTE. Despite being new to the program, he's already earned his WordPress certified editor credential along with three level three industry certifications, entrepreneurship and Small Business, QuickBooks and Intuit Bookkeeping. Far more than I could ever imagine doing myself. So kudos to you, Darwin. These accomplishments reflect not only his strong grasp of real world technology and financial concepts, but also his determination and perseverance. Darwin approaches every challenge with an entrepreneurial mindset, demonstrating critical thinking, problem solving and a proactive attitude toward learning. His work ethic, accountability and future focused drive

011make him an exceptional student and deserving of this gem award. Congratulations, Darwin. And next, also from Key Largo School, I'd like to bring up, please, miss Katherine Garcia. Miss Garcia demonstrates exceptional leadership and instructional excellence in the Tornado community through her strong implementation of UFLI and her commitment to supporting school wide literacy growth. She consistently delivers high quality structured literacy instruction with fidelity ensuring her students make meaningful academic gains. Beyond her own classroom, Kathryn plays a vital role in strengthening literacy practices across the entire KLS staff by facilitating professional learning community where she guides colleagues in analyzing data, deepening instructional understanding, and sharing effective strategies. Her openness to continuous improvement is evident in her willingness to welcome district coaches into her classroom for observation, feedback and modeling of best practices. Kathryn's dedication to her students,

012her collaboration with her colleagues, and her leadership in advancing UFLY make her an invaluable contributor to the success of the entire Tornado learning community. Congratulations Ms. Garcia. And that concludes our we'll take one more picture. Also with us is Assistant Principal Ms. Hannah Fisher. And that concludes our great Educational Moments presentations. A lot of great things happening at MCSD. We have anybody signed up? I think we do, right? First up we have Mr. Rich Russell requesting five minutes. Is there anybody else? Let me read it then. Presentations to the Board are limited to 3 minutes each for individual speaker and 5 minutes per representative of a designated group. Transfer of time between individuals and or groups is not permitted. Letters submitted to each Board member and or the Board Secretary prior to a Board meeting

013will not additionally be read into the record at the meeting. All statements must be directed towards the Board. No person may address or question Board members individually and a board member will not engage in a dialogue with persons making public comment. Furthermore, all speakers agree to abide by the Code of Conduct of Citizen Input through school board policy 01690 point and will begin their presentation by stating the full name in their city or town of residence. For the record. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. My name is Richard Russell and I'm a resident of Islamorada. Lifelong resident. I'm requesting five minutes if you will allow that. I'll be speaking on behalf of the Upper Keys Foundation. UKF is a non profit organization of Barnaby Rich and I, co founded in 2011. Our primary mission is to help

014underwrite the many needs of Carl Shores Athletic Department, particularly those student athletes who have financial challenges. So if I can get the five minutes, I'd appreciate it. In my email to the Board this morning and to Mr. Superintendent, I pointed out that the Monroe County School Board and Coral Shores yielded our rights to, you know, exclusive control of baseball facilities when we agreed to relocate to Founders Park. We made that move to allow track and tennis programs to exist both Programs are playing today. By the way, you can accurately assume that I absorbed a fair amount of criticism for our time when I supported the move. However, given the alternatives, I'd make the same decision today. I've seen firsthand the profound and positive impact that track and tennis have made on countless student athletes at

015Crawl Shores. Those programs have changed lives, they've opened doors and they provided opportunities that otherwise would not exist. Let me add that over the past 25 years, our partnership with the village, to my knowledge, we've had no significant issues between us. Our relationship has long been marked by cooperation and mutual respect. That's never changed. And as I mentioned in your email, while this process is certainly included differing opinions talking about the process of developing the park, I want to emphasize that Village manager Ron Saunders and the members of the village council have approached this matter thoughtfully and responsibly. They understand the importance of Carl, Schwarz, Davey and Varsity baseball to our community and they approved the project with artificial turf unanimously by 50 vote. There have been concerns expressed. Mr. Chairman, we talked about this

016before the meeting regarding the two year termination clause. Realistically, in my humble opinion, there is no incentive, politically or practically, for the village to disrupt or dismantle the Coral Shores base program. They recognize, I trust everybody here today recognizes that there is no viable alternative for a facility for high school baseball in the Upper Keys. Before I close, please accept these comments in the spirit they're intended. I certainly mean no offense by anything I'm sharing. I've been incredibly blessed in my life. I thank God for those blessings every night. My wife and I are landlords of office space apartments and a handful of rental houses, and every single one of those has lease agreements. They all contain language that protect our property and maintain our standards. If a tenant wants to make a change, our

017answer is usually absolutely. But we're going to do it the right way. Clear expectations and consistent standards prevent problems before they ever start. I offer that example again respectfully, to repurpose the analogy I used this morning in my email. I'm on the one yard line in my career and certainly don't want to fumble right now. I just believe that clarity and high standards ultimately serve everyone well. So I close by thanking each one of you for your for allowing me to share this perspective. I greatly appreciate your leadership and I mean that sincerely and I thank you in advance for making the needs of the Carl Shores baseball program the top priority as you work through this baseball license agreement. I look forward to next season when Carl Shores baseball is practicing and competing on

018a first class facility that reflects the pride of our students and our community. Thank you so much. Next up, we have Mr. Ron Saunders requesting five minutes. Mr. Chairman, School Board members, superintendent, staff. For the record, I'm Ron Saunders. I am the village manager for Islamorada, Part time resident of Islamorada, part time resident, Cudjoe Key. So I kind of split both places. I asked for permission to speak tonight because I wanted to just give a status update from the village's perspective on the baseball field of Founders park and then see if you have any questions. Because we do want to continue the wonderful relationship we've had over the years with the school district. A little history. Back in February 2001, the school board and the village entered to an agreement, an interlocal agreement, ILA, that

019governed the use of the field. And it's worked well for 25 years and we want to continue that. That agreement expired and in 2024, the school district and the village entered to a new ILA and that's what's been governing our negotiations for the past couple years. I started as I'm on our village manager in April of 2025, so that's kind of when I took over the mantle. Mr. Tierney came in after that. So we've been not really negotiating directly, but we have been in touch. And so from our standpoint, just a little bit of the history. When I came in, I appointed a baseball committee of citizens, five member committee, went to numerous meetings, the parks recreation committee, village council meetings, had a lot of meetings with constituents who had said over the past years

020they didn't feel like as Alamo residents and owners of the field, they'd had enough input. I think at this point we can say they've had a lot of input. After all that input, after hundreds of hours of input, I brought before the village council on January 8th a proposed baseball license agreement. And after discussion, it passed unanimously 5-0. If you'd watched all the meetings prior to that, that was a bitter surprise because we didn't think it would be that that much agreement. Let's just say we went with the artificial turf, which was a really controversial issue. We made some concessions, in my opinion. We sent that to the school district on January 9, which was the official position of the village of Islamorada on February 13th. So we sent it on January 9th. On February

02113th, I received from our legal counsel, Mr. Quick, a revised proposal that basically had a lot of red lines through it and additions, which apparently was the result of a workshop. The school board had And I came to say that we have some concerns about it. But I figured the best way to do is have an open meeting in the sunshine, talk about it and see how we can put this thing to rest. Because I think everybody here wants an agreement. I certainly do. I think everybody I've talked to wants an agreement. So we want to see kind of where we're apart. We want to start the basic premise of everybody agrees the village of Islamorada owns the baseball field, we are the owner. I don't think anybody disagrees with that one. As Mr. Russell

