001I would say eight hey Martin how are you okay one at this time may I please ask everyone to find a seat I'm also asking that you silence your cell phones we are very happy to have a full audience here and for those listening at home as always today is Tuesday March the 7th 2023 and we are meeting as the school board of Volusia County we will start with the Pledge of Allegiance which is going to be from Chisholm Elementary followed by the national anthem which will be presented by students from Henson Middle following that we will have a moment of silence and reflection and then we will start the meeting so if everyone will please rise and join me with the Pledge of Allegiance thank you hi my name is Melissa Markle and I'm
002the proud principal of Chisholm Elementary and I am here with Miss Dixon's kindergarten class [Music] one nation all right indivisible with liberty and justice for all my name is Natalie Walker I am the new chorus director of The Henson Middle School singing hurricane chorus and this is our hurricane hurricane Corps singing The Star-Spangled Banner foreign [Music] the boss first thing [Music] [Applause] was there oh [Music] [Applause] [Music] of the praise [Applause] for a moment of silence thank you you may be seated once again welcome I'm going to introduce those that are here with me on my far left I have Mr Carl persis representing District 4. next to Mr persis is Miss Jesse Thompson representing District three to my immediate left is our school board attorney Mr Aaron Wolfe moving over to the far right
003hand side this is Miss Celeste Gilmore she is our agency Clerk and she holds all of this together so we appreciate that Mr Reuben cologne is not with us this evening so we'll move on over to our vice chair this year Mrs Anita Burnett representing District 2 and to my immediate right I have the privilege of introducing Dr Carmen balgeman our superintendent and I am Miss Jamie Haynes your chair this year representing District One items for approval on this agenda are items 1.03 2.02 4.01 7.02 and 18.01 public participation times for items on the consent agenda we will you may fill out a card and before we vote for the consent agenda we will have you speak for public input we also have a specific time at 6 PM for items of General general interest
004pertaining to public education in Volusia County a total of up to 15 minutes will be provided for public comment at that time then we will have time provided for public comment on any action item before a board vote is called on that item and finally at the end of the evening we will have time for public input for items of general interest pertaining to public education in Volusia County before items from the board superintendent or the attorney are open for discussion announcement or approval we're moving on to item 1.02 District vision statement and board member comments our district vision statement is to create lifelong Learners prepared for an ever-changing Global Society do I have a board member that would like to start Mrs Burnett hello well I get to say it again two weeks in
005a row how about those bucks and um they they really did Shine and show that they um could go out there and compete and whether it was a win or a loss they did a great job and they have something to build on they also I think had a competition with the lady bucks and the majorettes that did as well so congratulations to them thank you next Miss Thompson um yes I know it's on our consent agenda tonight for um the Coronado Beach Elementary School Beta Club will be going on to Kentucky over the summer and I just want to congratulate all of them because I know they worked really hard and Miss Looper has done an amazing job with that program at Coronado so thank you thank you Miss Thompson Mr purses thank you
006madam chair good evening everyone um this morning I had the pleasure of being at Tomoka Elementary serving breakfast it's National School breakfast week I guess and so I was there and let me tell you chicken chicken like chicken nuggets and biscuits sandwich and then Pop Pop Tarts uh Cheerios cocoa Flakes and uh I don't know well it was pretty good oh cinnamon toast and buttered toast I got things all mixed up you know you're supposed to give kids one or the other I'm giving kids like everything and and the cafeteria manager is going no they only get one or two and I said that's too late next next going down down the line the hardest thing was getting the hair net on whoa that's a nasty thing but um other than that it was it
007was it was kind of kind of fun I also want to wish everyone a great spring break I know it's coming it can't come fast enough I know but uh it'll be here soon and want to wish everyone a super fun and relaxing time you deserve it thank you madam chair thank you Mr persis so um I was actually at DeLand High yesterday morning and I don't I don't know if this is just a high school thing but they um every student that came through and picked up a breakfast they got a ticket and at lunch they announced winners of the ticket and they're doing that each day this week and I was telling the kids I'm like you want the ticket and you want to bring it back and so I think we even
008had some more kids that heard about it and so they came in to get a ticket Dr Johnson and I were there um they had some great prizes they had some wonderful donations because the kids kind of looked at me and I said uh it's gift cards and what what high school kid doesn't want a gift card but I also had the honor and privilege last week of reading at Sunrise Elementary and I I I understand it's in District Five but you know we will go to other areas that are not just our schools when invited and I love going out to Sunrise and participating in their you know reading books to kids and I had one of the best first grade classes that I read to the teachers like I don't know what you
009did but they were very quiet but of course six-year-olds and some seven-year-olds will always ask questions like how old are you and so I said to them we will do some math when I finish reading and so I asked them if they could count by fives and they said yes so we counted to 55 by fives and they're like so that's I said no we're not finished yet and so of course they figured it out and then I made them you know I said so in June I'm there's I'm going to be this what would we do and they're like oh we'd have to add this I said exactly and so it was kind of fun and I Deuteronomy always find some way to pull that piece back in but I want to wish everyone
010a wonderful spring break next week a little over half of your school board will be in Tallahassee spring break next week we're going to be up in Tallahassee talking to legislators and Mr Gomez is joining us and so at the last board meeting at the end of the evening even though it was 11 p.m we talked about the topics that we're going to be talking with our legislators so if you miss that piece you can tune back in and hear what we're going to be going up and talking about and Mr Gomez is going to be there I think to keep us all straight but we're going to move on now at this time to the next part of the agenda and so thank you everyone and thank you for giving us a few minutes
011to share so item 1.03 approval of the minutes this is approval of the minutes for the February 28 2023 regular session do we have a motion to approve the presented minutes I move we approve the presented minutes thank you Mr persis do I have a second I'll second that motion thank you Miss Thompson is there any further discussion okay then I'll call for the vote all those in favor of the minutes please say aye aye anyone opposed okay it's passes unanimously now we're moving on to 2.01 agenda changes Dr balgaman are there any agenda changes before the agenda is presented to the board for approval yes Madam chair um I would like to move item 17.01 which is evolution leads presentation to take place right after the administrative appointments and then item 17.02 to go
012before 16.01 which is the hro update all right so board you've heard the recommendation from Dr balgeman I'm going to restate it she wants to move item 17.01 Volusia leads presentation to the beginning of the meeting following the administrative appointments and then move item 17.02 to um to happen right before item 16.01 do we have a motion to approve the presented agenda as amended move to approve with the Amendments thank you Mrs Burnett thank you Mr persis any further discussion then I'll call for the vote all those in favor say aye aye any opposed it passes unanimously we are now at item 3.01 the superintendent's announcements and comments Dr valgabin thank you madam chair board members good afternoon and what a lovely audience good afternoon to each of you and those of you who are
013listening at home just a few announcements this evening I want to start with the middle school and I see a lot of middle school principals in here as well this evening so thank you to all of our staff that are here when you know many familiar faces but a shout out to our Middle School this is the second annual Battle of the books which will be held on Friday that's March 24th precisely at Daytona State College and we will have teams from each of our middle school students will be competing they will be answering questions and books that they have read and I want to also say a thank you to Daytona State for hosting us last year's winner was Galaxy middle school as you may recall so I wonder who it's going to be
014who's going to take up the take it home this year so we will see and we will have that announcement at our next board meeting so good luck to all of you middle schoolers to all of our staff in the middle school team good luck to all of you also as you stated Mr purses I will be serving breakfast tomorrow and I'll be wearing the the hair net you know I think it's in fashion now actually um but a couple things I want to share as you know March 6th through the 10th it's the National School breakfast week and I do want to thank do a shout out to all of our members schoolway Cafe the team our school based team thank you all you know that's one of the first um actions that are
015taking at school pretty much once we get students in every day right it's it's a team of people that are behind the scene and they're making sure that they're fed and that their hearts and their minds are in a good place to begin each day so I want to thank the entire team for what you guys do behind the scenes each and every day for our 64 000 students um and I we have a short short video that's I've been assured it is short so but we want to celebrate School Way Cafe so can you go ahead um Mr Gomez foreign Bob do you copy what's going on you should be digging I don't know I can't get going this morning all right let's go over the blueprints one more time Tony do you copy
016what are you doing you should be digging I don't know I can't get going today all right let's go over the blueprints one more time you see it all starts right here [Music] hey man how you doing how's it going guys you have to dig in every morning a healthy breakfast gets you filled up and ready to go well I guess that's why you're the boss [Music] you boys ready to work Moss yeah when's lunch would you two get to digging already you're putting us behind schedule I can't believe you guys just you two every day [Music] [Applause] we have also some future actors in The Making as you can see uh social our school social workers a shout out to our social worker March 5th through the 11th it's designated as National School social
017worker week so we would like to thank all of our team our social workers who are serving our schools and our families on a daily basis ensured that those wraparound services are in place shout out to all of you thank you for all that you do um one book one school so I know many of you participate in this and you were invited to schools and you read to our students so our schools here around the state actually celebrated literacy week and last week we also celebrated read across America and many schools many many I would say pretty much all of our schools participated in this campaign we again one of the things that it really does it really reinforces or it provides the opportunity to really that home to school connection and where families
018are involved right they're reading with their children and it becomes a just a total Community right supporting the importance of reading so thank you all to all of our schools to all of our school-based team for participating in this and for our families and students we know the importance of literacy um also strategic plan right it's what guides our vision and our goals and it's really important we did promise this board when we enacted on our strategic plan that our principles and our school-based team because we've got 85 schools 76 public schools and they will be an active active participants in the process what does that mean that our strategic plan will not sit on the Shelf with the elf but our strategic plan will become a living breathing document that will guide our work
019and will refine our practices and I do want to do a shout out to the following schools because last week Enterprise Elementary actually hosted a mid-year work session and invited many of our very own principles to attend so in attendance we had pathway Elementary principal Ormond Beach Elementary DeBary Elementary Sunrise Elementary and Cypress Creek Elementary principles they all collaborate in that process and that's building your own right from within so we are looking at expertise from within and we're replicating and hopefully these principles also will be hosting for other principles and before you know it they all become expert at what the stock take process they already are almost there but it's it's just continuous refinement as you know but a shout out to our our team team for really embracing that walking PLC model
020time to shine scholarship our VCS time to shine 529 scholarship program what it does it provides our student with an investment account that provides a flexible and tax-free way to save for college and their K-12 education expenses so as Florida 529 savings plans let you contribute what you can when you can to meet your savings goals the Florida Prepaid open enrollment period is April 30th we're excited to announce it in partnership with Florida Prepaid the VCS time to shine committee will be selecting two eligible seniors to receive a two-year scholarship each which is valued at eight thousand dollars and two eligible card kindergartners to receive a one thousand dollar scholarship each so that's in in in session we're working on that I'll I will share with you the future board meetings who the winners are
021look at that one thousand dollars for a kindergarten it's a lot of money I also would like to show you another short video because it's all about you know serving our students it takes it really the entire Community to do that and it's important to recognize Spotlight our community members here and there when we see them doing great things and they don't even know we're paying attention so this gentleman here actually is a he has been doing this for a long long time and and really I'm very excited that we have the opportunity to recognize him here tonight he's not in the audience because of other obligations but Mr Burnett who is a community partner but also as you know a um a elected official but he has been hosting I don't know if you
022know this or not the games the football games right right at Atlantic high school for a long time now so at attending one of the meetings Mr Gomez was there and he didn't even know and Mr Gomez caught it on tape so here we are they started calling football games nine years ago or so and the basketball coach came and asked me if I'd like to start doing basketball as well so I've been doing football and basketball uh my youngest son graduated in 2019 but I'm still involved here it's it's it's really a lot of fun to do and the kids and seeing the energy you know I like trying to amp it up so that it's fun for them Orange love the man appreciate what he's been doing for my last four years [Applause]
023they bring a lot of energy to the game hype up the crowd like really high for me too congratulations career concluding tonight [Applause] I feed off their energy so it makes it easy for me to amp things up for them it's just an absolute Blast for me to do [Applause] one of the things that I like about the administration here in the athletic department and the coaches is that they emphasize that aspect of development of the person as much as they do the player the education is not just about learning books it's about learning to be good human beings and learning the practices and principles and the habits that make them and if we can have a little fun along the way let's do it yay [Applause] and again what I love about this story
024is that he didn't even know and Mr Gomez he had he attended one of the the games and learned about and just put him on the spot so thank you Mr Gomez and again thank you Mr Burnett who's not here tonight but thank you for all that you do and so many other community members right that we know that they give so much to our students again a shout out to you you may not have been recognized here tonight but we truly appreciate you and you're making a difference least restrictive environment so let's talk about that a little bit I think at the last board meeting I shared that Volusia County school has exceeded the state goal of having at least 77 percent of our students with disability schedule for 80 percent of the time
025in regular classes regular Ed classes now this week we want to share a little bit more with you as it pertains to the amazing improvements that we've made specifically in our high schools over the last eight years since 2014 team nine out of our ten high schools the percentage of students with disabilities that are placed in the least restrictive environment at least 80 percent of the time has increased over time including Atlantic high school that went from 53 to 78 percent uh University High School from 48 to 89 percent the graduation rate for students with disability has also increased tremendously in all 10 high schools during that time including just a few the land high school that went from 37.5 percent to a 93.5 percent Deltona High School that went from 40 percent to a