022said, we consider ourselves the landlord and the tenant. I'm an attorney, has prepared numerous leases for myself and for others. Almost every lease I prepared contains a standard clause that before a tenant can make improvements or renovations, they need the written permission from the landlord. That's a pretty standard clause. And that's kind of what we're asking for, is that we want to have final approval for anything that goes on our property. Having said that, there's very few things I can think of that I would say as the designee of the council that we would have a problem with. We've had a great agreement with you for 25 years. We want to continue that. And so I don't really understand all these changes that came back after our village council approved once again a 50 vote

023of the official position. So tonight, I guess I wanted to come before you and say if there's something that's a stumbling block or that's a basically a no go, I'm not clear what it is because the changes were made basically trying to take away, in my opinion, the right of the owner of the, of the field, the village council and the, and the Islamorada residents, our right to have final approval of anything. And once again, a reminder, I've dealt with school district for a long time and I know that when you do projects on your own property, you're pretty much on your own. You can do whatever you want to. This is on property not owned by the school district. So we're going to require permits, plans, et cetera, just like anybody else would come

024in there. We certainly want to work with you on it, but we are going to have final approval one way or another on what goes in our field. And so having said that, that's the point I want to make tonight is that we want to have an agreement as soon as possible. Right now the only official position of the council is the five to nothing agreement that we pass on January 8th. If we have to make some Differences. There's some differences we need to resolve. I'm open to it, but at this point, I brought copies, but apparently you've already seen them. This was the agreement we passed. And all these red lines are from you guys, so there are too many to go through paragraph by paragraph. My point being, I think a lot of

025it's just some language that we want to do, but if you have something in particular that you want to talk about, I'm open. But we need to get this thing done because people are getting impatient. I know you have a contractor ready to go, and we want to work with the contractor, work with the school district, but at this point, we're kind of stalled until we can come to some agreements with that. I'm not sure how much time I have left, but I'll weigh the reign of my time and answer any questions. Or listen, any input from the school board. Next up, Next up, we have Mr.Frank Derfler requesting five minutes. Wow. Can you top that? Frank Drerfler, Village of Islamorada. Since before there was a village of Islamorada, I'm here to say thank you.

026Basically, this last weekend, we had our 31st annual gigantic nautical Market. We filled your parking lots, we filled the side streets, we filled the old road, we filled every place. We hauled in school buses. Well, well over 6,000. More like 8,000 people back and forth to the park. 350 vendors, 20 food trucks. Why do we do it? Why? Well, because we're able to put into this community about $250,000, about a quarter of a million dollars in benefits to both CTE and academic scholarships, interestingly, from the Upper Keys Rotary Foundation. More than half of that goes to students already in university or technical education. And so that's why we do it. The Gigantic Nautical Market has enabled the Upper Keys Rotary foundation to put about $4.1 million into benefits for the community. Over the last 20

027years, we've done all sorts of things, like we have an agreement with the local hospital. Right now, we've funded about $75,000 in student scholarships for students who are interested in medical science. We had an agreement with the Landau foundation. We funded about $100,000 in scholarships for the arts to students. For scholarships for the arts. We've just closed that one out. So it is our pleasure, it is our duty, it is our mission to help support the students of the Upper Keys and throughout the Keys. That, by the way, includes about $50,000 a year to take stock, which, of course, is matched by the legislature. So Again, thank you. Thank you for the use of your school buses. Thank you for the use of your parking lots. Thank you for the support of your staff. And

028oh, thank one or two of you who actually were there doing things during the event. So from the Upper Keys Rotary foundation, thanks for your support for the gigantic nautical market. The only time I'll interact. Thank you. Mr. Dick. That concludes citizens input. Thank you. I have the consent agenda. 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 will be no separate discussion of these items prior to this meeting. Board members have had the opportunity to review each of these items and may request that any item be moved to an action item for individual consideration. I recommend the board approve the consent agenda as presented. So move. Second. Any discussion? Are there any. No votes? Hearing None. The consent

029agenda has passed. Yes, you have Amber. We have a report this evening. It's an academic report. I want to thank the team for putting this together because it's. It's an aggressive report covering a couple of different facets of the performance of the district. So I appreciate the work that they put into that and we will turn it over to the academic team. Good evening everyone. I am joined by Heidi Roberts, who is our English language arts coordinator and Yanelis Ballard, our director of assessment and accountability. And we are going to share data and some information and share with you a story. So I'll let Ms. Roberts begin. Good evening, Chairman, members of the board, superintendent, members of the community, we're glad you're here because we have some really great things to report to you tonight

030for our mid year review. Our story begins with data. And to share that story with you, I'm going to turn it over to Yanelis Ballard who is our director of assessment and accountability. Good evening. Our story begins with our youngest K1 and 2. What you see before you is our star progress monitoring data. This graph represents the percent of students estimated to score at or above the state benchmark. I'd like to direct your attention to the blinking green dotted lines when you're looking at the math proficiency data for PM2. Last year we were at 59.8%. For PM2. This year we're at 68.5%. That's an 8.7% increase. And then for our star reading proficiency last year we were at 58.8%. This year at 63.2%, which represents an increase of 4.4%. This slide represents our grades 3,

03110, ELA and 3. 8 Mathematics. This is historical data from PM 1, 2 and 3 from 2223 to present. The orange line is district data and the blue line is our state data. In English Language Arts, 47% of our students at the midway point are performing at or above grade level. This represents a 9% increase since the beginning of the school year as well as a 4% increase from this point last year. In mathematics, we're at 32% of our students are performing at or above grade level, which is a 17% increase from the beginning of the year and a 2% increase from this time last year. The blinking green light represents a continuous increase year after year for our progress monitoring scores. And as we continue our story, I'd like to share the progress made

032with our English language learners within the same time frame. The data you're seeing represents percent of EL students in at or above grade level for English Language arts. The blue line represents PM1, the orange line is PM2, and the green line is PM3. We're starting with 22-23 PM1 until our most recent 25-26 PM2. So I'd like to draw your attention to PM2, where we've made a 4% increase compared to this same time last year for our English language Arts or our English Language learners in our ELA progress monitoring data. Similarly for mathematics, we've had a 1% increase in our PM2 data from this time last year. Transitioning to our ESC student population, we started PM1 with a 1% increase. PM2 performance data has remained unchanged compared to last year at 21%. And for mathematics, similarly,

033we were at a 1% increase in PM1. PM2 is unchanged at 13%. So you've seen district trends. So now I'm going to give you provide school level progress. So the bar represents a comparison of PM2 from 2425 and PM2 of this current school year of 2526. As you can see, the majority of our schools are performing better in PM2 this year than they were in last year. So we're starting with English Language Arts. And then similarly for math, the majority of our schools are performing better this year than we were last year. So now our story brings us to an important milestone in a young person's life. It's high school graduation. The state provides graduation rate as lagging data. So what you're seeing represents graduation rate from the class of 2022 to the class of

0342025. The blue represents the state of Florida and the yellow represents The Monroe County School District. We're very proud of the increase we've made from 86.9% to a 91.9%, which is a noticeable 5% increase from the 2324 graduation rate. Now, our director of assessment accountability shared our data story which demonstrates those positives. Do you guys want questions at the end or do you want them as we go? Can you go back to the graduation rate? So what happened that year? Because if you were to look, I think if you were to put your line from 2122 up to now, it would show a continuous increase. So what happened last year that caused us like, have you considered that? Yes, we've had a lot of discussion with amongst ourselves and our team. And when we look

035back, one of the big factors from 23, 24 is that those students entered high school during COVID years. So they're beginning high school education. As they started to meet those graduation rates. They were not in school. It was online. And we look back at the trend data in progress monitoring, and again, remember, they weren't assessing at the same. But if we look at grades and we look at the trend data coming out of that, we know that our students started at a lower pace. And as you said, you're right, if we added the fifth year back, you'd see that we were going up. But this class, again, coming out was performing at a lower, you know, line. So if we'd have shown you the trend data for that class in particular, just the single class,

036it wouldn't have looked like our earlier graphs. So that was one big factor that we felt was key to this graduation. And this is also lagging data. So that's another piece. So those that was lower Algebra 1 scores in 9th grade, and that as well, are fewer kids. Right. And if you look at attendance and grades during that time. Dr. Woltanski. Absolutely. We faced that, what everyone did, which is getting the momentum of kids into classes, making sure they were completing courses, and again, caring a lot about their social, emotional, and making sure that they stayed with it. So in looking again, we're not 100% sure, but those were some of the factors that the team discussed because it's obviously a glaring change in the trend that we were making. Yeah, thank you. Any other

037questions at this point? But Covid was all over the state. Correct. So there had to be something more to it than that. It again, we looked back at trends. In the end, it the preparation, the kids going in there was a larger component of students who are not graduation ready. And again, we can't pinpoint exactly. And this team has looked back in terms of what we can see, which is data and numbers as all of us are kind of new from when those students were graduating. So again, but we have reviewed it, we have looked at it to try to see if there are other things. And the support coming out of it of course was very heavy with Esser funding. So there was a lot of support put in post. That why we compare

038so differently to the state? We're not exactly sure. We just kind of looked at our students and historical data to see what we could determine is the difference there. And we also know that our preparation program to have students graduation ready by the time they enter 12th grade has improved drastically. So our trend data on that is a second piece that I think is has contributed to this graduation rate and what we assume will be again a trend upward. Because what we are doing with graduation coaches and what we are doing to make sure that we are supporting our students so they come in to their senior year graduation ready has also improved. All right, I'll let Ms. Roberts go on. So about that big blinky plus 5%. I'm going to continue our data story

039talking about how we are noticing upward trends. So even that 5% increase is something that we are acknowledging as a success that we want to continue to build upon. So as we look ahead, we think what comes next. Our superintendent introduced the one team one goal initiative for student success. This involved all levels of district staff pushing in to support students from Key west all the way up to key Largo, from VPK all the way to 12th grade twice a week for about an hour each visit. Sounds easy, right? How do we get that off the ground? So from vision to system wide action. We began this process by surveying our district employees to identify where they felt they could best be helpful, which location, which grade bands they wanted to support, which teaching experience

040level they considered themselves to have. And then we also surveyed our school administrators to identify what needs they felt they had in their building so that we could match people up to be most effective and not waste anyone's time. Look closely at this picture. You recognize these faces. They are from every department in our school district. There were 70 plus district employees that attended Ms. Acevedo and her team's training presentation so they could be prepared to support students. 70 plus district employees in one room for one goal or online for student success. Some of the data you see here, that top pie chart is just demonstrating how we use that data collected from our progress Monitoring information as well as the survey data to assign staff members to schools with intentionality. We wanted to make

041sure that we put people where they were needed so that we were not wasting anyone's time. The second bar or the top bar graph there in the middle is kind of just a vibe check. We were trying to get perception of how people were feeling prior to going into the schools for this district support visit initiative. The bottom bar graph is showing the significant change of emotions. So at first people were feeling any range from total confidence to complete panic. Now we've seen after their first visit that people are feeling far more confident in their experiences with the One Team One Goal initiative. This is a complete credit to the people working in the buildings, the literacy coaches and the building administrators and the efforts that they put in to ensure that we are being

042successful with this One Team One Goal initiative. In addition to that, on the district side of things, we are continually cycling for improvements. Right now we are reviewing the implementation phase of the 1T1 goal initiative. And as we move on through development of the process, we're going to continue reevaluating and ensuring that we are doing the best that we possibly can to maximize outcomes for students. So I mentioned that staff from the district perceptions are positive. But let's hear from the people in the buildings. [VIDEO PLAYS] Our building administrators are feeling positive. One of our major concerns going into this initiative was we wanted to be sure that we weren't placing any additional burden on the teachers in the buildings. So let's hear what they think about the One Team One Goal initiative. [VIDEO PLAYS]

043So as you've heard, district support members are pushing in to support ELA Math Science. Essentially where the data shows the support is gonna the support goes. Now let's hear from some of our most important team members. [VIDEO PLAYS] So our story continues with our oldest learners. You may know that the state requires our seniors to pass the Algebra and ELA 10 test in order to graduate. If students do not pass, they're offered opportunities for retake or alternative assessments to capture concordance in order to meet those graduation requirements. So let's talk about how this One Team One Goal initiative ties into that. But first, a little bit more background. In our district, new concordance assessment options have become available for the 2526 school year. Monroe county began with 155 students that were at risk of not

044graduating because they had not passed their ELA 10 or their algebra assessment. Now we only have 52 students in the district that remain. Our latest administration of the CLT10 test, which is one of those new assessments that we adopted, tripled our number of senior passers. So as a result of that, the district kind of evaluated the pass rates as well as the cost of the assessments and determined that we want to offer an April opportunity for our seniors and juniors to take the CLT10 one more time. This also allows for students to have extended time, and we're really hopeful about the outcomes from that. This graph is sort of just reiterating what I said. Those blue bars represent this school year. The left side shows August where we began the school year. I want to

045point out that we began the year with less students than years prior that needed to capture concordance in order to graduate. And then the bar to the right in blue is now representing the 8.4% of students that remain in February that still need to Capture Concordance. Our One Team One Goal initiative is also working diligently to support those 8.4 remaining percent of seniors that need to capture concordance. The folks in this room with microphones in front of them behind you are working directly with seniors in our school district to help them prepare for these tests so that they can be successful and earn a diploma. So you've heard from me. I want to point out one of our seniors here who's photographed with the superintendent and one of our literacy coaches. That's an example of

046one of our students who's been paired up for the One Team One Goal initiative and did earn his concordance score, now knows that he can graduate. But let's hear from a few more from across the district. [VIDEO PLAYS] You can see how proud those students are and what a relief that they are now experiencing. Our story continues into our future. As Deputy Superintendent, Ms. Acevedo is going to share how we're planning with intent to maximize Opportunities for all students. Before I go on, does anyone have any questions on that portion? As you saw, Dr. Waltinski, if you look at the graduation, that was what I was referring to. Referring to. We look at the trend and they just weren't as prepared coming in. Can I just what schools were the videos from the teachers and

047the younger students? Like I know Mrs. Whitehead is Poinciana. We had Gerald Adams teacher of the year, Dara Hennessy. The students from those schools were the two Gerald Adams students. Then the high school kids were Key West High and Queen Coral Shore is high. And you're finding in the schools that we didn't have the videos of, they're just as pleased as the schools that we did hear from? Conversations and through. Again, we're trying to submit that survey data and gather feedback from people so that we can continually seek to improve. And if there are issues or any adjustments that do need to be made, we've been making them. For example, those surveys have, in addition to the questions that were asked there, there were some open ended responses of how can we make this program

048better for you or for students? And a lot of schedule changes had to be made. There were some adaptations that were made kind of in response because we know we want it to be a positive experience. We don't want to be wasting adults time, we don't want to be wasting students time. So so far I guess to answer your question, feedback has been pretty positive. What about the juniors? Are you doing focused on juniors now too? And what was their success? Do we have that? We don't have the data up there. But yes, we are providing opportunities for juniors to take it, to take the CLT10 which is again a new concordant. And they also get the opportunities and the preparation for sats when they come and as well as again to take the fast