02698.7 percent this is really points of Celebration right New Smyrna Beach High went from 45.2 percent to a 94.7 I'm looking at the board members as I'm sharing this and you love hearing about your school I can see it um so I want to thank again our ESC department but again also it's the people in the field right that are doing the work day in and day out thank you because you guys from the time the sun comes up until it goes down and even beyond that you're there working and impact creating an impact and making a difference so I do want to do a shout out to everyone and that's it Madam chair that's it for me for this afternoon for this got a short right thank you Dr balkman we're moving right along
027to item 4.01 administrative appointments and transfers Dr bagelman do we have any administrative appointments this evening yes ma'am yes ma'am chair we have one and I would like to ask Miss Tiffany Fuller to join us along with Mr Wes so just to share a little bit with you um Miss Fuller has been with Volusia County Public Schools since 2008. she has earned her bachelor's degree at Bethune cookman University in English education under her master's degree from the American College of Education in educational leadership and curriculum and instruction she holds certification in Ed leadership English speakers of other languages English grades 6 through 12. Ms Fuller began as a teacher at Mainland High School she became a teacher and assignment at Mainland High School then went on to becoming a writing coach a Reading Coach a
028reading resource teacher and then the assistant principal at the land high school before working as a specialist in the recruitment support and retention today I'm recommending to you Miss Tiffany Fuller as the coordinator for Recruitment and Retention in human resources if approved by you this this afternoon her effective date will be March 8th 2023. 7 A.M tomorrow sounds like tomorrow that would be tomorrow yes it would you've heard the superintendent's recommendation for Miss Tiffany Fuller as the coordinator for Recruitment and Retention and human resources and even though I'd like to pass the gavel I'm not going to I'm going to allow someone else but do we have a motion move to approve thank you Mrs Burnett do we have a second second thank you Mr persis any discussion I'd like to say something I want
029to thank you I want to thank you for all the years that you've already served and you also served at Campbell in the middle of all that which wasn't mentioned and you know that you you totally won my heart over when you served at DeLand High and you did an excellent job and I know that they miss you but I really think that you're the person that's going to take us the next step forward in helping us to continue to recruit and retain our employees because you have a love and a personality that just draws people in um and you're part of Volusia County and we appreciate that so I am very pleased that you agreed to step up to this challenge no other discussion I'll call for the vote all those in favor please
030say aye aye any opposed it passes unanimously thank you so much um I won't hold you long I do appreciate your your kindness and your kind words um I am excited to step up to the challenge teaching is my heart and my passion it is it is my story it is my work it is who I am and what I do and I speak that passionately because it's my identity it's it's what I go home to my husband is a Volusia County teaching athletic director in our district I have two beautiful boys that are students in our school district so this work is integral and passionate part of my life and so I'm excited about really being purposeful and both being proactive in ways that we can recruit right now and long-term ideas and solutions
031for our future recruitment ideas I'm also just as passionate about the retention and support part of our office I think there is so much greatness that we have in Volusia County Schools and I want to do everything I can to highlight and celebrate and recognize and extend that that magnifying glass of greatness that is Volusia County Schools and Shout that from the rooftops as far as we can because we have great teachers and I want our teachers to know how much we support them I want them to know that they deserve and need to be here and that we want them here and I'm excited for what we're growing in our program both in our teacher support staff and all of our positions so I appreciate your support and I am um I'm reaching out
032to our larger Community because it is a collective work it is a collective work for Volusia County not just Volusia County Schools and for all of the areas that are represented in Volusia County Schools and so I'm excited to partner and grow and expand and I thank you for this thank you [Applause] will you please join us up front for a photo foreign [Applause] at this point we're going to move to what originally was item 17.01 which is the Volusia leads Dr balgeman thank you thank you madam chair thank you board members I am so so pleased to call on this group and actually I'm going to ask at this point for Miss Tiffany Fuller to come on up our specialist well soon to be coordinator effective tomorrow and um Meg Roa where's megro another
033specialist in the retention piece now and I know they're going to share a little bit with you but I will be remiss if I didn't say a few words so when we were leading during covet 19. the years after that it was imperative we saw the need and we saw actually let me go back let's let's look at Volusia County you know you'll hear about the greatness that resides in our schools right and it's it's the people and their heart and their commitment and I knew that right here we can really capitalize on our talents so Meg quickly along with the team and Waffa they they put together for us I said I want the best of the best the you know people that are that that are change makers there will be um capitalizing
034not only in infusing their skill set and their knowledge and the strengths that they bring and their commitment but where we grow our own so I share with the team our vision and quickly they put this together for us where we have I they will share with you how many currently we have but these individuals were they refueled me because when I was serving as Deputy on a monthly basis we would meet for the most part with the exception of here and there if if we couldn't and they were exactly what I needed because it was a true Testament and reinforcement of the quality that we have in our district right of individuals and how they're impacting positive changes so anyway they got me through many days and and I'm very very grateful to them
035again this is just a small representation of the amazing talent and quality that we have in this District that every single day we would work hard for so take it away I can really do your entire presentation but you know take it away I'm certain you can I'm going to bring up my PowerPoint sorry I need my glasses there we go so I know that the rest of well good afternoon Madam chairman chairperson superintendent balgavin I am so excited for this opportunity to share this great work that Dr valgobin has already laid out for us um this has been my bucket filler over the past two years as you have had that opportunity as well but I would like to call the members of Volusia leads who have joined us today to come up because
036this is a shared presentation all right so we all have roles so I guess we're just going to have them stand behind and we'll take turns swapping out seats okay [Applause] yes they'll introduce themselves as they take their part to share in our slide deck presentation but this Volusia leads is a movement to grow teacher leadership across our district and these are some of the members of our team some of them have been here since the Inception and then some have just joined us recently this year which you'll learn about in a few minutes our work is directly related to goal 2 in our strategic plan how did we start is Stephanie here come on over okay so in January of 2021 I have had a partnership with Futures in my role in professional learning
037for many years I've had opportu they brought grant opportunities to me and they've always been to grow teacher leadership this one came across in January of 2021 so we're in the midst of covid and the whole purpose of the grant was to grow teacher leadership and really have them like think about the SEL part that that balance that teachers need in their role so do you want to share thank you good evening everyone so um Stephanie Parks assistant director of Futures Foundation one of our focuses is to assist in Recruitment and Retention opportunities and so um in 2021 in January we received an opportunity for a grant through the Consortium of Florida education foundations of which Futures is a member of and basically it was it was called a teacher collaboration and innovation in the
038time of covid and so we reached out to Meg having had a great partnership with her in facilitating funds for the peers and public practice program and said do you have an idea of what we could do with these funds should we apply and she said absolutely and so we put together a proposal and we were one of five foundations across the State of Florida that received funding for this it was seed money of 5000 just to start over the course of that semester we decided to start with the teacher of the year nominees as the first cohort it was an easy place to start I think we had about 20 25 nominees ended up being a part of that first cohort and during that time they had a lot of book studies teams meetings
039Twitter conversations and I got to kind of watch and be a part of over the past several years we've continued to reach out to teacher of the year nominees as well as first year teacher Award nominees we've been able to secure additional funding through the school district Education Foundation matching grant program which not only doubles the financial piece but also doubles the impact we can bring on more people we can have more programs if we have more money and so through that over the years the past several years we've been able to increase the amount of money and then increase the matching increase the program and then eventually culminated in a wonderful celebration last year called eset2 which I know you're going to talk about later so I'll I'll leave that for you um but
040either way we we think that it's a great opportunity for us to kind of be that liaison to find those funding opportunities and to assist in those efforts you Stephanie and we really truly would not have started if it weren't for both of those organizations supporting this this work and I just before we move forward I want to just keep in mind that this has been a very small But Mighty group who has done a lot of work and growing across the district to where we are today we are a grass it has started out as a Grassroots effort and we have landed on this as our vision for the work that we do and I'll just give you a moment to read our vision to yourselves at this point I'm going to turn it
041over and we're going to have we're going to play musical chairs that's what I was going to say so press this for your next we'll just pull the chairs back and stand right here that's okay all right so good evening everybody um I am Valerie Marcus and I am 21-year veteran teacher of Volusia County I currently teach fifth grade at DeBary Elementary I attended eset2 that they'll talk about later this summer and that was my first experience with Volusia leagues and during that talk about inspirational that meeting that whole day you left feeling excited empowered and inspired and inspired everything was absolutely phenomenal and I knew that I wanted that no I needed to be a part of that group and so I got my chance in October of this year attended the first meeting
042and and was the first question as we walked in it was what does it mean to be a teacher leader and so everybody there kind of reflected they did the personal Reflections and then we shared out and so many of these things as you can see and as you can read a willingness to grow the empowering other networking good listener being vulnerable all of those things are what also relates to all the research all the research that shows what it means to be teacher leaders what it means to have an impactful mentoring program this is what it is and these are our leaders in Volusia County that we're saying the same things so that meeting even more was very empowering and very inspiring to me and I didn't really make the connection as until about
043a month later um I had the opportunity they're privilege to be announced as one of the top five finalists for teachers of the Year this year and as exciting as that was and overwhelming in everything I couldn't help but keep asking myself why why me why now 21 years I've put out my heart and soul in but that's just me and I didn't need anything else I didn't need all of the extra but why and so I realized going back to this meeting this slide and act one thing kept standing out and it was three words be a voice be a voice those three words were my why those three words are what Volusia lead stands for it's a voice for showing what teachers are doing what students are doing that power that we can
044do that we work together we collaborate if we Inspire one another that we walk away every single day excited to walk into those classrooms those students walk away excited to leave school and tell everybody about it and so that is what Volusia leads us to us and Volusia leads is our voice so we also all have our little teacher leader signs right here of what being a teacher leader means to us so you'll see all of those as well if you have you good evening I am Liz Jackson I am a 19 year teacher I am a media teacher at Palm Terrace Elementary and I am here to tell you about our why as you can see on the screen this was asked of all of our new recipients of their why and this is
045what you get here be a support system and give back bring autumn autonomy back excuse me and collaborate all of these things my why is because so important to me wonderful teachers of Volusia County right here I started very young I started when I was 21 years old going into classrooms knowing that I was going to be a teacher with Miss Presley third grade at Bonner and she poured into me knowing that I was going to be a teacher volunteering her classroom so I have the honor and privilege to pour into others so that is my why evening everyone I am Nicole strocia I am an academic coach at DeBary Elementary I just want to share a little bit about how we have grown like Megan Stephanie shared with you we started um in 2021
046January of 2021 with 28 teachers of the Year those teachers did various book studies and then we sent and created proposals for our next steps um in January oops sorry summer of 2021 the original team members submitted their proposals and our Focus was new teacher mentors and the new teachers of Volusia County and we our proposals were to have new teacher Mentor plcs as well as Mentor trainings and our new Mentor trainings we have also supported the Recruitment and Retention office by being part of the pre-service campus days with our new teachers as well the 2021 school year teacher leadership trainings we have had many book studies one being every teacher a leader we have had Mentor trainings and initial training as well as monthly plcs the new teacher welcome pits we created and put
047together four new teachers as well as some kits for our mentors we started a social media Twitter account so that way we can let people know who Volusia leads are and some of and highlight some of the great things that are happening across our County like Dr balgavins shared we have had collaborative chats with her as well and then we had a teacher leader book study and we ended last year with our eset2 which was a inspiring and it was elevating and celebrating effective teachers and teaching this school year for 2023 we have increased our membership we have reached out to the new teacher of the years as well as the first year teacher of the years we have created multiple professional learning opportunities we have created teacher leadership Pathways and we have a teacher
048Clarity Cadre which is looking to start model classrooms along around Volusia County and we have also this summer we are planning on having a Mentoring Academy and being present at Volusia learns lots of things happening so as they said we started out with 28 members in 2021 and we have grown our membership and we have added new people and some people have left but right now this is our representation we have 21 members representing in the elementary and that's 11 Schools elementary schools that are being represented as well as three high schools and three middle schools good evening my name is Laura Matthews I teach third grade gifted at George Marks Elementary um as Nicole said we involution leads have been wearing many hats so what we would what we have done is we've identified
049five different leadership Pathways that members can choose to pursue so it's we can choose to pursue all of them or depending on you know our interests and our passions the pathways all began as a result of things that we found we were interested in doing things that members were passionate about and so we just broke it out into different areas and we're going to take a deeper dive into each one of those areas now foreign I teach third grade at Beachside Elementary School I want to talk to you a little bit about our social media presence our social media goal is to promote positivity showcase teacher leadership work and celebrate great teachers and teaching We Begin each month with a quote from one of our book studies we did which I know will be mentioned
050later is teaching with light and the quote boosts positivity for the month we also do a thing called motivation Mondays so what we'll do is we'll find inspiring quotes that will give you that little boost for the month and then we also wanted to share our Twitter Twitter handle which is here that way everyone can come check us out and follow us and see the great things that we are doing in Volusia County Schools we are working on the website and getting that up and running so stay tuned for more updates about that thank you me okay Reid saleed was one of our Pathways and this is where Volusia leader Volusia members we have decided that we wanted to choose this leadership pathway because we were committed to Growing our own knowledge as well as