049test retakes. And now we've added the CLT10 and they can take the ACT. So each time there's an option for a concordance score and again there are several, there is preparation done through literacy coaches, their reading classes to prepare them for the upcoming assessment. And what we found by adding in the CLT10, which is one of the reasons we focused on it was it was new this year and we found again that those early administrations were successful and had a slightly higher number of students passing. So again the reason we're adding it for seniors only is kind of just watching cost preparation and you know, looking at it because the juniors will also be able to take fast, take retakes Et cetera. Okay, and then what happens to those seniors in their school day once

050they pass the test? Well, it's a school. Each school makes a decision, but a lot of those students move on. And once they have, if they are in a reading class which is preparatory for them to pass the concordance score, they meet with counselors, determine their interests, and usually move into an elective if they need it. And if they are credit ready, meaning they've earned all their credits, it's the only thing that they're waiting for. Then with their counselor, they determine what's the best place. But we do not. Generally, they do. They are not held in a reading class. Some kids will stay in because they need it for a GPA boost. They still want to enhance their skills. So the story is not the same for every single student, but it is done on

051an individualized basis with the counselor and of course, the team. Okay, thank you. I gather it must be expensive. So if we tripled the passes, was that 1 to 3 or 20 to 60? If we tripled the number of passers. Right. Well, we've just given the CLT10 this year, so I don't have the conclusion Data, but the CLT10 test is under $25 a student when we give it. But again, at the end of the year, we'll look at the data, but thus far, the data shows that that is the test that has more capacity for passers at taking. So the numbers that you're asking for, I don't have, but we can definitely compile those test by test because again, there are several methods to concordance scores. Well, I mean, even offhand, is it 1 to

0523 or 20 to 60 or somewhere. It was by percent, like 6% for SAT and then tripled for CLT. So we hadn't done by a number by a percent here. 15.4% for the CLT passers. And for SAT it was under 7%. So we are getting a better return using the CLT and cost effective wise, it is under $25 per student. The CLT 10 that we are providing in April is untimed, meaning it's not college reportable, but every student can have extended time. And that's why we're offering it for any student that needs it. Any seniors that need it. And they can take it more than once. Yes, they take in it. We administer in November, we did it in February, and now we're going to do it again in April and we can superscore it.

053Which means for CLT10, if they did better on one versus the other. Like, if they needed the ELA and the math portion, we can grab one score from one administration, another score from a different administration. You can take it from wherever, but. But as you get towards the end, you have some of the ones that just be the toughest one to pass. So may not go up anymore. We got all hands on deck. It would be good if it did. And again, we offer opportunities well past a graduation ceremony if a student does only, you know, earn a certificate of completion, but is continuing to try to get that concordance score. In fact, Coral Shores High School had a student this year who earned a concordance score, and they were a graduate in 2024. So

054they took home their diploma now in 2026. So there are students who have perseverance, and we're giving them opportunities. And so we don't give up as long as they're working toward it and to be able to help them out. So that would count on. Not in our graduation rate. No, but it. No, it doesn't count on our graduation rate. However, it does complete our mission absolutely right. We are handing someone a diploma. So over the past year, that has happened at several schools. Students just staying with it to get what they needed. And again, we're working with them to afford that opportunity. So moving on, one of, again, a lot of initiatives that we are doing. And so the superintendent asked us to talk about our scheduling process, which we are revising. And superintendent brought

055master Board. And so we are working on a new process. And our commitment is very simple, that every student deserves a personalized pathway for their strengths, their interests, and for their goals. We know achievement grows when students have access to the right opportunities at the right time. So superintendent Tierney charged the team with restructuring the scheduling process and redesigning the master Board to better serve support individualized progress. So a little bit different process, and we want to share that process with you. Every school determined a scheduling team, a new Master Board team. And that was a slightly different approach, where it was just administrators before in several cases. But this is comprised of administrators, counselors, in some case teachers, such as el ese teacher to come together and talk about what they would like the

056schedule, review their schedule in its current status, and then look at what they'd like. They reviewed data including advanced placement, dual enrollment. They looked at acceleration CTE pathways and elective assignments. They looked at barriers to access. Were there subgroups of students who were not getting into certain advanced placement or opportunities? So that was a design and prototyping stage. Then the Next phase was course selection and that was a focus on expanding acceleration opportunities and increasing access to interest aligned courses and advanced courses. So schools submitted new course requests and we've had a lot of interesting things, taking in student interest, parent suggestions and the staff. And again, looking at the pathways that they have already built, they brought to us new course requests that were vetted by the curriculum team. And by vetted, that means

057aligned with state standards and feasibility overall, does it lead to something else? So this is an opportunity that I get to share with you that we have introduced the Cambridge ACE program. It's a rigorous, internationally recognized curriculum offering flexible pathways and potential college credit. It's launching at Marathon High School and Key West High School alongside with dual enrollment and Advanced Placement. This will be in addition to those offerings. Both the Cambridge and the Advanced Placement capstone diploma earn a student a Bright Future scholarship. The reason that Coral Shores chose Not to implement 8 this year is because they are very heavy in Advanced Placement. They have a strong, rigorous Advanced Placement program here. What they have instituted is they have instituted the capstone program. And that along with the ACE diploma, there are requirements. If

058students take so many courses, if they pass certain tests and meet that requirement, then they would earn a designated diploma. And with that capstone or ACE diploma, as I said, that student earns a bright Future scholarship, which means that SAT that other students have to master and so forth are not something that will hold them back. So we're very excited about that. And all three schools are planning on a new implementation that fits their students and again, what their interests are in creating their master board. So how did families learn about this? Well, you might have heard there have been showcases at the high schools, there have been articulation visits. One of the things that was implemented several years ago that we have spent a lot of time focusing to make sure every student and

059their families are aware of what we have to offer in our schools is through visits where we bring the incoming 8th graders to visit the high schools, where we bring in K through 8s. They don't need that articulation between 5th and 6th. But at HOB, we started two years ago where they go out and visit the two elementary schools that feed into them so that they get the knowledge and the view of how exciting it is to go to the next step in one of our schools. So that's been an opportunity and again, you might have seen some of those things. They continue on and that is part of this whole process and it helps them become aware of what courses are out there. What is new and what is their interest and what pathway

060might they want to take? So at this time, we are in the student registration and budget alignment phase. And that is the part where we are preparing our students, particularly at the secondary level. And right now the focus is at high school to give their individualized course request. And that is being done not in mass, but counselors or administrators are going to sit with every single student over the next month and talk to the student to ensure that they have their interests represented in their course requests, that their opportunities are there, that they're aware of new opportunities, and particularly in some of our subgroups to look at the data and their performance to determine are they ready to try something a little more rigorous or a little more advanced, and if they need support, what

061support do we need to give them so that we build that all in to the Master Board, not just the courses and who's teaching what, but the support so that every student can succeed. And that will create that Master Board schedule. And the next part of that is once all the course requests are in and the budget is in so we align it and make sure we have the right people in the right places, then we will, much earlier than in the past. By May, we will have our Master Board schedule in a solid draft form. And then we can help teachers prepare for what they're going to teach next year so that we can train them in the summer. They'll know as they go off. For example, the teachers coming to the ACE program,

062we are providing training in the summer. There's a new science class, Coastal Sciences, that just seems to have been taking off this year. So this gives an opportunity in that staff preparation phase to train our students, I mean, our teachers, and let them be prepared. And then all that guesswork, and some of you probably can remember, what's my schedule, what's my teacher going to be? And you don't know until like that magic day when they unlock it. We kind of remove all of that and we know where we're going. Students know, teachers know, and families know. So that is our goal, to do our rollout and then our communication about what is coming in the 26, 27 school year. So we began by looking at data from our youngest learners through our graduation rates, with