051leading others every teacher a leader was our first book study and every new member of Volusia leads will participate in reading this book and we chose this book because it sets the foundation of what a teacher leader is and that is our role and goal of Volusia leads so to date we've had 50 teachers participate in that book study the second book study is teaching with light this is about teaching self-care and supporting one another it was our theme for eset2 we have also have a relationship with the author Carol Radford and six of our Volusia leads members participated in the author's inaugural book study that included participants from schools and districts around the nation Carol was a keynote speaker at our eset2 as well as one of the Volusia learn sessions and we have
052launched our first book study with teaching with light we currently have 28 participants in that book study and we have had about 150 of these books distributed across our district already we are developing a plan to use that book study with the second year teachers as well and third year teacher mentoring teacher Clarity and success is another book study that we did and a Cadre of five of us were part of a three-day summer Institute with Corwin and we have and our goal is to develop model classrooms across across our district this year we already have one model classroom Megan Martin's Sweetwater Elementary kindergarten and we have gone to her classroom and talked about what teacher Clarity looks like and got to see it in practice so that way we can offer professional learning and
053support for teachers in the upcoming school years okay District Community Lisa liaison um here's our quote that we have led our inspiration ignite the spark that was that creates ideas and innovations that will influence change in ourselves and the organization in which we work and we just feel like that is that sums up Volusia leads as part of Volusia leads we plan to develop and grow this pathway in particular we have had discussions with Dr balgabin and we have shared our teacher voice and we know that she has heard our voice and we hope that we will in the future we have talked about different focus groups that we will be part of and working alongside Dr belgaum hi welcome thank you everybody my name is Megan Martins I'm a kindergarten teacher at Sweetwater Elementary
054the next pathway that I'm going to present to you is the professional learning leadership pathway this is just an amazing pathway because it is all about collaboration the professional learning leader pathway allows members to lead colleagues and teacher-led teacher driven professional learning it provides opportunities for members to be Innovative Visionaries that focuses on bringing teachers together to focus on their needs and their interests to grow professionally at Volusia learns we will be hosting an informational session for potential new members and we're inviting current teacher of the year nominees we're also going to highlight and share an overview of the following professional learning events we've hosted simply sharing any set to that was mentioned before so the first one what is simply sharing first off simply sharing is super powerful it's all about collaboration it's getting
055those teachers and those teacher leaders and creating these collaborative environments within our schools where we can come and we can share a resource we can share best practice we can share you know just something that is effective in our classroom and then we're all walking away you know with stuff in our toolbox we're having simply sharing is about having those you know conversations that they're the vertical conversations they're breaking out of those silos where we're coming together and we're collaborating because collaboration is what we need in Volusia County Schools we need that time to talk to each other and learn from each other because a kindergarten teacher can learn something from a fifth grade teacher a kindergarten teacher a third grade teacher can learn something from an ese teacher it's all about learning and growing
056together so that is what simply sharing is about Laura has started at her school I've started at mine and we're all going to be starting it and we really feel this is a power powerful tool to push through Volusia County Schools the next one is eset2 oh Sharon [Music] because it's great it's so powerful and it's about coming together and you know we need that um so the next one I mentioned was eset2 we hosted ESAT eset2 last summer at the Brandon Center um it was amazing we have it about 75 people attend we had new teachers we had veteran teachers we had teacher of the year we principals assistant principals academic coach ese teachers it was just a variety of amazing like-minded Educators and we came together to celebrate them and just you know
057show their hard work we're also going to be hosting it again oh and Carol was our keynote speaker like Nicole had mentioned the author of the books that we've been using and this summer we're going to also do an eset2 but the exciting part it's going to be like two parts we're gonna have e set two and then we're also going to be including the Mentoring Academy training that Volusia leads is currently working on and so we'll get into that a little later and let's see I think that's it for that and then I want to um oh that's what I was gonna say so next up we're gonna have the famous Meredith she was a new member hi I'm Meredith Gilbert I'm a third grade teacher at Beachside Elementary and I was lucky to
058attend ESET 2 last summer because um I had been a mentor the previous year and I had attended or participated in the every teacher a leader book study so I got to attend eset2 and I have to say it was probably one of the most uplifting and positive events I've ever attended as a teacher so because of that I chose to become a member of Volusia leads and have been participating this year and I am so excited because I am now helping plan organize and facilitate this Summer's e-set too you're skipping the video because I know Dr balgovin had shared this with you at a previous board meeting but you'll have access to it as well and this is I'm going off script a little bit I wanted to highlight that we've had we've built
059this partnership with Dr Carol Pelletier Bradford like they've mentioned the authors of the resources that we've been using and been driving our work she's coming out with another book in I think May is when it will be coming out that highlights people from Volusia County Schools yes [Music] put it in there Dr Melissa Carr and then a former Volusia employee Chantelle Woods is also included so keep your eyes open okay hello again um one of the other Pathways that we have is the new teacher support leadership pathway and this is a pathway that I'm personally very passionate about we did start a mentoring program and we are focusing on trying to support school-based mentors at every school our quote says high quality mentoring programs have been shown to increase teacher retention and Effectiveness and new
060teacher surveys rank mentoring as the most helpful type of support so we feel very strongly we're using a Carol Dr radford's book mentoring in action and that is for the mentors the new teachers and second year novice teachers receive the first Year's matter and their companion books that they will be using we also will be focusing on another book that I believe came up on a previous slide called teaching with light that we would like for our new teachers to be part of reading that and so we're developing the mentoring training and support plan and so in order to do that what we have been working on just recently January February is Phase One the lead Cadre there's five of us that are part of the Cadre we have been doing a really deep dive
061into studying the book how we can better use it than we have in the past our goal is to create a high quality mentoring program not just an invitation for hey if you need me come see me we would like it to have a system of training and report for all mentors so the training plan is in progress so our first five teacher or first five mentors that are participating right now we've just finished that up we're going to now lead the other members of Volusia leads in a book study to understand the people who have also chosen this pathway and then from there 25 approximately lead mentors will lead training for 175 school-based mentors using these books it's important to note that the principals have been asked to identify school-based mentors so all schools
062will be represented school-based mentors have completed a survey to indicate their interest and can be a mentor and we would like to have more than just one at each school this group of mentors will support new teachers across the district for 2023 and 24 that we can get started right off the bat in August all mentors will continue to hone their mentoring skills and strategies through monthly mentoring meetings that's the mentors coming together as a PLC to talk about what they're doing in their schools this process will be reviewed revised and repeated so that we can make it the best it can be thank you want to allow you guys the time just to take that quote in and I Know Tiffany apparently my new boss and I as as of tomorrow or no well
063anyway well we have talked about this and the work that we've been doing so much and how much this is such a strong strategy not only for our new teachers but for our veteran teachers these ones who are standing behind us now this is filling their bucket it's keeping them in their roles so they they can help and Lead their colleagues so these are our three guiding principles and I thought it we thought it'd be really cool for you audience if you want to kind of participate with us so I mean I like to bring the height right so it's kindergarten coming out okay so you know it so on the count of three three you guys want to say mentoring matters with us so ready one two three matters [Music] relationships matter hey you
064everybody all right we're excited of course you can tell about our next steps with our new teacher support and other endeavors we promise to continue to think broadly lead boldly and give light and positivity to all teachers because we are volusially [Music] thank you thank you thank you for giving us this opportunity and the time um as you can tell you you see why my bucket has been filled yeah right right and if you want to come join us please come see us we'd love to have more hands in the work but let's give them another round of applause [Applause] yes please come forward for a photo foreign [Applause] we're moving right along to item 5.01 recognition of Staff exceptional student education Dr balgowan Madam chair board members and VCS family there are many opportunities
065that the Special Olympics provide for our students we also have many staff members that we know that what they do on a daily basis that they coach our students up and view this as a labor of love with us today are some of those staff members that are directly involved in the Special Olympics these staff they work diligently not only to build relationship with students but like I said to nurture their passion each and every day working side by side with students are coaching encouraged by valuable valuable team members River Springs Middle School is here represented by our principal Miss Stacy gottlip are our wonderful principal and Dr Lisa Winston our coach and educator and waldrove assistant coach and paraprofessional [Applause] freeze high is represented by Mr Mr Presley assistant principal [Applause] Smyrna Beach high
066is represented by Miss Sue Hopkins the assistant principal [Applause] we also have many of our students athletes present here tonight can you can you raise our hands through the special Olympic students form new friendships as you know and some have traveled across the country to compete so these athletes show us pretty much on a daily basis how to overcome right obstacles and live a life to its fullest they exhibit confidence they exhibit kindness and it's all rolled up into one so we can learn all of us can learn a thing of two from these students that are here with us tonight so Madam chair I would love for us to be able to take a picture and recognize our staff and our students and it's it's however you would like to do that if we
067want to do it by school or I think we should do it by school because it looks like they have quite a few people with them yes so we're going to start at the top of the list with um River Springs Middle School if everybody from River Springs Middle School will come forward [Applause] here [Applause] next up Sea Breeze High [Applause] get in here [Applause] now we need new New Smyrna Beach High School is this right here okay you're good got it thank you so much [Applause] I think yeah yeah foreign it's exciting because both of the students that were here tonight um did play basketball and the young lady also did bowling so it's exciting we are so proud of all of you all right moving right along we're up to item 5.02 recognition
068of Staff maintenance and operations Dr balkaman thank you madam chair thank you board members and this is the maintenance and operations um it takes all five goals right so our next recognition is for again for staff and Mr John DeVito our very own from the land middle I'm not calling you Danny DeVito tonight as you can tell um come on up because I want to share a little bit what he did he actually noticed a group of individuals staff members that you know what I let you tell the story tell the story you want me to you want to tell the story instead I think I think I will yeah yeah go ahead I have the names here but I think it's it's more powerful so we're sitting here tonight and it was It was
069kind of neat because um ever since I've been at Deland middle there's been a lot of projects happening in facilities and maintenance has been on top of it but there was one project that happened right after the Hurricanes that was near and dear to my heart um we have probably the largest flagpole in Volusia County Schools okay like it's 90 feet tall 85 feet tall something like that well the cable snapped inside the cable or inside the pole and it happened right before the Hurricanes we've taken the flag down and I personally I'm the son of a veteran my son serves in South Korea right now um we buy big flags and and hurricanes came so facilities and maintenance were shipped everywhere across the state to fix other projects and stuff but this group Taylor
070Troy Bill and Sean um you know every time they were around they asked about the flagpole like where you at this flagpole and like we're trying to figure out how to get up there because there's been additions added to the school so it wasn't easy so finally one day they showed up and they brought this big massive lift in and I watched them fly high above our campus trying to get to the top of this flagpole well um I had a meeting to get to so they brought the lift down they're like I don't think this is going to work we can't get the right angle because there's not a lot of room to work and I said okay well we gave it a shot so I go into my meeting and I come out
071and I hear the the lift is still working across campus I'm like what are these guys doing and I come out and I'm like I thought you guys couldn't do it and they said mention trim and trees and doing some other stuff why the lift was there and I was like okay cool they're like no we got it fixed I'm like you got it fixed how did you manage they said we just kept working it and working it and working it until they finally got the lift in the right angle to fix our flagpole and then the next day they had the cable they had everything they needed and our flag now flies high above the campus and when I say it's a big flagpole it's a big flagpole you can see our flag from
072Taylor Avenue when you come in you can see our flag from New Hampshire Avenue so it's a big deal and people noticed it I mean we had I know Miss Haynes fielded a call afterwards from Uncle veteran said why doesn't DeLand middle fire flag and I'm like look because we have the biggest flagpole you know that could be found so these guys are awesome um you know they literally went above and beyond the Call of Duty for this one yeah [Applause] so the video I'm going to add a little bit to to that that flagpole that okay so just a couple things let me quantify some of this in terms of how we've saved in the district which is these four individuals the repaired a faulty lighting on the field and surrounded areas at Deltona
073High and I see the principle there in the back which the cost saving was four thousand dollars they repair the flagpole believe it or not that very large flagpole that the savings to our district was 8 000 so it must be pretty large it's huge um they replaced the gym lights at the the land Middle with more efficient LED lighting which directly saved us 6500 in labor costs over contractors quotes that we had received and they also repair the faulty wiring at Deltona Lakes Elementary parking lot which saved us nine thousand dollars in that contractors would have charged us so if you add it all up it's it's quite a bit but it's not even about the it is about a little bit about the money let me not put that you know it is
074but it's most importantly that what you said Mr Davido going up above and beyond right so that's why we're here this evening to recognize these individuals so if you're a principal here and you had done your submission please and come on up along with with these individuals so we can recognize them how would you like to do that Madam chair can we go ahead and call them up we have certificates for them yes I have Troy Shu William Coakley Taylor cronies and Sean Chapman [Applause] thank you Taylor Sean Spencer Mike you want to join us to do tonight [Applause] now we're moving on to item 5.03 recognition of Staff school counselors Dr balkovan thank you madam chair thank you board members I'd like to share the out this opportunity as it pertains to our school