063progress monitoring too, showing most students on an upward trajectory and better prepared for graduation. This information guided, as Ms. Roberts said, how we deployed one team, one goal. And we now are, as we, ironically enough, we are working towards successfully completing this year while we are planning for an even better next Year using our data and looking at continuous improvement, data driven decisions, and again, the commitment to individualized scheduling and opportunities for growth so that every one of our students can thrive and again, find the pathway that suits them. And we provide the support so they'll be successful. And that superintendent and board is a completion. So questions on any of this? So not really a question. Thank you all for your great work on this initiative. For those of the public or even the

064school board that don't know, the CLT10 and the ACE program were both Superintendent Tierney's ideas. He brought them to me during our interview. It was one of the things that really pushed me in that he was bringing new ideas and initiatives to the school district to help more of our students be successful. And so I personally appreciate all the work that you guys put into new ideas because I really. The CLT10 is already working. For those in the public who don't know what we mean when we talk about concordance scores, it means that people who aren't passing their ELA or math requirements have opportunities by taking different kinds of tests in order to allow them to graduate. So, for instance, if they do well on the ACT or the sat, that also would give them

065concordance scores, they get opportunities through a college readiness exam that CFK also administers. But CLT is an exam that allows students who never before would have gotten a high school diploma to get a high school diploma. It doesn't have them college ready, but typically those students aren't heading to college. So this is enormous. And I really thank Superintendent Tierney, A, for bringing it to us and B, the whole team for implementing it in a way that's clearly been successful. And the ACE program was another thing. It's for those students who are college ready and going to college, but it's another way to define themselves, separate themselves, and show themselves as ready and top students in a climate where it's just gotten more and more and more difficult to get into the schools you want because

066of the competitiveness. So thank you, team, thank you, thank you, principals, and thank you, Mr. Tierney, for bringing these new opportunities for our kids. Yeah, I have a question on the scheduling. So. Does this mean that the kids will put in their requests and we're going to determine what the teachers will be teaching based on what the student requests are. So the way that it works, and this time, again, there will be some individual conversation with students, and some students know exactly the path they're going. But yes, course requests will go into the Master Board schedule. So, for example, these ACE Courses they cover, again, gamut, including cte, which is another angle of the part of the CTE program. I mean, the ACE program that's different from Advanced Placement. But anyway, they'll have the opportunity.

067And for example, Marathon High is putting out seven or eight new courses. Well, they may not all get a full classroom of students interested in that, but they want to put out there what they've heard. So when all the requests are in, then through focus, we will be able to tell where the interest lies, what classes we can fiscally offer. Meaning they have enough students that are interested in teaching that, and that will help build the Master Board schedule. So that's why many of you who have children know you're going to get an English, your math, your science, your social studies, your requirements. But in the elective world, it's where the interest is, lies. And again, making sure that if students start on a CTE pathway, they can continue on. If they're interested in fine

068arts, we can do that. So their interests and their elective choices does partially drive how the Master Board ends up looking. Because if a class has only eight students interested, then again, not fiscally sound and we won't be able to offer that. And again, we're waiting for the budget. So it all has to come together. But it begins with, with the student, what they're interested in and the right pathways. So often the kids who are taking these advanced classes, like in your junior year, they're all taking AP Lang and they're taking AP Chemistry, and they're in AP Precalc and AP U.S. history. And often that leaves them only French to take. Say there is no Spanish class that can fit in for kids who are taking those four classes. And that's what I'm asking. Is

069it flexible enough that you'll be able to before the day before school starts when they say, well, you can't, you know that you can move classes around just for that sort of, of things. Yes. And I think what you're talking about, where there's only one class and you have to. And oftentimes seniors with those Advanced Placement type courses is they have those individual classes. So there's only one of AP Spanish, there's only one. And how do you make that come together? And that is part of building that Master Board because from an administrative, from the team standpoint, you're looking where the interest lies. And a big one is, for example, band, band encompasses. And our bands are growing in all three high schools. So you'll look at those large groups and then you look at

070those individual classes and then you schedule those around. And so yes, that's what the team that I talked about before they come in and look at that based on the student request to make sure that we can accommodate as many as we can. And it doesn't happen 100% of the time because sometimes that is the only place it fits. And students may have to choose from that live synchronous. But then we also have other offerings that we can go to in the Key west area. DE is larger, so of course it's different. And that's why every high school is a little bit different in their approach. But what you're asking me is how do we do that? It's when we put all the course requests in, the team looks at it and make sure that

071the computer. Computer's not spitting out the schedule. It is looked at. It gives you the massive look. And then you have to. It's kind of old school. I'm old school. We used to have a magnetic board. This doesn't fit here. So you move the magnet here because you want to make sure those kids have every opportunity. Let me interrupt. I got a message. There's no volume going out on the tv. Right. But we're all talking. They can't hear anything. You have to repeat that now. Okay. My magnet story, really? I got it from, well, one person. Somebody's. Yeah, so. Well, she was here earlier. Okay. Okay. Dr. Waltinski? Yeah. What's the parents involvement in the student course selection? At high school students take the information home. We have the showcases, but when students come back

072and sit with a counselor, they're sitting with them. However, counselors are open to parents who want to come in and talk to them about the schedule. And part of the this new master board process is, and the superintendent brought, is with intention that by May students can see their schedules. So that way if a parent does have a concern or what commonly happens sometimes is over the course of the summer they will earn the ability to take a dual enrollment course, whether it's online. You know, here they take them sometimes online from UF because or again College of the Florida Keys, they earn that over the summer test assignments and then they want to change their schedule for that. So all of that is still possible because again, the superintendent charged us with creating a

073master board schedule and a process that allowed for individualization and more ability to take opportunities for acceleration and advancement. So that was our charge and that is that will continue until the first day of school. So will somebody have a change? Yes, but what they won't do is go through the whole summer wondering, what's it going to be? Which has been part of the process in the past. And the assumption is this should greatly reduce the schedule changes at the beginning of the following year. Yes. Which has been a problem that the Superintendent. Superintendent is also trying to address. Correct? Correct. Okay, thank you. So what point does a student find out that their schedule choice can't be met because the class can no longer be offered because it's not fiscally responsible, and what do

074they do to fill in that class? So if we put our schedules in, we create the Master Board, and this is what we can offer. I wanted to take Perfect one. That comes up often as AP Music Theory. And I want to take it, but only eight students want to take it. Honestly, as a team, there's a lot that goes on. They notify the student that their choice can't be. And every student doesn't get notified that their choice can't be made because that going back twice is difficult with some larger classes. But when the schedule is put out, there's information that comes out these classes did not make. And so in those types of things, for the more the students that are entering that Advanced Placement and dual enrollment, any class, the students can go

075down and see their counselor if they know there's a conflict. As Dr. Wotanski said, there's a conflict. This is the only time we can offer French and Spanish. You want to take both. This is what we have. It's conversations. And it goes back to where I started, which is that individualization. So when students see their schedule, it should. It will accompany information when the master board is put together. These are classes where we had enough students interested. And so if you don't see it, it's much like now they put in six course requests and they might come up with something because a computer would roll it, and counselors still always brought them in. I'm not happy with it, so we'll talk about it. But as Ms. Kahn said, the entire process should create something where

076students already know what their choices are. They've talked to a counselor through the process. So the counselor will say, you know, that you might not get all of your first choices. However, make sure these are things you're interested in. And then if they have questions, they'll have the ability to go in and talk to someone before having that massive scheduling change era where you're just going in and kind of making changes. Because school. School starts in a few days, so most kids will know before they leave school the previous year. That is the scheduling, that is the timeline we decide. And again in May our goal is to have everything pretty much in place. And again at this point we're looking at what the kids want and then looking at what the budget will allow

077us to put together and that will create the master board. And it is a change in timeline before it was June. This will also allow us to order textbooks earlier again. Teacher training. A lot of good things will come out of having this earlier preparation. What about teacher location find for these classes? Well, I'm glad you said that and I am going to speak if you don't mind, Mr. Russell and Dr. White. So Dr. White and Mr. Russell and I just completed completed meeting with all 10 principals and in that meeting we talk about people who may not be intending to return. People have already completed that. Where might their gaps be and what they are looking to offer and who might they need? Math teacher, high math, you know, algebra. So we talk about

078those second grade or pre K and so we have those discussions and those meetings and we've just done that. So we've got a preliminary look also because Mr. Russell through HR has had that open portal kind of the open be a teacher in the Florida Keys. There's roughly about 140 people who have shown interest in that. So principals have been encouraged to go in, look at viable candidates for something they know they may need in the coming year and actually begin either they or their assistant principals to look at those candidates and look at credentials and start talking to some of those candidates for the possibility to fill some key roles, particularly the hard to find. So we're. That's also part of the process that's not particularly tied to scheduling but we have just completed

079that. So we do feel good about that. And I will say I don't have numbers and percentages but but when we look at the retention and people who are saying I plan to return, it was a pleasant round this year to go in and see that so many people had the intention at this point in time to return to our schools. That's very important. Harry. So we have the open portal. Is there anything on there to indicate the cost of living down here? Because lots of people are always interested but then they start looking and all of a sudden that hundred and something turns into 20. So that's a great question. The way we tackled that about three or four years ago, Labor Day weekend we opened up the 2627 instructional opening ad, which is

080what Ms. Acevedo is referencing. One of the questions that is asked, basically in so many words, do you have a housing solution in the Keys? And that has been a game changer for us to have that information front loaded. People that don't have a housing solution yet, every Wednesday from 4 to 5 o', clock, Jerriann Wynn or Daniello or myself or a combination of us do get to know mcsd. A lot of these candidates participate on that hour long teams call and we do talk a lot about cost solutions, living challenges. Make sure you're doing your homework and get out early and start looking. One of the advantages of this process in encouraging principles to vet candidates as early as March, 1, you have a chance to grab the best talent before they go to

081other counties. Two, if you offer early, they've got more months to try to secure housing if they don't already have a solution versus if you hire in June or July. So that's a very good question. But I will tell you, if you talk to any principal, they'll tell you if they're looking at that list and they have a housing solution, that's a huge advantage going into the interview process. And soon we'll hopefully have a housing solution. Yay. Anyone with them from Palm beach? No. Thank you. Mr. Russell should have brought one. Any other questions? Thank you. Well, I guess at this time we have to look to Mr. Sims. Smith. Sims. Smith. Sims Smith. It doesn't matter either way. Wake him up. As most of you know, our mediation had to be adjourned in the

082Ajax case, or not adjourned, but rescheduled actually was cancelled because we were owed some data that we did not get. So we are in the process of rescheduling by the end of March at the latest, the first week in, in April. So that is the update on that. Can I ask you a question? You can ask me a question about. So how many times is this that we had to reschedule because they haven't given, given us the data we needed? I don't know that we've had to reschedule, but we have allowed them to inspect the property three times. And so each of those times we did not schedule because they were coming to do inspections. So they did one inspection, they wanted to do another inspection. The third inspection we said fine, but give us

083the data before, before mediation the data was not provided. I did see an email today saying they are having their experts completely compile reports, which is good to hear. So assuming that happens, we are on for it again. The last two weeks in March or the first Week of April is what I last saw on the Next Agenda. Superintendent, I would love to see some kind of motion in regard to that where if we don't get those documents prior to the March 10 meeting, that we move forward with a lawsuit because they've been putting this off for a while. At some point, the rainy season is going to come again, football's going to try and play, and we're not going to have any kind of resolution to this issue. When Tommy Roberts becomes a football

084field, I'm happy to let them know of a deadline that is being proposed and if it indeed comes to a vote, that they will possibly not need the mediation. But I do want to take it and try and get it done. If not for, you know, maybe it won't resolve. I haven't have high hopes it will, but to just get a preview of what's going to be possibly the. The ultimate resolution, so. Right. That's why. That's why we were trying to do it then. I have no issue with us coming up with another date by the end of March, but if we still don't have the documents by the next board meeting, they're clearly not going to give what we need to mediate. And I just. I'm uncomfortable. I feel like they're postponing because they

085don't want to pay us money. And at some point we have to draw a line. My new thing this year is everybody's finally got to have a line. We're a government entity. We work on and for the people of this county. And we're not going to be that government that just lets people push and push and push and push until we raise up our hands and give up. I will not do that any longer. I get where you're coming from, and I'll consult the superintendent on how to phrase it, but I will put something out to them saying there will be consideration of. All bets are off at the next meeting because it will be considered, obviously. Thank you, Mr. Chair. As usual, I've already spoken to all of you and spoke about the issues

086that I think you've heard about tonight already. So I'm not going to belabor the that with any further conversation unless somebody has questions. Okay. The board heard about One Team, One Goal initiative, and I appreciate their brief on that. And I just want to let people involved in that know that change. I know change creates anxiety and stress and that this was a big change for people. And I appreciate the work that they're doing. And I do find it remarkable that you know, for 75 people out of the 80 in that building, I didn't get one complaint about having to go out and work with students, which I just find quite incredible. So the fact that that whole building is willing to go out and support students and teachers and schools, to me, is really

087quite heartwarming. There are many benefits to it. And the academic team, of course, pointed out the academic benefits, but I think another one is we have an organizational focus right now on how difficult a teacher's job is and how important it is for us to support them in any way we can. So just an ancillary benefit of getting out of our building and into the classrooms. But I just want to thank everybody involved in that because I recognize it's change and difficult and people have just handled it so gracefully. Shifting gears, we're seeing protests in our country. And freedom of speech is one of the most important rights that we have as Americans. As educators, we have another principle under which we have to work. And, and that is local parentis, meaning we are as

088responsible for students as a parent in place of parents whenever they're in our care. And our responsibility does not. Responsibility does not pause during heightened emotions or times of protest. So we want to make sure that students do not leave classrooms, do not leave schools during the instructional day. Our duty is to provide the highest instruction that we can, but also safeguard and ensure that safety at all times. When they remain in class, we have the opportunity to educate them and ensure their safety. And I hope that any individuals or organizations that were planning a protest, if that were during school hours, would make it clear that students should remain in school. Their time in school is precious and fleeting, and I would hope that we would honor that time and their futures. At this

089time, I'm going to turn it over to the Southern group and our own Ms. Kate Deloach. Hello, everyone. Can you hear me? Awesome. Well, I am coming to you from Tallahassee and week seven of the 60 day legislative session. I'm being optimistic. We're gonna, we're gonna finish on time this year. Last week, the House and Senate passed their respective budgets. I know we've talked about our project, but I wanted to mention a couple of interesting things in the budget to highlight for you all and then I'm happy to answer any questions. The Senate in their budget increases the total FESP fund by about 2.37%, while the house increases them by 3.42%. The house in turn is proposing an increase to the Safe Schools allocation and a new distribution methodology without A guaranteed base amount for