075counselor of the year and the school counselor advocates Volusia County councilor Association is a chapter of the Florida school counselor Association each year they receive nominations from school counselor of the year for administrators other students also other student services personnel and school counselors themselves they receive these nominations their goal is to recognize the outstanding work of the school counselors at each level and bring to light their advocacy efforts as it pertains to school counseling and that profession and to share also collaboratively the efforts that they they Embark upon each and every day as they spearhead involving this work involving our stakeholders so the award recipients are selected by the Volusia County school counselor Association board and and recognized during this National School counseling week during their annual awards banquet and many of you were there
076with me that evening this year the award recipients for Volusia County school counselor of the year and nominees for the Florida school counselor of the year are ready ready Lisette Nazario from high Banks Learning Center [Applause] and I see her back there with her school family Richard Scott from Deltona High School [Applause] principal is there with him and Michelle Brown from River Springs Middle School with her principal Dr Marcy Burchell from George Marks Elementary and she's there with her principal along with recognizing the outstanding work of our school counselor at each level the Volusia County school counselor Association would like to recognize The Advocates also who support the role of the school counselor and they help them remove impediments providing a comprehensive School counseling program that is Miss Katie Berry school counselor advocate for school
077community and family family and family [Applause] and Jennifer Dietz school counselor Advocates she's the school-based administrator [Applause] [Music] here with a picture and you can call by school well I I actually could we have the whole group come forward however you like anyone that's with you Mrs Burnett and Dr valgabin and myself were fortunate enough that we attended the banquet and got to see all of these wonderful winners so we are happy that you joined us tonight in the boardroom well everyone that Dr balkaman introduced will you please come forward and your principles or any one that's with [Music] [Applause] um [Music] all right who's that guy back there yes come on [Applause] how do you know we're moving on to item 5.04 recognition of Staff Career and Technical education Dr balkovan thank you madam
078chair and this is the last recognition for this evening and it's no other you're absolutely right um board member versus its career in technical education you get 100 percent uh Madam chair board members at this time I would like to recognize again our amazing staff when it comes to CTE um our career in technical education teacher of the year and rookie Teacher of the Year Amanda Ellis the Agricultural Science teacher from New Smyrna Beach Middle is our teacher of the year would you like would you like to go ahead go ahead go ahead go all right good evening Madam chair Haynes board members and superintendent Dr balgabin we're excited to be here to recognize our our CTE teachers and so I will get started uh and and then with the um with the first recognitions
079and then miss um castelli will finish it off all right the mission of Florida Association for Career and Technical education outstanding teacher and New Teacher of the Year Awards is to recognize teachers who are providing outstanding Career and Technical education programs for youth in their respective fields and communities recipients of this award must have made significant contributions toward Innovative unique and novel programs that are serving to improve and promote Career and Technical education tonight we recognize Amanda Ellis agriculture teacher from New Smyrna Beach Middle School as a 2023 f-a-c-t-e teacher of the year [Music] Amanda teaches CTE because she believes in making a lasting impact on the lives of students especially those students that are often overlooked she employs project-based learning methods in her classroom instruction where students work together to develop solutions to real
080world problems and she does this in an environment where student voice is encouraged and appreciated we would also like to recognize tonight the 2023 f-a-c-t-e new teacher of the year winner Mr Andrew peck of DeLand High School [Applause] also an agriculture teacher Mr Peck is a member of if I'm going to say a lot of acronyms so and I can tell you later what they are if you wish f-a-a-e-f-a-c-t-e and n-a-a-e-a-c-t-e he has served as the new teacher representative on the f a a e board since 2020 and 21. Mr Peck received the Florida teacher TurnKey award from n-a-a-e Furthermore Mr pick serves on several committees including the Florida FFA State officer screening committee and the faae policy and bylaws committee where he has served as chair he has also made immeasurable contributions to various
081planning committees for several State and Regional agriculture teacher conference events we'd like to thank Amanda and Andrew for their continued work with our CTE agriculture programs and ask that they come forward for a picture and before that if before that what we'd like to do is continue with the recognizing the district teachers of the year so Mrs castelli take it away all right so we had an awesome month of February it was CTE month so we had a lot of uh celebrations throughout the month at the end of the month we recognized our outstanding CTE teacher of the year for our district our nine nominees this year are an excellent representation of what exceptional CTE programs we have in this district from Finance to culinary to early childhood and agriculture our nominees have a combined
08292 years of teaching experience together as varied as their expertise is the common theme of why they chose this profession was evident in their applications when asked why do you teach CTE responses were I feel like what I teach applies to everyday life for my students and we are the reason many of our students come to school every day not all of our finalists are here tonight but I'm going to recognize everybody so please stand up when I call your name and please come up Margot Rivera from Atlantic High School criminal justice Joseph Monaco DeLand High School culinary Emmett Foxworth DeLand Middle School Technology education Paul Reed Mainland High School game and simulation [Applause] Patrick hole New Smyrna Beach High School agriculture [Applause] Christina Marrero Pine Ridge High School early childhood education [Applause] and not
083with us tonight is James Kohler from Taylor Middle High School he's our building construction and our electricity teacher [Applause] and also Shelly Walters from University High School she's criminal justice [Applause] our overall 2023 outstanding CTE teacher of the year winner is Miss Haley Dougal from Spruce Creek High School in finance [Applause] and if it's okay with you it's time for pictures they want the principals or assistant principals whoever's with them to come forward also directions see Paul right how are you doing I'm doing well foreign great photos little bit of board members okay no you go first Smile everybody okay foreign [Applause] [Music] foreign [Applause] thank you to all of the CTE teachers their administrative staff and our CTA CTE staff at the district level we also attended their banquet and it was a lot
084of fun I talked about it last time we played a musical bingo all right before moving on to any of the next items it is time for public participation however I have been asked if we could have just a very short restroom break so it is 607 we will be back in here at 6 15 and we will have public input thank you you know if you've joined us since we started the meeting at the very beginning would you please silence your cell phones at this time we're going to start the public input normally we do 15 minutes of public input I'm currently I have 10 cards that were given to me right before we took the break so we're going to go ahead and do all 10 cards they're in order of the way
085they've been received I'm going to announce the first Speaker you will have three minutes and I'm going to go ahead and announce the second speaker so that they are ready when the first Speaker ends and that's how we will move forward through the 10 cards instead of just taking five at this time so thank you for allowing us to have a short break speaker number one will be Miss Sheila Butchart followed by Speaker number two Suzanne Southard is Miss McCoy going to take Miss butchart's place I'm just reading for her thank you she has another meeting all right so this is Miss Michelle McCoy but this is Miss Sheila butcherts it's Miss Sheila yes but I just I don't want people watching to say that's you know if they're from delay and Thai they're going
086to say you're not miss pachar all right thank you I am not here to tonight to speak for any one group in our district I'm only speaking for myself however I can tell you there are many unhappy employees tonight in Volusia County Schools I have been an employee of this district for 30 years with a master's degree in library science and I am here tonight to talk to you about the irrational knee-jerk reactions of this District in a district who's motto is Grace and respect let me share how that was demonstrated involving every school district every school in this District today at about 11 30 media Specialists across our district were asked to join a team's meeting at 1 20 with no explanation the lack of consideration with short notice is is the minor area
087the beginning of the disrespect that was shown today as I as many of the others joined this meeting with Miss Hazel and Dr rabinski Mrs Hazel stated that due to a lack of media oversight for several years the current media supervisor would be moving to the ELA department and that Dr rabinski would now be overseeing instructional materials and Media Services if we had any questions do please call either of them questions were in the chat people had their hands raised and all were ignored and both ladies hung up leaving the media specialists in total disbelief if this is the year of the people I sure do hate to see how employees will be treated in the future we are under Fire in all directions by our governor our legislature members of our community media specialists
088want to follow the laws and although I will say it is pretty insulting that as a media as much as with a master's degree and at least four Master's level classes on book selection we still follow the procedures that were set in place as I look at all of you sitting here I have been one of your media specialists at some point in my career in fact it was downright insulting the way we were treated today we have taken on so many more responsibilities including all the technology which by the way those changes those procedures change regularly as well we have a procedure in place for challenge materials why are we not following it as we had decided to do through our school board policy I sit at most school-born meetings and hear about the
089shortage of educational professionals I have stayed here for 30 years so I do think Volusia County is a good place to live but damage was done today and I do not know how we can be fixed so much for grace and respect now I have to she had to head off to a meeting that was um one of the book committee meetings to finish that process with that book thank you next up is Miss Suzanne Southard followed by Elizabeth Hensley good evening my name is Suzanne Southard and I am the director of religious education at the first uu church here in West Volusia I want to thank you for all the awards that I got to see for all the wonderful Educators I was really happy to be here to clap for them as they
090work so very hard I am here tonight to talk about censorship and uh I was very disturbed by what happened last week uh we had book branding book burning in the 30s by a particular fascist party and that didn't work well I would really like the media Specialists to be in charge of what the books are they do go to school for that particular reason I do not appreciate that a group came before you we all know of a book called Chicken Little the sky is falling the sky is falling although that may have been pulled off the shelf too I'm not sure um that's what they're doing they read a particular thing and then they think it should be banned I think parents should have the choice of what books they should or shouldn't
091read with their children and that shouldn't extend to other parents should be able to decide what's good for their children and then discuss with them why they don't think it's appropriate for them to read it I'm concerned that pulling all books off the shelf I really don't want to see Volusia County another laughing stock as many of the other counties in Florida are because of what the things our governor is doing if this continues I can sample a book that I use very frequently which contains rape incest kissing intercourse murder theft all sorts of terrible things it's called The Holy Bible will that be unacceptable too then you're going to consider the IB students who have to reference it for some of their classes I can think of 50 uh Expressions directly from that is
092that going to be banned as well it's got some terribly naughty things in it I really like you to reconsider allowing the media Specialists to do their job not over micromanaging what they went to school to do and if someone has a particular problem with the book for their child then they can tell their child why they don't want them to read it and I thank you very much for allowing me to speak tonight thank you next up is Elizabeth Hensley followed by Jody Atkins hi my name is Elizabeth Hensley I briefly saw Miss Haynes last Friday at Freedom Elementary for the science fair banquet and I just wanted to say hello thank you very much for coming in I'm very glad that you're familiar with our wonderful school that you are the elected representative
093for but I want to say that because I've had such a wonderful experience as a mother of three children in our school system I am very protective of it I think we have wonderful and exceptional teachers and as a general rule I think we should let them do their jobs in the last few years we have thrown a lot at teachers we had mask mandates and then no mask mandates plastic dividers and mandatory separation and mandatory quarantine and all of that changed but while their classrooms were completely disrupted the teachers responded with a smile and with Solutions in my experience the teachers have been solution or solution oriented and have done everything in their power to enable students to learn at their highest investability these teachers are highly trained and educated and they're exceptional in
094their jobs I believe we should allow them academic freedom when they are teaching our children because in my experience teachers are really doing a great job coming from this perspective I am against allowing the breach of procedure while reviewing these books that are challenged as I'm sure most of you are aware parents are very opinionated when it comes to their children's education I am one of those people I have the right and want to retain the right to guide my children's education this involves whether or not they wear masks and this involves whether or not they have books available to them at their Library I would like to make the decisions for my children but this does not give me the right to make decisions for other people's children as a result I do not
095control the reading material available at children in their classrooms and libraries I want the school board but mostly the teachers who are on the ground to determine what is available in their classrooms again our teachers are highly trained and they are very good at their jobs if they think a book should be there let it be there they are not going to put an inappropriate book like pornography in an elementary school classroom they're just not going to do it I would also like to point out that reading materials available in the library are not required reading it is merely available reading made accessible to children who independently review titles and bring them home I am a proponent of self-selection to encourage children and adults to read material that is interesting to them personal choice and
096reading selection and private reading is protected by the Constitution and the Supreme Court of the United States determined that in the 1965 decision Lamont B Postmaster General in addition because we believe in the First Amendment and the Bill of Rights as a result we believe in private reading and reading selection we must acknowledge the procedural safeguards in place to protect the First Amendment rights of those involved the procedural safeguards require a whole book being read before Banning it I draw your attention to the Miller test there are three prongs of that test two of those three prongs involve reading the whole book for content I see my time is expired thank you very much thank you very much Miss jodiakins followed by Mrs Genie Maddox hi I'm Jody Adkins from DeLand I'm a retired media
097specialist from Volusia County of 25 years so I just had a few things I'd like to share the messaging of our governor and some very vocal parent organizations that espouse the importance of parental rights especially as this pertains to a parent's rights insofar as their child's education is concerned was encouraging I wasn't aware that parents didn't have rights so that's news to me and I'd further with all this sentiment in the way that all lives matter all parents have rights those rights are not just afforded to those who are the most vocal or the most Sensational in their communicative style for nearly 30 years parents of Volusia County Schools students have had the right to review their child's reading in the library and in the classroom parents are offered an opt-out form to sign stating