090each school district. The House FESP statewide summary indicates 54.59% increase in the Safe schools allocation and a revised allocation method is not included in the Senate budget. In the implementing budget, the House version of The Implementing Act HB5 changes the Educational Enrollment Stabilization Program to the Family Empowerment Scholarship Stabilization Program. Those changes are not included in the Senate implementing bill. The House implementing bill also revises the Florida Education Finance Program to lower the local effort threshold from 90 to 85%. Both in the House and the Senate budgets provide around around $100 million for teacher salary increases. However, the House's proviso language stipulates that those salary increases would go to full time classroom teachers and certified pre kindergarten teachers with at least 20 years of full time teaching experience in Florida public schools. The Senate's proposed

091FEFP includes a designated scholarship funding allocation. The House's proposed does not include a separate scholarship funding allocation. As part of the fcsp. House and the Senate announced on Friday that they have named their conferees. So they have named the members of each chamber that will be a part of the budget conference process. And we were told today Senator Hooper indicated that there are allocations being, you know, going back and forth between the House and the Senate that is the first step to reaching budget conference. So once they have allocations then that process can begin. If they start that next week, that still puts them on track to potentially finish on time. We are still following quite a few bits of pieces of policy legislation that are moving as I'm sure you've noticed this year, some

092things are moving in the Senate but not in the House and vice versa. So these next two weeks will be pretty critical in terms of what is going to pass and what isn't. But we are entering the budget stage of session so things will start moving very quickly. And with that I am happy to answer any question. Yeah, it comes on what, what would be the reasoning for only giving raises to teachers with 20 years experience? So that is a good question. I am not sure. I don't think I saw the exact debate on that in the House. But that might be something that they end up, you know, during conference changing those requirements a little bit. But perhaps they were trying to make the money go a little bit further. I'm not really, really

093100% sure, but I'll dig into that John, and see what I can find. Sounds like they were. Well, I, I won't say what I think. It is a Republican Senate, right? Yes, yes sir. I'm part of that. All right. Well, anyway, I don't. So my, I don't know if everyone understands the 90% to the 85%. I mean, it is not really better for us. It is not. The reason that it was decreased to 90, 85% is because they ran out of all of our state funding right now, including 900,000 extra dollars is going to the scholarship. So they had to decrease us to 85% so they would have more funding for the scholarships. And so it doesn't necessarily mean we're getting more funding, it just means that they can spend more on the scholarships, whereas

094that's why they don't do it in the Senate bill budget. Because in the Senate budget, they put the scholarship money separate so that we would know at the start of the school year how much we were getting and how much they were getting. And what happened this year is, you know, they get a percentage and the number. The way, you know, correct me if I'm wrong, Kate, and, but I like to say, you know, if there were 1,000 students that were being funded through the current FEFP in Monroe, and there would be money for 10% of them or 100 students, actually, you can only spend 99%. So it would be 99 students to get the scholarship. And then the rest of the 901 students would be the funding for us when our enrollment dropped because

095of whatever reason, lack of immigration in people moving away, cost of living, lowered birth rate, whatever, we lost 200 students. So now we had 800 students, which meant. And they had. And there was 99 over there. So now there's 899 students. So there's only money for 89 students in that situation because 10% of 899 or 90 students. And so because the entire funding is based on the entire student population, when our students population goes down, the funding for the FES goes down as well. So this is a band aid fix that they're trying to do. But it hurts both sides, basically. It. It. When students leave us, there's no, there's less money to fund the scholarship students. And so that is why I don't, you know, as a board, I think we should be supporting

096the senate side where they put the money in a separate bucket and our fluctuations and their fluctuations don't affect the funding of the other because that's, you know, I mean, we can get through this year, next year with an 85%, but then it might be 80 and then it might be, you know, it all. We need reliable Funding, we need to be able to trust what the funding is. And frankly, the 9010 for a property rich community was put into place to provide fair funding between us and the property poor districts. But now if it goes down to 85, that's less coming from our taxpayers here. More will come from the state of the percentage of it. But what, what they do. I mean, I agree with you on the other point of it went

097to the Senate bill where they had the separate fund. That would be the best welcome completely. But, well, we'll be funded for the number of students we have, regardless of whether it's the 85 or the. I mean it used to be that state gave nothing to Monroe county, that Monroe county residents paid everything and that's why they made the 9010. Right. But that's what we do now. So if it goes to 85, that's less than Monroe county residents pay into it. They get a little more money from the state. But as far as what the total amount number is, that's another story. And that can go down. But you know, the more we get from them, from the state on it is a good thing for us. But you're right, I mean it's, they're just

098$900,000. It's all a shell game anyway. 888,000 in the hole right now because of, on the most recent count. Right. And we were told when we were up in, when, when the superintendent and assistant superintendent and Yvette and I were up in Tallahassee, we were told by the, the Senate Budget Committee staff that they thought we would start in the hole this year if they didn't move and which we have because that's why they had to switch to the 85%. Yeah, it's, it's still no matter what, it's always going to be a problem until they separate that completely out. I will say thank you to the superintendent for recognizing the impossible situation with the money and identifying Ms. Osborne to keep track of those students who are claiming scholarships and whether or not they're actually

099using them or coming back to the school. So that will definitely be super helpful in figuring out the actual amount of money that we will be down. Unfortunately, when they took our count at schools, our numbers were lower and so our funding is going to be lower. And you know, there's just no finger pointing to be able to point to as to why our numbers are down, but they are down and so we get less money and that's just the way the system works. And I think you're right, Dr. Walt. You know, you definitely are seeing different approaches to this problem from the House and the Senate. You know, the Senate budget also does include a declining enrollment supplement that's not included in the House. So there's going to be a lot to work out

100during budget conference between the two chambers. Yeah, I just bring it up because when you look at the percentage increases, you know, that's what we're quick to go to. We're like, oh, look, there's 5% more on this one than this one. But when you look more at the details, I think there's more policy stuff that we should consider support reporting on the Senate side. In the past, it's been half. Is it still at that? You don't hear us. In the past, what's been happened? The, the declining enrollment. They used to give us half of the fta. So I believe in the Senate supplement they have put in, it looks like 65 million in non recurring funds for districts where there is a decline in the unweighted public FTE between 2425 and 2520. But yeah, you

101don't know what the numbers are. In the past it was about 50%. I'll check on that for you, John. Oh, yeah, so. Well, that's the point where one has it. And that's another thing of where one. One bill has it. You know, the Senate has it one way and the House another. And you, you really need to figure out what's all of it. But they're not going to listen to us anyway, so I wouldn't worry about it. Whatever's going to be is going to be With Kate as our voice. They might listen. I think they'll listen to Kate. Yes. Especially if she represents Miami Dade and Palm beach and Broward. Do you represent any of the big ones? You all are my only that district. Well, you better have a loud voice. You take a

102bullhorn with you next. Next week. I'll bring that one next week for budget conference. All right. Yeah. The second count or the, the October counts were down 42,000, I think is the number across the board. There were fewer scholarship students than predicted, although they were more than the previous year. There were fewer home school students and there were fewer public school students. And that money for this current budget, I mean. Right. We were just talking about next year's budget. But that money from this current budget is over $300 million that was appropriated to K12 education. But the students across the state are now not there. And there is a question up in Tallahassee about what will happen to that money. Will it just roll back into the general revenue or will the state use it

103to, you know, help with some of the declining enrollment budget impacts to the districts that have experienced those. Which is most districts, by the way, but across, you know, based on that, and that is what the Greater Florida Consortium lobbyists are talking about the most. Because being from the Gulf, the southern Gulf or coastal city or counties, we had the biggest declines. We're the biggest part of that. 42,000 students. Well, no, no, there was no hurricanes this year. And when they, when they presented this, they said in the past they've done. They've distributed money for declining enrollment in specific counties because, because of hurricanes or natural disasters they've never seen. It's unprecedented for there to be a decline across the state. Anyway, thank you, Kate. Thank you. Thank you all so much. Have a great