098that their child can or cannot read in his or her school library when parents have concerns about material in class they can speak directly to the teacher if that doesn't satisfy their concerns there is um Rick they can request an alternative assessment for their child there is a full process for concerned parents to challenge a text that includes reading that is entirely relies on reading the entire book not just excerpts we seem to be suggesting that there isn't a right that parents have always had this simply isn't true why are we convening committees to evaluate novels in our school libraries when the formal process by which a book can be challenged hasn't been undertaken why do we have policies if they aren't utilized perhaps the board could do a better job communicating the rights that
099parents already have surely it is every parent's right to filter the reading of their children the parents of minority children have the right to receive an accurate education about their Rich Heritage and the contributions to this country the parents of lbgt children have the right to send their children to schools with the expectation that they are safe from harm at the hands of other children and adults on campus all parents have the right to demand an education that prepares their children for a world that doesn't exist yet but will surely be fraught with varying perspectives opinions that differ from their own and values that don't align with their own don't all parents have rights we cannot permit the belief that parents don't have rights to these things and furthermore we must provide these things to
100parents and to all children thank you thank you Miss Genie Maddox followed by Kathy pachura Couture I'm going to deviate from the book comments right now my name is Jeannie Maddox I am the President of the Volusia school counselor Association and a board member of the Florida school counselor Association in my 36-year career in Volusia County Schools I've worked in four different elementary schools and one Middle School I've had 10 principals and 16 assistant principals four of those assistant principals have gone on to be principals one became a deputy superintendent and one became a school superintendent in another state I'd like to think the example I said in creating and implementing my school counseling program while working with these administrators influence the way that they think about School counseling and have utilized the school counselors
101who came after me I like to think the idea that school counselors should not be used as substitutes to plan Master scheduling used as testing coordinators or for lunch duty but are given the freedom to develop a comprehensive School counseling program is in some way related to our experiences together examples that I set presentations that I gave and conversations that I had with those administrators during our time together each of those 26 individual administrators I worked with have provided me with unique opportunities to share the purpose and benefit of the school counseling profession to influence their thoughts and ideas about how school counselors can be utilized to impact students like a pebble dropped on the surface of a pond the ripples created by the impact of that pup will keep moving outward so when each
102of these administrators moved on to their next school and their next school counselor I like to think I helped create a ripple effect of Greater understanding of the school counseling profession that will benefit school counselors that come after me the school counselors of the year you saw honor tonight are exceptional school counselors who are also the pebble in the pond with their administrator these school counselors are creating ripples with their administrators and helping them to understand the importance of the role of school counselors that they can provide when their time is unencumbered and they are given the freedom to be the best they can be however many of our school counselors do not experience experience that level of support they work in schools with administrators who have no understanding of what school counselors really do
103and are being used for inappropriate job roles some of the schools counselors especially the new ones are already saying out loud they wonder if being a school counselor is really worth it is it really the career I want they had no idea that they would be assigned so many clerical and pseudo-administrative non-counseling tasks and spend so much time with paper rather than students but people don't know what they don't know and many administrators don't know the wonderful things that school counselors can do when they are free to design a comprehensive School counseling program that utilizes their school data school counselors have the skills and knowledge to help with improving the school climate as indicated in the Volusia school counselor strategic Volusia School County strategic plan which includes School climate improving School climate reducing absenteeism discipline
104referrals and suspensions school counselors are an untapped resource in many schools please tap into our Knowledge and Skills to offer all schools and students in exceptional school counselor like the ones recognized tonight thank you thank you the next person will be Ashley Jackson good evening I'm Excuse me I'm Kathy Patrol Couture and I am a professor at Stetson University in the teacher education program and I would like to talk to you a little bit more about the books um reading is fundamental right we know that inform citizen the purpose of education is to have informed citizens currently Volusia County as you guys all know is sitting at about a 53 proficiency rate and so I look at it and says that means almost half of our students right now are not reading up to their
105potential my comments are twofold first I applaud parents who want to read with their children I might want to get involved in their in their children's reading I want them to read I want them to read every book from cover to cover and I want them to sit down and I want them to talk about their books with their children my own two children came through Volusia County Public Schools one is now a proud attorney and the other one is a writer they are super informed citizens of the society who went from Woodward Elementary to DeLand Middle School to DeLand High School and I can say Bravo they did a great job I read every single book my children were assigned I sat down with them to be honest with you my kids went through
106IB I didn't like all the books they read but I sat down with them and talked to them about it and I sat there and discussed it with them so I look at it and say read Bravo read to your kids get involved in reading but don't tell me what my children can't read Don't force that on someone else um so I do oppose forcing the scope and breadth of reading to what is appropriate to your family on my family and I can say that that's one of the things that makes us critical thinkers when I look at that I say trust your your teachers trust your Librarians know that they're they are not grooming your children I teach teacher Educators we go through a very rigorous process to get them to that point to
107become teacher Educators they go through a rigorous process to become certified teachers and so do our school librarians they check those books out they look at the books we know that there are contents think back that Catcher in the Rye some of the books that have been banned in the past we don't want to actually be able to do that so I just look at it and say good job for reading but let us look at this as a saying is that do not impose your beliefs on the beliefs of everyone in this in this community take the time to be able to read someone else's perspective and see it through somebody else talked a little bit about the books and I know a lot of it I looked at the ban book list and
108of the 10 top 10 right now are stories about lgbtq um children let those children see themselves in those books let those children be able to identify with that because bottom line is we want people to read thank you sin followed by Riley Kellogg oh um across the country parents and school districts have been asking for more input into what is taught in schools here in the Volusia School District the process for reviewing books includes experts in the fields which are as well as parents and community members sure is that the results of the reviews are reflective of what our community needs and what our community wants after watching the last school board meeting it seems that a group who has historically been vocal about parent involvement in education is now demanding that the school
109board circumvent the process and remove books without using the approved process and more concerning than that are four board members that agreed with that as a parent of children in the school district I strongly believe that the people best suited to make decisions on which books to have on the school shelves are those with the education training and experience to provide them with the best tools for making these important decisions Librarians and teachers as a licensed clinical social worker I have seen children who have survived physical and sexual trauma who are dealing with significant mental health distress who feel isolated and alone while as a parent I believe we are all trying to do what is best for our children I also know that not all children are able to get what they need from
110home they all deserve to have access to books that will help them feel less alone and less different books that have been carefully vetted and chosen by the experts reading books that reflect your experiences can bring a sense of belonging and improve your mental health and reading books that reflect experiences you are unfamiliar with can increase empathy and an appreciation for the diversity of experiences within our community please keep in mind also that many of the children that we're speaking about are older teens who are one year away from being able to enlist in the military and fight for our country they're one year away from being able to buy guns one year away from being seen as fully adults with all the rights and privileges that go with that designation why would we make
111our children wait until we have less influence on them why not let them explore these carefully selected texts when they're able to come home each night and we can discuss the books with them why make these children wait to read about others like themselves and perhaps feel just a little bit better no one is forcing any parent to allow their child to read certain books and we already have a process in place to opt out saying that children can access these books in public libraries doesn't acknowledge that not everyone has a privilege or access to those public libraries public schools are charged with educating everyone and do a disservice to our community when allowing students limited access to the expertise of the Professionals in our own schools I don't envy the board their positions I
112bet you guys get a lot of emails but it is an honor to be in your place and I ask that you respect the responsibility that you've been charged with trust your schools trust the parents to ask to review or better yet trust your Librarians and teachers open the world to your children and let them grow trust them learning about themselves will be an empowering thing for them and for parents also peer-reviewed not crowdsourced please thank you Riley Kellogg followed by Maria O'Brien good evening my name is Riley Kellogg I'm a I'm an IB 10th grader at DeLand High School I've loved books my entire life ever since planning to read I have spent as much time as possible pouring through books I don't like that books are being removed from school libraries merely because
113they are deemed as inappropriate by a small population of people who attempt to force their opinions on others I don't want to have someone else dictate what I can and can't read based on an arbitrary set of criteria there is enough of that through predetermined curriculums and standardized testing one of my favorite quotes is book spilled empathy empathy leads to compassion compassion leads to change this quote is said by Alan Gratz an author that I like another Author George R.R Martin said a reader lives A Thousand Lives before he dies a man who never reads lives only one I agree with both of these reading allows for me to get a glimpse of what other people's lives are like in a perspective I wouldn't otherwise see when I found out that 22 books were being
114challenged and possibly pulled from the shelves in our libraries I immediately asked if I could join one of the review committees I was told that students aren't allowed to participate because the books were being challenged and we therefore should not be reading them I don't feel like anyone else should tell me what I'm allowed to read I don't need someone else's restrictions to help me decide what I should be reading one of my teachers has a large classroom Library there are two full bookshelves that overflow into boxes on top of the nearby filing cabinet and onto the floor my teacher said he will probably be taking down the library I have had this teacher for close to two years at the start of class we usually read for five minutes on a day that I
115don't have a book with me I go over to the shelf and pick a random book I don't read the description or look at the cover I just grab a book and go back to my seat at the end of five minutes I either put the book back or borrow it so that I can finish reading I enjoy this because it gives me the opportunity to read books that I likely wouldn't have read otherwise if the library has to get censored or removed from the classroom I won't be able to do that anymore I don't think that anyone should get to make the decision on what books can be put in school libraries based on criteria such as whether or not there is any cursing in the book anyone who is set at foot on
116a middle or high school campus will know that such language is used on a regular basis there is no point in censoring books for language that will continue to be used anyway thank you Maria O'Brien followed by Jacqueline Crawford a good evening superintendo balkovan and the board members I'm going to tell you that I've been crying quite a bit and I'm a little bit emotional so I don't know if I can articulate this the way I want to I want to say that some of the um some of what I want to say has been spoken before it's been articulated some of these points have been articulated and I may or may not reiterate some of these a few months ago I was awarded the second for the second time recognition as a Florida Power
117Library School the rubric used for this designation reads as follows a Continuum for developing outstanding School library media programs that enhance and support the schools educational agenda quality library media programs provide a welcoming resource-rich environment that supports multiple literacies cultivates a culture of inquiry and later literary appreciation and encourages the independent ethical exploration of information and ideas at the core of what I do students I came here stood here with you took photos and believed for a moment that you stood with me you thought you were proud of me proud of my school one of the three in this District Who currently hold this designation I thought that you had the capacity to see the full picture and the little details a person in this position could do if he or she were were given
118the respect to pursue and Implement what some of our founding fathers saw as essential to our democracy books reading School libraries I've been in this district for 23 years I too am a parent of two boys that attend evolutionary Volusia County Schools they've excelled I had no books when I was growing up but in my household they had books they read we had discussions in the name of books that contain sexual or obscene words we know the difference yet you took every opportunity for us or from us to discuss in a genuine and respectful manner what these books were or meant I took offense to Mr panervo's suggestion that we are less than Christian because we want to have and we want to take that extra step to make sure books represent all of us
119I may be um let's see whatever here it may be true that some books may not belong in our shelves but your mature um but you've ability to do our job with fidelity I would just wanted you to consider time please give us back the time so that we could do our jobs diligently respect us as the Educators that we are and talk to us I would have really appreciated if they wanted to talk to me first before they took the steps that they took and I feel like I've been attacked thank you thank you Jacqueline Crawford I'm Jackie Crawford I'm from Daytona and I'm a current media specialist and I'm not a public speaker there are a lot of things that I would like to say about the way books and media centers are
120being handled in this district and across the state but for today I will just be addressing the way media Specialists are being portrayed in the public eye I did not go to school for education I went to school to get my Master's in library science because I am passionate about serving the public and ensuring children have access to books I believe in the power of books and promoting empathy and the benefits of reading regularly to children and growing Minds I see the proof of this in my own children who are kind and compassionate they are honor students at every level School level in Volusia County Schools and have been recognized for various achievements throughout the district I love being a media specialist and I love my school Community I believe that all of my students
121should have the same opportunities as my own children and I believe one of the best ways to accomplish this is to promote instead of discourage reading I haven't read all 22 of the books that are up for reconsideration but I have read some and I know they are important as a teenager reading The Perks of Being a Wallflower was life-changing as a lifelong book lender I encourage all of my friends to read it as well this book sparked the love of reading and my friends that wasn't there before they felt seen and heard and it felt good I think I can speak for my fellows media Specialists when I say that we are in this because we care about kids and we want what's best for them when extremist groups say harmful things about Educators