104night. Board members, where do we start? The last time? Let's go over this way with what? Are you done? Yes, that, that concludes my comments. Thank you. Yeah, that's it. He doesn't want to say anything anymore. Anyway, he was done an hour ago. Miss Talbot? Well, as always, there's fabulous things happening at the Monroe County School District. This past week we had a visit from the Department of Education and I was able to sit in on some of their meeting. And I was extremely proud to see some of our students really shine there. We had Kyla Daughtry, which is an 8th grade student at Horace O' Brien, as a tremendous vocalist. And accompanying her was flute player Lizzie Alonso. And they were quite a do. I think everyone there was extremely impressed. So much talent

105from those two young girls. Lizzie was a ninth grader, but by the way, from CFK. And it was so great to see them honor our fourth grader from Poinciana School, Mattheus Lombie. He is a student who suffered a significant health issue, and yet he continued to excel at school and keep up. So it was really great to see them acknowledge him and honor him at that meeting. And then a little bit later in the morning, they were at Poinciana School seeing all the fabulous things that are happening there. And I think everyone was impressed with, with all that we have to offer. Also, a little update on the housing project that I've been following quite closely. I'm really excited to say that it went through planning this past week and which was a big one,

106the tree commission, which I thought that was a huge, a huge thing because removing trees is sometimes an issue, but we Presented Marks ide presented such a fabulous landscape plan that they agreed to all of that. So things are moving in the right direction. So I'm feeling really optimistic that we will continue to get there, and pretty soon we'll have shovels in the ground. And congratulations to all the high school teams, baseball teams, they had a great win in opening week, so that was fantastic. And congratulations to the Key West High School wrestling team. They had their 17th district title win, so that is tremendous. And earlier this afternoon, Mr. Tierney and I had the opportunity to walk around this beautiful campus here at Coral Shores and see the track team in action, the tennis

107team in action. It is so wonderful to see so many student athletes out there participating and so many students there supporting them. So I think that's always wonderful to see a good community of students actively involved in their school. And I also just wanted to say thank you to all of the district employees. My been at the district office when it's a ghost town, because everyone is out supporting our students. And I think it's tremendous to have our staff at the district office involved. And I think that everyone invested in the success of our students 100%, as much as we can. Anyway, I know that almost everyone's out is fantastic because I think we all want the same thing, which is our success of our students. So thank you to all of you that go

108out and do it. And from what I understand, everyone is very happy to do so. So thanks again. Yes, thank you to everyone. As always, there's much to be proud of in the Monroe County School district. I do also want to say, superintendent, I've been hearing from staff, parents and students that they see you up and down the keys. That's something that the upper keys used to complain a lot about. And so it's incredible the number of schools that you visit that you're not just visiting academics, but sports. And I'm excited to see that continue because that means there's a focus on the entire county as it should be, and not just on the area where the administrative bill is located, building is located. Pat, quick question. With the increase in the safe schools budget,

109can we be using that for better tech. Technology? This is. Pat, they're just. Yeah, they're just in discussions about the safe schools allocation. Nothing has been decided yet. And truly, some of what Dr. Woltanski is saying, we have to be very careful with the changes that they're making in the FEFP because they're saying that it will go up. But we are potentially one of the districts that it will not go up that it will decline because they're removing the $250,000 minimum and changing the calculation. So you just have to be very. At this time. Thank you. And Ms. Kahn, if you will, I will add that that particular money is pretty specific for use for safe schools cost. I will say that next board meeting I'm going to bring you some tech items, some technology

110items for consideration as we continue to make improvements. And that funding is both through the voter approved sales tax and through the voter approved millage. Could you possibly identify on the presentation which things might apply to safe schools money and which things don't apply to safe schools money so that we can see. Because if safe schools is only hardening and we've done all of that, safe schools money means nothing to us if we can interpret the safe schools provisions and the places we can spend that money to, for instance, anti bullying and other things, that is technology and very different from school hardening. So I'd like to see in what ways we can. I can almost promise you that none of what we'll bring next board meeting is going to be using safe schools money.

111I can identify potential funding sources, but we can probably, I can work with Dr. White to bring you what we can use this particular pot of money for. And it's very specific. There are other funds that we can draw from sales tax, for instance, that we can use for either safe school or for technology. We have other options. But that particular funding I think is specific and we'll get the details on that and be able to share it with you. I just think we need to be starting to be a little more creative as a lawyer. There are lots of different ways to read the way things are written. And so if we're losing money as a district, which we absolutely are, everybody is, through no fault of our own. Anything we don't put in

112one pot in terms of safe schools we might be able to use in another way of safe schools. And I think that maybe we need to think about the definitions and what the possibilities are that they might cover. Thank you. Oh, is it, Is it? You guys are just both looking at me. I want to thank the community for not losing their minds over the traffic with the gigantic nautical market. Saturday was perhaps the. I don't even know. There was a boat off a trailer and there were water main breaks and there were accidents. And you know, still the show went on and we've been having challenges, but I heard less complaining this year than usual. But maybe that's just because they all complained to Frank. And so thank you guys for that. The whole

113project, it's a great weekend. And, you know, if you. It's. Well, people know well in advance, and they can just avoid that section when they. If they have to. The Friday State Board meeting was in Key West. I wanted to let anyone who didn't watch know that the State Board was really interested in the one team, one goal project. They lit up. They wanted to ask questions about it afterwards. It really, you know, they wanted to know that the administrators were connected to the students and that they were willing to do this extra thing that was very student specific and they were very excited about it. So, you know, as we collect our data, it's probably the kind of thing that would be worthy of, you know, a presentation at some point, like at a

114conference sort of thing for those of you who have done it, because it did get a lot of. I mean, when we show the success, I think a lot of people are going to want to hear about it. And also at that meeting, I wanted to give a special shout out to Kerry Baker from the Key West Chamber. She stood up and spoke on an item, but she mostly just spoke about how much the business community and the schools here and the college all work together. And it was, you know, it was great to have her positive vibes in there. And, you know, we really appreciate it. Obviously, the community and the schools are deeply entwined, and it's our superpower. So thank you. So just a reminder that we are about just over two weeks

115away from daylight savings, and I appreciate Coral Shores getting a head start, but can we set that clock back so Dirk doesn't bill us an extra hour? But the second thing. I know you second thing is I just want to reiterate the. The district's position on the fan code of conduct. Sporting events are getting well underway, and I have unfortunately attended several events where the fans became a little bit unruly. We have a position that if you are removed the first time, you removed that time, if you come back and it happens again, you will be removed from that event for the remainder of the year. We are emboldening our school administrators to do this because we're protecting these students. Most of them are now student athletes who have futures in baseball, soccer, on the

116line, and they should not be disrupted because you cannot control yourself. I mean, we had a lot of scouts at a certain event that did not need to be involved in anything that occurred. And I certainly would like more people to come forward to help remove these unruly fans because it's jeopardizing their future. Mr. Superintendent, with all these people going into the schools, do our lawyers go in? They're certainly intellectually capable. And I'm sure they'd be willing if we asked them. They are willing. Then. I'm sure they would. I have no doubt. Now, that's off the. Off the book, though. That's pro bono. Okay, sure. Yeah. I want to report on that at the next meeting. Thank you. Action items. I recommend the board approve Rex Weech field improvements, furniture, fixtures and equipment. So moved.

117Second Discussion. Unbelievable. Are there any? No votes. Hearing None. The motion carries. At this time, unless there's anything else before us, this motion. [MEETING ADJOURNED]