122and media Specialists they're not only trying to discredit our education and our career but also our Humanity thank you thank you [Applause] that concludes public input at this time there will be time if you have any issues with anything on the consent agenda or the items that we are going to vote on that are single and also again at the end of the evening we're moving on now to item 7.01 removal of items from the consent agenda Dr valgaman are there any items requiring removal on the consent agenda no Madam chair board members are there any items on the consent agenda that you would like to remove for further discussion then we're moving on now to item 7.02 approval of the consent agenda items approval of the consent agenda as printed Madam chair thank you
123Mr persis I'll second that motion thank you Miss Thompson so we have a motion and a second to approve the consent agenda any discussion I'll call for the vote all those in favor say aye aye any opposed it passes unanimously we are now moving on to item eight point zero one discussion and sorry removing we do that we're moving on to nine give me just a minute we are moving on to 17.02 that we moved earlier during the main agenda to take place prior to the human resources update so item 17.02 is social media litigation Dr balgeman thank you madam chair I would like to invite our general counsel Mr Kevin pendley to join us along with Mr William shinoff from France Law Group to come forward they will speak with us regarding the social
124media litigation case thank you Dr balkova Madam chair board members joining me tonight from the law firm of France Law Group has William shanoff to discuss proposed litigation concerning social media thank you all very much for the opportunity to speak with you here tonight again my name is William shanoff I'm an attorney with the France Law Group about three months ago my firm began litigation against a number of alleging that they are intentionally addicting children to their product been well aware of the harms of their product and that they're not taking the appropriate measures to protect the children children so to give you kind of a little background we've been investigating this matter for for about three years now because I'm the head of our public entity practice and I've heard complain ber of superintendent
125regarding the issues they're dealing with on campus on a daily basis and whether that's been they've seen an increase in depression Eating Disorders a number of mental health issues and unfortunately and the big complaints have been the regards to not only the cyber bullying they're seeing but the the content that's been shared with the kids and what they need to do to prevent it and the biggest issue they've been dealing with also is the fact that they great example is I was in front of a school board last week in New Jersey who had a child that committed suicide because of something that was posted on tick tock and they would not and so what really pushed this case for was the fact that there was a whistleblower that came out to the from the
126company meta So Meta is the parent company to Facebook and Instagram and she went out in front these companies are intentionally addicting children to their product because the more time that they're spending on it the more money they're making and the fact is is that there are safety measures that could be put in place to help protect children of screen time that they're there and so as part of this litigation what we're trying to do is number right now we don't have any being put for Force these companies to create those changes and so us as attorneys were able and as well as what we want to do is hold these companies accountable to make these changes and also work make them go and pay for the mental health services that we need to start
127putting forward in our schools to go in and so this is not a class action so we're not going and asking one District to go and represent all the school districts across the country uh this is a mass action litigation this is going to be a centralized litigation in the Northern District of Cal Court of and so the defendants in this case are meta so that's again that's parent company to Facebook and Instagram uh bite dance which oh which owns tick tock Google which owns YouTube and main defendants and the reason for that is because right now the evidence shows that those are the companies that are have algorithms in place that are going and pushing this content and we and with purpose of a dick and so uh we the two main things that
128I want to make sure you're aware of is uh your District's participation in it will be similar to The Vaping litigation that we handled on behalf of your District so there's going to be minimum and as well as we're handling this on a contingency fee basis with a reduced rate of 25 instead of 40 so there's no Financial Risk for the district to be involved so I want offer the opportunity board members you've heard what Mr shanoff shared with us about the social media litigation does anyone have any questions Mr purses thank you Mr shanoff for that explanation so let me ask you you you're going after all four obviously you've you've done your research is is you know normally you would you would think I mean I would think I'm not in attorney so
129but you would think you'd go after perhaps one because we couldn't couldn't one company be a little different than another or one maybe you know really at a line and another one is not so much but you're but are you lumping all four or are you really going to be singling out as you go through it so what ends up happening is we make the go and we include discovery and at the end of the day if it goes to trial it will be up to a jury to determine in apportionment a fault of just percent who has more of a percentage of fault at the end of the day and so they'll all be held accountable and so they 've been according to what the uh evidence shows let's say some may be held
130more to a higher yeah absolutely thank you madam chair anyone else I have one question and I apologize what's the name of the company that owns tick tock I have no further questions either Dr Bogman I am Mr penley is there anything else you need to share with us Madam chair as I believe that the award is aware we have had actual on-campus disturbances caused because of these challenges that get publicized and because of that disturbance on campus and actual cost to us I believe that the board should seriously consider the litigation and his merits thank you so my understanding tonight this is just a presentation and if we choose to have a vote on it it will come at another board meeting if it's the board's pleasure the purpose of this presentation is correct
131is it's just to inform the board and if a member wishes additional information or to take action on it it would require bringing that motion forward at a future board meeting and I too agree with what you shared we have incurred a lot of cost due to um and predominantly it's Tick-Tock I mean there have been a lot of tick-tock challenges out there that we have incurred a lot of damage to our buildings but what concerns me even more even though it takes money for those repairs and it causes um issues on campus you know when restrooms have to be shut down because they're destroyed and things like that what concerns me even more though are the challenges where we've had students hurt physically hurt teachers paraprofessionals administrators office staff bus drivers physically hurt and
132that is not acceptable it's never acceptable to come onto a campus and physically hurt someone else or to do damage on that campus therefore taking away from the reason why students are there which is to receive instruction so um we appreciate you coming this evening and sharing this with us I can't speak for all of the other board members but Dr Balkan would what I would like to ask is that when you have your weekly meetings with each of us this week if you could ask each board member and direct Mr penley on if we're going to bring this back forward I will go ahead and no I will not say how I'm I'm not going to do that but um thank you very much for bringing it forward with no further questions we're going
133to move right along we're moving along to item 18.01 authorization to advertise amendments to school board policy 202 establishment of attendance areas Dr bakoban thank you madam chair at this time I would like to ask Dr Earl Johnson our chief off Chief Operating Officer along with Miss Stephanie dosser a coordinator for business and planning too share their presentation with you thank you madam chair school board members superintendent algopan I am asking that the board approves to advertise amendment to school board policy 202 which is um establishing and it's boundaries area zone for Pine Trail pathways um RJ Longstreet and Beachside as well as west side and uh we're looking to rezone students from Champion Elementary School to some of the students will be going to Beachside Elementary School and and some of those students will
134be going to West Side Elementary School so I think we have approximately 65 students that will be going to west side and close to 200 that will be going to Beachside so we're asking that you approve us to advertise this rezoning and to school board policy 202. thank you Dr Johnson are there any comment cards for this item Mr Gomez all right then board members um we'll start with Mrs Burnett thank you thank you I know we've participated in a few community events where we've had some input as well and and I appreciate you getting some questions for me today the issue I have and and I get it we we need to rezone for these schools the issue I have is that we haven't given the community an opportunity to participate with the Daytona
135Beach Housing Authority and getting some of that input as to where some of the displaced people have been relocated I know you got me answers today and I do appreciate that please know that but I feel like we haven't done our full due diligence on on this yet and so that's where I stand on it thank you Mrs Burnett Mr persis a couple of things and yes we have attended a few of these meetings they haven't been I would say as heavily attended perhaps as we would have liked to have seen but uh uh uh so to your point about uh if we voted to approve this now then it would be we're giving permission to have it advertised is that that so it would be advertised for the days and then it would come
136back for a vote would it just be a one vote or would it have to come to us twice or just just one time for a re a rezoning I'm just not sure just the one time okay and today is what March the 7th so we would probably advertise this and it would go out we wouldn't bring it back until the end of April no the April 11th board meeting would have allowed I think the 30 days or we could say the end of April the end of April 18th because we would have definitely met this I do think because it's something that as as we were talking about at the last meeting unless the parent really knows I mean really knows that you're you know my child is going to be attending a different
137school next year if this passes I just want to make sure every parent that's going to be affected knows and not just by a letter that went out or something posted but you know a direct email or a couple of them because the worst thing is for a parent to come back here and say I had no idea that you had rezoned my child and then you know they get upset at us because we did this without letting them know so I think we we just can't let them know too many times or in too many ways that you got to make sure that they know the the other part of this that I would add is uh and I've talked to Dr Johnson about this is the situation at Tomoka because Tomoka students next
138year will be displaced and be at the old Osceola site we have students that are living in the 32114 zone who attend Tomoka Elementary School and always have and but two years from now I think the plan is when the territory is it gets a larger a new school those students who are currently zoned for for Tomoka Elementary will be Zone to Terry T because it's a long ride from where they live to to mocha well my concern for those students is that when we moved to MoCA to Osceola while the new ones being built it's even a longer for them from where they live to go over the bridge and you you know what I'm saying Jamie so I'm thinking picture it for a minute yes so what I'm thinking is you know is
139it really fair for those kids to have a a longer ride while Tomoka is being built and then when it's built they're not even gonna go to Tomoka they're going to go to to Terry too small so shouldn't we consider perhaps seeing if it's possible to send them to charity small Terry T small is being built because that's where they're going to go rather than put them on a bus for a longer bus ride and then not even end up going to that school when it's finished it's just you know what I'm saying I'm just thinking it's it's it's hard enough when your child is displaced to another school anyway but then if if it's going to happen because we're going to get a we're going to get a brand new school and you know
140we get to go like we did Beachside um but in this case there isn't that that benefit um because because they're not going to attend that that school so I know we have it I know you haven't had a chance to look at the numbers and everything has to work work out but I'm just thinking even if it's not with this particular policy maybe if it's something that the board could can consider before the next school year starts that's all I'm asking Madam chair before I move to you um Dr Johnson do you know the number of students that live in the 32114 that are at Tomoka I don't know the exact number but the students that he is speaking of are the students who used to live in Caroline Village and um rezoning that
141we're doing right now only pertaining to because of that move so this is Phase One and phase two would be tier T however the additional phase which we'll have a conversation next year will be Tomoka because for Terry T because we're going to have to move students from Horizon and Sugar Mill into mocha that are living in the 3211 area code but that is not the phase of rezoning so that will be addressed yesterday okay so I understand what Mr persis is saying though yes that's not part of the zoning but the one thing that we did talk about leading up to this process was not moving children multiple times and I'll be honest with you that was one piece I never thought of and so Mr persis I appreciate the thought that you put
142into that because let's all right let's just stop for a moment and say we're a second grader okay go back to being seven or go back to being eight in third grade I you know I knew Tomoka was one of the schools that got those kids but I just never thought about moving them from Tomoka over to Osceola which will be further it will be a further ride okay because of the Beachside piece then the year that they would be going back to Tomoka we're not going to send them to Tomoka we're now going to send them to Turi tea and so that's a lot I mean and and I'm happy to talk about Mrs Burnett's piece in a moment but I just I never thought of that and we're talking about kids okay so
143the whole idea behind the Turi tea building of a new school is to bring those kids that have been bussed out to 11 different areas where their parents can't get to the kids can't attend performances or award ceremonies their parents can't get there for conferences and things like that the whole idea is to bring them back into that community so that when I go outside to play in the yard I'm playing with someone that I go to school with instead of no I don't go to school with the four kids next to me because they get on a bus and go somewhere else Dr Bachman I'm gonna ask right along with Mr purses could we just find out the number of students that that involves because if we can keep you know 25 kids and
144we can keep 25 kids from being moved from Tomoka to Osceola and that you know in a longer drive and then finally going to cherry tea I think it would be best if they could start friendships with the kids that they're going to be with yes Madam chair we're all on the same page last week when we had our one-on-one you're absolutely right Mr Parsons said did bring that up and a few others and Dr Johnson and I talked about it right after and what we're going to do is pull the list so we can Cross Point and make sure that there's not movement more than once because because it may I mean they won't all be in one grade level they'll be spread across and so maybe we have to take an additional modular
145classroom into turiti or something like that but I think if we can go ahead instead of moving them multiple times and give them a chance to build relationships with the students that they're going to go to school with I think that's in the best interest of the kids I know it may take some more work on our part okay I apologize thank you Miss Thompson you're up next I was actually on the same wavelength as you because I was going to ask you Dr Johnson how many children would be moving twice between the two rezonings as far as like being relocated from Once if we knew like how many or if any that as it relates to west side or Beachside yeah like going children that were going to be relocating to these schools and
146then we're going to do more rezoning with cherry tea the students who are going to go to West Side and Beachside will be moved once okay let's think about it like this the students that that are currently at Beats those students came from Osceola and Artona both of those groups would move twice right because Tony had to go to Austin so well our nartona I mean I said so they were moved until this building was built and so the the year in which we're anticipating Tomoka been opened so will tear T and we'll know definitively that we have capacity to house those students from Tomoka and Horizon and Sugar Mill and Long Street at the new building you know right now we don't have that number and that's what I have to check on the
147number of students that live in the 32114 area code that to mocha so we can look and see if it's not that many students and we have capacity then it will not be an issue right now probably not that many students that live over there in the 32114 when I was there it was I think around 60 but that number could have dropped a great a great deal so I hesitate to say oh yeah it's definitely yeah so you have to find out I'll find out yeah and I'll get back with you tomorrow so the last time that I it that was a number that resonates with me to about 60. thank you yeah that's it okay then you know there's been a lot of thought put into this yes you know we just came
148up with another piece but that's because we've got building going on on two sites that you know maybe would not have necessarily been there so coming from a person that you know even though a part of my career was on the east side but the bulk of my career has been on the west side of the county I shared a little um before on the west side of the county we at one point every year we rezoned every year we opened a new school in like the Deltona area and or up in the DeLand area or something like that and we ReSound I mean and we did the best to get the word out to parents but you know it is what it is and here's the one caveat that I'm going to add to
149this is Beachside is a beautiful school it is a beautiful campus and we've got kids that lived in the old Hearst neighborhood okay when we close down Hearst because we opened up Champion that we have been busing a long distance to go to Champion okay and so my thought is I don't know I mean yes we want to let parents know and I will tell you it doesn't matter how much we advertise it it doesn't matter principals will do call outs and text and messaging and we should be doing that okay there'll still be someone that says they didn't know and there's not been the movement on the east side of the county that we've had on the west side of the county the east side of the county has stayed fairly stable you know
150I can tell you when they opened a few school you know what I'm saying but it's been a stable thing and it's okay it is okay because kids adapt and and they're going to not have as long of a bus ride because some of the because I'm assuming that the group from Hearst is actually going to go to West Side more than likely that lived or well wherever but the bottom line is they're not going to have as long of a drive and here's what's happening to Champion the growth out at Champion has increased drastically that we're pushing that school above capacity and I will tell you having been at schools that had 1100 1200 elementary kids it's too much we know that if you've been on an elementary campus that is far too large
151and it's our job to bring those numbers back down to a manageable amount so that teachers and staff and administrators can do their jobs so you know I appreciate what everyone has shared I do think we've got to communicate well which I think will come down to Mr Gomez but it's going to come down to the principles from those areas and it's all about how you communicate it if you communicate it in a positive way and say your child is you know riding a bus now is going to you know it may go from 30 minutes to 15 minutes and to me that would be huge is apparent or your child's going to a brand new school and like that but my my only thing is the chamoka kids I that the turiti kids that
152are sitting right now at Tomoka I think we just need to look at those numbers but that's how I feel about Mr persis yeah just one other thing since we're this is isn't really part of what we're talking about but it is concerning um when you talked about elementary schools being at 11 100 and we work in in this County when that was a pretty normal thing uh when the school was built for 7.50 and you have 1100 and where it and where you really get taxed there's of course places like in your multi-purpose room and your parking lots and your cafeteria and so that just brings to mind a school call Holly Hill that was in elementary school it's it's Pine Trail it's Sugar Mill it's the same that's Holly Hill Pine Trail Sugar
153Mill of the same school but then we added a middle school Wing to it and we added a gym and that's all we did we added a a six seven eight two-story building and we added a cafeteria is the same office is the same everything's the same but now they're at that 1100 whatever and it's just not working I mean it's it wasn't built for it and you got bigger bodies there too not little Elementary bodies so I just want to get that on your radar um how we bring relief there I'm not sure there's a there's a couple of ways but I just want you to know about that one and I want to share with you since you're asking that I did go out there to Holly Hill K-8 with Miss body Corps
154met with the principal on the AP we had a good conversation there was a plan in place where we're doing a study right now I know Miss core is going to be sharing with with us that pretty soon and then I can share that with you in the one-on-ones right thank you any other discussion about this item I'm going to ask Mr Gomez one more time are there any cards on this item does anybody want to speak about this item before we vote [Laughter] thank you all right then if there are no cards on item 18. 01 do I have a motion well no the superintendent has to give a recommendation here I go I recommend approval to advertise the amendments to school board policy 202 which is the establishment of attendance areas to modify
155the beatside elementary Champion elementary Westside Elementary Pine Trail Elementary Pathways Elementary and RJ Longstreet Elementary attendance zones all right you've heard the superintendent's recommendation do we have a motion to approve uh yeah Madam chair I'll make the motion to approve with that just the caveat that I wouldn't want us to take final action until that last meeting in April just to make sure there's plenty of time okay because we're dealing with spring break and all right so I want to give what the dates are in April our meeting dates in April are Tuesday April the 11th where there is a workshop and a school board meeting and then we don't meet again until Tuesday the 25th which is just a workshop not sorry not just a meeting not a workshop so the 11th April 11th
156is a workshop in a meeting April 25th is just a meeting so my motion would would be for April 25th that we would take final action on this okay can you not put can you not put that with this and can we vote on that separate yeah of course sure okay so I don't even have to vote on that I mean as long as you kind of get it in your thinking that's all because all right I'm gonna sit can I can I play devil's advocate for a minute on that we don't vote till April 25th we've also lessened the amount of time to do more marketing to get the message out I mean I mean we're we're between two places it's like how much time do you need to Market it if it is
157approved to get the message to parents because if just think about that okay so Mr persis you've made a motion based on what the superintendent recommends to advertise the establishment of the attendance series do I have a second I'll second that motion all right so we have a motion and a second any further discussion all right then I'm going to call for the vote all those in favor please say I I always opposed nay all right the mat the motion passes three to one all right now the question is before we move on and we want to we will have already met the 30-day advertisement do we want to hold this meeting on April 11th or April 28th or 25th Dr balgeman did you already have a date selected no Madam chair it will be
158at your pleasure Mr persis what date would you like you know I I still kind of leaned just rather lean to uh give parents more more time to weigh in because when it comes to actually marketing it we won't have to more Market too much if mostly affected people are aware of it I just want to make sure that if my child is going to be rezoned that I am fully aware so I'll have plenty of you know time to weigh in on it or you know tell you why I don't like it or tell me or tell Anita whichever Zone the child's in uh and and because of the spring break taking up a week you know I'm okay Miss Thompson if we do it on the 25th then that's delaying it being voted
159on right well the 25th is when it would come up for us to vote yeah and then we lose time letting them know or like what you spoke of time loss afterwards that's that was partially my concern Dr Johnson Wayne a little bit I know we're doing some work behind the scenes on this which is going back looking at the numbers seeing how many students specifically right making sure that we cross so that uh cross in terms of um so that we don't have the same student moving more than once and then the communication piece to the parents let me ask you a little bit I know we have got a couple meetings that are set up Rachel is going to be doing some work behind the scene generating the letters and and that communication
160process do you guys feel that we could safely because what I will do at that point is in my one-on-one share details with each board member prior to coming to the meeting and then we can still do a presentation here um yes ma'am currently with the students that it will affect we've already had five meetings we we have one at West Side one at mainland and one at Beachside also at the meeting that we had at Mainland um one of the community members wanted us to have additional meetings and we had two additional meetings in the three two one one four area code during the day because we didn't have a lot of participation in the evening so we had a total of five meetings one of the meetings that we had in the 32114
161area code one of the participants wanted us to have a town hall so we talked about after the board decides on whether or not this is then we're going to have an additional meeting we also sent out flyers to the affected parents to twice in regards to those um news who it would affect however we did not have a lot of participants Point Mr purses I don't know whether or not the parents truly know but we have been put reaching out and communicating I also have a meeting with some other community members Thursday of this week and I talked to Miss Burnett about that um and then we're going to also have additional meetings so um if we are going to look at those students from Tomoka that's going to be some additional Communications that
162we need to make to parents so I would say that we probably could benefit from doing April 25th and that's because I have not communicated if in fact it is the board's will to um incorporate the Tomoka students also I have not had options that group Mrs Burnett thank you um I I agree you probably can't get this to the 25th of April but what I was going to add to that is when you have the town hall meeting can we please have somebody from the Housing Authority at that meeting and talking to the community and what their plans are so that they know and so we can get some input as to where the displaced kids are and where they're at now and where they will likely end up in a school that's a
163big deal yes ma'am I met one of the commission Housing Authority today and um so essentially I know where a number of those students are as well as I know what the and I think that if you have him at the how at the Town Hall I think it gives everybody the opportunity to attend that meeting and hear it as well yes Ma thank you okay okay well then having heard this and having hearing Dr Johnson's um you know what he feels is best based on what he and his team have to do and and I do appreciate knowing that you've already mailed out flyers twice knowing that we may be hitting some homes where they're not at right now still due to the damage I I just like to recommend that we also do
164some text messaging and emailing because a lot of that the schools do have access to so that way we're trying multiple ways to get the word out and it may not I I'm just making a suggestion Mr Gomez it may not be a bad thing to also post on not only the website but also on our social media pieces you know just a variety of ways to try to hit all of the parents and the families because you know maybe their high school student will see it and say hey Mom you know um yeah yes ma'am my brother is now going to go here you know or something like that so I mean if we do that we may have a chance of hitting more people and I do like the town hall idea and
165having an opportunity to invite everyone and I am so sorry those of you on the east side are having to face this but take a deep breath and there may be a little grumbling but what I will tell you is it's still better to have manageable size elementary schools than to have over capacity because that's not what's the best thing for our students so it looks like Dr balkabin we would like that piece to vote on it on the April 25th meeting yes ma'am we're in we're already in the works with that and we will have more concrete numbers for you and delineate the process that transpired prior to that and then I'm just thinking Madam chair if in fact recommend that we go forward with the Tomoka rezoning to Terry T but the 23-24
166school year um then I guess that would have to come back that would probably need to come up at the end of the March I mean for us to our markets our March 28th meeting and then that would kind of put us right at April 25th too so we may be able to do those if we can advertise it so Dr Johnson is going to be important that Dr balkman have the information to share with us this week so that that could be ready for the March 28th meeting yes a skillmore you'll need to hold a spot and then that way we'll know because if we we can't wait to get that one advertised if we're going to do that piece too yes all right so board members I do apologize but with all the
167changes with 17.01 and 17.02 and everything um and everything being moved around we did leave out one presentation and I don't want Mr West to feel neglected so we left out the human resource update which is item 16.01 Dr valgovan chair you know that Mr West really look forwards to these presentations um is someone joining you is Miss Workman here sick child this evening and so um all right chief of Human Resources um good evening good to see you all um thank you for giving me the opportunity of course to come before you with uh Human Resources update thank you Mr Gomez is going to join me this evening um yeah that's okay so um in addition to the multiple job fairs okay that we are participating in right now um and very excited that
168of course Tiffany she's been on board but now she's going to be stepping up into that role of coordinator and we're going to hopefully be able to get her help to replace her position okay um so we are are definitely moving forward she's been at um we've been at job fairs every day this week and our Continuum we have um in fact we even have some job fairs that are going on over spring break so that we will be participating in as well I wanted to bring before you tonight okay it's just kind of some clarification on the international teacher and I know we've been through this before but I'm just going to hit on this briefly and then we'll talk a little bit uh we have one other I I notice we're on the
169Third Kind of square over on the right here between February and April April excuse me where we're planning preparing for candidates we have committee interviews in fact our first committee interview is tomorrow for our ese candidates we're very excited about that we've invited Miss Wiles and the entire ese team our coordinators to come in and participate in those interviews as well this is our first round of interviews we also have our science coordinators our math coordinators set up for interviews that we're going to be doing for those teachers that are going to be moving forward and then what we're doing is prepping them so that our principals are going to be that next round of interviews and of course that's when they will participate on the uh our our open hiring day on teacher day
170um of the April the 26th so we're very excited about that so there's the timeline and just to let you know we're we've been taught talking about the support that we're going to be providing for all of our teachers all of our new teachers and some special support so we're going to have to have in place of course for our International teachers as well through tpg and so just wanted to run through because there's been some misinformation out there about our International teacher program and and the funding that that is taking place for that we Stephanie actually showed these numbers before and showed this slide before to show cost difference of how much one teacher costs an international teacher as opposed to any other teacher that we would hire off the street and because of
171the health contributions and FRS contributions that we're not going to have to end the FICA contribution that we're not going to have to add for these folks it is a a differential there of 1 690 that's per teacher that's in Year One in year two it's 139 dollars and in year three we're going to realize a savings of fourteen hundred dollars and twenty eight or fourteen Twenty Eight so I just want to make sure that that misperception out there I think maybe um it was in the paper at one point that it cost two million dollars the two million dollars set aside is for the salaries of those individuals well of course we have um salaries of all of our teachers that we have to set aside as well so this is definitely going to
172be a cost savings for us over the three year period And so just wanted to kind of keep that in perspective as we're going through this the other thing that I wanted to mention just as a brief note here and but very important is that we are moving forward with our ratification process for our support Personnel um Miss Albert has has put out that infra has been working with perk and it's going to be able to get that information hopefully to those support Personnel the week after we get back from spring break so that they will be able to to vote on that and ratify that and we should be able to bring that to you as a proposal for your approval on the March 28th board meeting and that's the same time that hopefully
173we'll be able to bring before before you a non-bargaining salary proposal as well and we're working on a few things there to to try to balance the scales as well so we'll be bringing those to you just kind of a foreshadowing of what's coming so thank you very much for the time tonight appreciate it does anyone have any questions for Mr West thank you Mr West all right we're moving on to the final public participation part of the evening we're at 19.01 I have a few cards are there any more cards anyone else in the audience want to submit a card okay as always we're going I will announce the first person is going to speak followed by the second person I am in possession of four cards so first is Ashley marvinos followed by
174Christine Serie A foreign good evening everyone after listening to the censoring propaganda I want to make it very clear what my husband Dan and I are advocating for I'm going to read from the Bible in Genesis Chapter 19 Verse 30. and lot went up out of zor and dwelt in the mountain and his two daughters with him for he feared to dwell in zor and he dwelt in a cave he and his two daughters and the firstborn said unto the younger our father is old and there is not a man in the earth to come in unto us after the manner of all the Earth come let us make our father drink wine and we will lie with him that we may preserve seed of our father and they made their father drink wine that
175night and the firstborn went in and lay with her father and he perceived not when she lay down nor when she arose and it came to pass on the morrow that the firstborn said unto the younger behold I lay yesterday night with my father let us make him drink wine this night also and go thou in and lie with him that we may preserve seed of our father and they made their father drink wine that night also and the younger arose and lay with him and he perceived not when she lay down nor when she arose thus were both the daughters of lot with child by their father and the firstborn bear son and called his name Moab the same as the father of the moabites into this day and the younger she also Bears
176son and called his name benimi the same as the father of the children of Ammon until this day so we kind of need to know that in order to understand genealogy right there's no graphic details I'm going to read a book that's in our Public School library right now in case any child is listening this is a time for you to turn it off this is Page 238 pause pause for just a moment pause yes I need to make okay okay um and I'd like to State something for just a moment I apologize so at the last meeting it was written on a card that someone felt I should give a disclaimer so that's why I gave a disclaimer because previously I've spoken to our attorney there are a lot of things we have to
177do to be prepared for meetings so I am giving a disclaimer at this time my first part of the disclaimer is are there any students or children here in the boardroom that are under the age of 18. if so I need them to exit at this time next if parents if you are parents if you are listening at home I'm giving you this time to have your children exit the room if you have it on your TV or playing if they're under the age of 18. all right you may start crazy because they can read this book in their library right now Daddy had been back to Kaylee for lollipop licking my term a few times she had a vague notion that it was wrong but she wasn't sure why and didn't know who to
178ask they'd probably just be jealous that warm summer night she slept in a thin white nightie nothing more nothing less at all under sorry less wasn't on there nothing at all under the moon full shimmered against the tan of her Exposed Skin and her hair whispered over the pillow like a pale waterfall as usual the smell of wild turkey preceded daddy in the bright Moonlight you could see Kaylee cringe and shallow sleep Daddy crept through the door to the side of the bed stood looking for a long time before stirring her with a volley of kisses cheeks forehead lips oh little girl do you know how beautiful you are no one has ever as lovely as you not even your mother when she was a child I can't believe you're mine Kaylee Rouse at his
179words came into the moment secure in the aura Aura of Daddy's love she tried to sit up but Daddy pushed her gently back down against the mattress stay just like that for Daddy I want to teach you something new he lifted her nightgown rolled it up over her belly coaxed her thoroughbred legs apart she squirmed a paltry protest don't move daddy Scarlet face underlined his command I thought he might smack her but as quickly as Angus angler flared it dissipated smoke don't be afraid this won't hurt you'll like it I promise he kissed the length of her torso down to the small naked V it was only his mouth that night he didn't even ask her to touch him prove how much she loved him afterwards she worried did he want her love anymore what
180has she done wrong and yet he had taught her something new something awful worse something wonderful something every girl should know the joy of though of course you shouldn't learn it from Daddy at 10 isn't exactly easy to separate good touch from Bad Touch proper love from improper love Daddy doting from a pervert I'll leave it to you for you to consider what a huge difference in sexually explicit content is as a mother this book should not be in our school libraries thank you thank you next Christine Serie A followed by Kim short good evening board and Dr balgavin Christine Serie A I've spoken to each one of you either on the phone or emailed or I know you from my former position um you know how I feel our current situation you know that
181I really wasn't sure if I was even going to speak tonight but then after sitting back there and listening to everyone speak tonight I really want to say a few things please do not make changes major changes the policy 320 at your next meeting it is a good policy it follows the current laws you are protected under that our children are protected under that our parents are protected under that please trust our media Specialists and allow them to do the jobs that they're trained to do they you've heard from them tonight they are trained they have Masters they take courses in these things please give all parents the choice for what our children's read so far every one of the Committees that are reading these challenge books have recommended to keep the books in our
182libraries they didn't all agree there were some great conversations been on one myself and I've attended many of them I think that's really telling from your community that the vast majority of your citizens want to keep these books in the library please involve your entire Community with your decision making now I'd like to talk about something we can all agree on something happy we love our school libraries and they need to feel our love we may not all agree on what books our children should read but I think we can agree that we have amazing libraries we have amazing staff so please help me share our mutual love for school libraries with the Positive school media campaign hashtag 386 loves School libraries we heard tonight that our schools are not feeling our love so I
183ask everyone here everyone listening please be kind show kindness support our libraries I have little buttons here that I've made I'll give them to Angel to pass out please wear them with pride show the schools and the parents that you support the mutual love for libraries regardless of what their opinion is thank you Kim short is up next followed by Elizabeth Albert this is hard I hear a lot of people speaking and I I know some of these media Specialists and I'm just going to start with saying that I have a lot of respect for a lot of them I know that they only want what's best for our children except that I feel like we're forgetting that we all have different perspectives based on where we come from my perspective is is different and
184I and I also want to say that I've been through my committee meeting process already and and I have to say this because I think it's needed to be said I don't think that our committees were formed with a real look at what our community looks like I think that they were stacked and that's okay I mean it is what it is I I asked a very simple question during my committee meeting that I also think needs to be stated and I got no answer to it which is how does this book align with our curriculum or support our curriculum and I had a lot of Educators on that committee and nobody had an answer and in fact it was kind of downplayed that what was more important was that we give our children books
185that they want to read and while I agree we need to give our children books that they need that they want to read we have a responsibility to a lot of things and one I would say is the law and I would disagree with them that the materials that we have in our libraries are okay for our children to have unfettered access to we are a public school library public school system with a public school library and I I think it's important to note that there needs to be some reality check done here that our families are what bring dollars into our schools and they will make choices based on where they feel like their children are safest Public Schools charter schools and private schools are all in competition for those children and where they're
186going to go we have a brand to protect this is the reality of the situation we're in guys we need to error on the side of caution it's just smart business if I was running a charter school or a private school and I found out that you had books like this in this school as a businesswoman I would use that to my advantage and I can promise you that's what's going to happen so that's where I stand this is not personal if you want your children to read these books you can go to the public library you can access them online you can purchase them I think people need to understand that in order to protect jobs and in order for us to protect what I believe is great which is our Public School System
187we need to start thinking about what that perception looks like to the outside world thank you thank you next up Miss Elizabeth this is our final final card so good evening Madam chair Dr bagelman members of the board members of the audience um so I want to shift gears a little bit here and I want to talk to you about some information that I found out earlier found out about earlier this week so it was shared with me that the Department of Education has publicized the evaluation results for classroom teachers folks that work in our schools as instructional Personnel administrators and so forth and so when I was looking at the information I quickly put together a little Central Florida comparison chart for my own purposes and when I sit back down I'll send you
188the link and you guys can look at it but there were some interesting things that I noticed doing a little data walk through these numbers here when I started to compare our district with Central Florida districts and then the state so one of the things that we know for sure is that for annual contract teachers and we have more than 50 percent of our instructional Personnel are now annual contract teachers so we know that their evaluation rating means money so if you are rated highly effective of course with this past contract you're going to receive uh one thousand four hundred seven dollars as your salary increase and that'll grow forever if you're effective only it was 9.67 so there's a big difference there so evaluation outcomes matter so when we looked at this I noticed
189that in Volusia County only 37.60 percent of our instructional classroom teachers are rated as highly effective when I compare that with the other districts in the central Florida region the other districts are 70 60 80 91 percent in Orange County by the way so I wonder what is happening in Volusia when our percentage is so very low compared to these other Central Florida districts now you know we have top-notch high quality instructional Personnel we see them every time we meet we talk about the Fantastic things that they're doing in their schools in their classrooms how our kids are successful our CTE programs every time we meet we highlight what's going on there but why are these evaluation ratings so off it's a wonder to me another thing that we know is that when you look
190at the administrative readings too I was very surprised to see that 71 administrators were listed as needs Improvement that was kind of concerning to me just wanting to make sure that we're doing our due diligence to recognize what's happening with the evaluation system if we have folks that need support get that support to them because we know all of this is connected to retention Tiffany Fuller Bravo to her you did a great job appointing her in that place but let's set her and everybody else up in our district for Success let's take a look at how at what we're doing and how we compare could you imagine being a high performing teacher in Orange being part of that what did I say they have 91 percent come into Volusia doing the same thing and you're
191just effective you wouldn't want to stay thank you thank you Miss Albert board that concludes all of the Republican participation in all of the items that we had to vote on this evening along with presentation so we are now down to item 20.01 this is the opportunity for each of you as a board member along with the board attorney and the superintendent to bring forth anything that you would like to share or speak about who would like to go first Mrs Burnett thank you um well listening to uh Mr persis about the Holly Hill Middle School I I agree with you and I think there's plenty of our community members who would like to see us Dr Johnson also look at redistricting rezoning middle schools so I'm putting that out there right Miss Thompson I
192just want to thank everyone that came out to speak tonight I know it's not easy and wanted to wish everyone a Happy Spring Break and hope everyone gets a chance to kind of recharge thank you thank you Mr purses yeah thank you madam chair I to always I wanted to thank I don't know it seems like lately the videos that were showing I think they're like awesome I don't know like tonight just the one with the um what was the first one we saw with the kids with the mustaches on I mean you know just because normally in the past it would just be the same back to school national school I'm breakfast week and it would be showing you know kids going through through the line but just having some humor some really clever
193who's ever doing it Bravo and you know keep it up but just makes it entertaining 's fun and you still get the message across so it's one our videographers they're pretty they're yeah it's Chad and Jerry yeah Chad's here tonight Jerry was here last time good well who's ever doing it yeah I know you guys hate to take credit for anything but Mr purses I thought you were gonna like the Atlantic video the best yeah thing I wanted to ask you do we have uh such a thing and Jamie you may know this is there such a thing like in um Middle School I can't remember if I had it or in high school where a a let's say students having a problem and rather than send make a a re a referral to the
194assistant principal would go to the guidance Council to to the school counselor gosh gosh school counselor is there a is there a format for that with a a teacher could or is it I mean the old way we used to be I would email these school counselor and say you know I really think if you get a chance you should see so so and so that seems to be having some issues or whatever but I just didn't know because sometimes the students just having a meltdown and it's really not a behavior you know what I'm saying it's it's really not to be punished it's it's it's for help it's I don't know and and actually that's a good question Mr Parsons when we've increased the number of counselors in our schools it was really to
195provide more of that type of individualized support to students right and I will tell you that at every level some they have some shape or form where for example we don't it's not a referral but but it's counseling conversations that need to be had so it's either between the classroom teachers and the counselors they do they do take care of that or and and Rose if you want to add anything else to that but I know between the classroom teachers and the counselors they work collaboratively and with the PBIS model it facilitates for that also okay yeah maybe there's yeah there's a way for the teacher to alert to alert the assistant principle I really think and I will tell you I think our teachers are doing a pretty good job I will share with
196you with you this week because I've been looking at referrals by school and looking at where we are in terms of discipline Matrix and you will you will see there's more of a proactive measure that's taking place there are teachers and you know they don't want the student to get in trouble you know like oh I'm writing a a re a referral you know go to the office the media is like but to your point it might be a good good idea for us because we do have a lot of new teachers to remind them that that that is afforded to them that that's a good practice and that they can certainly do that that's all right thank you Mr Wolf board members and members of the audience everyone listening the community of Volusia County
197all staff members please enjoy your spring break be safe rest rejuvenate and come back safely to us all right so I'm up and we're going to close this meeting out before um 8 P.M I just I forgot earlier one item um I have to give a shout out to DeLand hi there it's your leading group won their first state championship and um that is wonderful great job to that group I too want to wish every one of you um a wonderful spring break I would say please just enjoy your family your friends you know rest curl up and read a book I mean that was always my favorite thing to do but what um I would say is disconnect okay so at this point in time um we will we will we will be available
198next week because we are working we will be in Tallahassee speaking with the legislators but please disconnect yeah please disconnect and not that we would not appreciate having an email from you but we're asking you to please disconnect while we're up there um because my new thing is I'm not answering things after a certain period of time every night um pandemic I did but now we're not but we do want everyone to have a wonderful time and I hope you have Sunshine here and I actually hope we have Sunshine up there they're already telling me it's going to be cold tallahassee's weather is I I don't want to I don't want to drive back this year through a whiteout storm where you can't see azaleas will be blue yeah we hear you but thank you
199everyone and we are adjourned