001Good afternoon and welcome to the October 28th, 2025 school board workshop. The time now is 10:05 p.m. And in just a moment, we're going to stand for the Pledge of Allegiance, followed by a moment of silence and reflection. So at this time, would you please join me in standing for the pledge of >> allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Thank you. You may be seated. with me um this afternoon here in the boardroom. I'm going to introduce our board members and other staff. On my far left, we have Mrs. Donna Bromer representing district 4, Mrs. Christa Goodrich representing district 2. Dr. Gilbert Evans, our school board attorney. Then over to my far
002right, we have Miss Celeste Gilmore representing. She's our agency clerk. She represents us all. Then we have Miss Jesse Thompson representing district three. Then we have Mr. Ruben Clone, our vice chair, representing district 5. We have Dr. Julio Nazar a filling in um for just a short time today. Um Dr. Balamman will be here. She had another engagement that she had to be at at the start of this meeting. And then I am Jamie Haynes um your chair and I represent district one. So today we have um four items in the workshop that we're going to be talking about. The first item that we're going to start with is a district audit update. We anticipate this will take at least an hour and we have um here with us today um we have Todd CE
003who is um our chief financial officer. We have RSM which is our internal auditing committee I mean company. Um with them is um Laura Manlo and Michelle Copala. And then we also have two of the members from our um audit committee that are community members that volunteer their time to be on our audit committee and that is Amy Williams and Stan Schmidt. So at this time we're going to let them take it over. >> Yes, ma'am. Thank you so much. Um Miss Haynes. Um, and as Miss Haynes said, I am here on behalf of Dr. Belgabin. Um, so she is at a Daytona Beach News Journal 20th anniversary women in business event celebrating the most influential women in business. So I have reason to believe that she will probably be recognized today at this event.
004So as soon as she's done, she will be here joining us. Um, so Mr. CE, thank you for joining us. Our chief financial officer. Um, and with you you have Miss Amy Williams, CPA, audit senior manager, James Moore Company. Miss Laura Manlo, manager of risk consulting RSM. There's also Michelle um, Capola as well, um, CPA Supervisor Risk Consulting RSM, and they have a presentation to share about district audit updates. Well, first of all, uh, good afternoon board members and, um, Dr. Vier and, um, chair, madame chair. I'm going to go ahead and just get us started here with real quick. Let's go ahead and and this is a um, this presentation is addressing guardrail number three and improve operating efficiency and maximizing resources to support student learning. Next, Okay. In in Florida, school districts operate
005under more statutory audit layers layers than cities or counties. Um, by law, the auditor general must audit school boards on a fixed cadence um annually for smaller counties or at least every three years for the US larger counties. And that's on top of our other audits that we we do here at the district. So these slides um provide a snapshot of different audit types uh that touch Velia County Schools each year. We'll start with our cornerstone audit on the annual comprehensive financial report. Um we'll talk a little bit about the operational audit. We'll also um be discussing a little bit on the internal audit function and also the internal accounts which is the the [clears throat] internal accounts audit is your school activity funds. Um also the component units that are included in our ACER
006and that would be our futures foundation and most of our charter schools and um the performance and special audits that we can go through at the district. Um and we also have capital projects funds and performance or special audits as well. So there is other reviews that we encounter here and that's really related to actuarial reviews and debt service. I made this a little bit more scripted so I didn't go too far off track so I could just get the meat of it real quick. allows me to read a little bit faster here. But uh feel free to ask questions of me of any of these audits. Um RSM will be actually presenting the back end of this presentation with their own slide deck. Just starting out with the annual comprehensive financial report also known
007as the ACER is our cornerstone audit for the district. This engagement is performed by either the Florida auditor general or in years where they're not when it's not scheduled with the auditor general. We have an independent CPA firm. They are external. They're current forbis marvas mazars sorry. The audit provides reasonable assurance that our financial statements are presented fairly in all material respects and that the internal controls over financial reporting are sound by statute specifically Florida statute 218.39 and financial audit is required every year and the report must be submitted within 9 months of the fiscal year end. The scope includes testing of revenues, expenditures, capital assets, and compliance with laws and regulations. When applicable, the auditors also conduct what's known as a single audit. For federal awards, this requirement is if we expend one u
008more than $1 million, 1 million or more in major federal program funds under two CFR part 200 for state assistance. It's only triggered if we expend 750,000 or more in qualifying state project funds under Florida statute 215.97. Though this rarely applies to school districts um because the FIP allocation that we receive in the general fund are not considered um um state projects. Just to let everyone know that. And finally, the ACT for audit also includes a review of IT general controls areas such as user accessibility, um, cyber security, change management, and since those systems are integral to the fi financial integrity, the auditors issue an opinion, a separate management letter under Florida rules, and a report on internal control and compliance, all of which are included in a published act for each year. The operational
009audit is performed solely by the Florida Auditor General's Office. This audit is required under section 11.45 of the Florida statutes and each school district must be reviewed at least once every 3 years. Unlike annual financial audits which focuses on the financial statements, this audit looks at the operational performance, efficiency, and compliance. The scope and timing are determined by the legislature and auditor general. And each audit typically focuses on those key topic areas such as procurement practices, payroll controls, transportation efficiency, um cyber security, uh school safety compliance. Findings from these reviews are in in inform statewide legislator reports. Let me just say that again here just to make sure I say this clearly. findings from these reviews often inform statewide legislative reports and best practice recommendation. Uh um Miss Wilson here could probably speak to that
010since she did work for the auditor general's office. For example, the auditor general may um compare internal controls and efficiency matrix against other forer school districts to highlight opportunities for improvement or commend exceptary practices. The end result is a public report that only identifies any findings but also includes management responses to those findings um through corrective action plans which a day district will then follow up on. The process demonstrate continuous improvement, transparency and uh that responsible stewardship of public resources. [clears throat] I'm just going to touch briefly on this one because um our auditors your your internal audit function here will be addressing this in our slide deck but I just wanted to say on the internal audit functions managed through the schoolboard audit committee and carried out by the external audit firm RSM. that
011functions separate from external audit financial audit and is designed to evaluate the effectiveness of internal controls, risk management and compliance across all operations. The audit committee established under section 218.391 of the Florida statute works with RSM to develop an annual audit plan that prioritizes the district's highest risk areas. RSM of course will address this more in her followup in her slide deck. The internal accounts um audit which is um managed here by or conducted by James Moore is our school activity funds. Each of our 67 schools maintain what are known as internal accounts sometimes called school activity funds. These funds handle transactions such as club club club duels, fun fundraisers, field trip payments, student activity revenues, all of which must maintain be maintained under strict control set forth in chapter 8 of the department of
012education. What they call is the red book. We that's all of our counting codes that we have to follow for the district and for all school districts across the state have to follow um DOE red book um guidance each year. The independent CPA form as it was mentioned James Morren company audits every school individually. Those audits ensure the principal and bookkeepers are properly accounting for those receipts. Dispersements and reconciliations in accordance with state guidelines. The results are then considered into into a single report and the summary of the internal audit or accounts is rolled into the district's ACER as part of our annual financial reporting. Any findings identified during these audits are reviewed by district management and the individual schools to ensure corrective actions are completed promptly. These processes reinforce strong stewardship and accountability of
013the money that they receive at the schools. So we're moving on here to component unit financial audits. Under Aonian standards in Florida statute, certain entities are considered component units of the district primarily futures foundation and Valuchia County for Valuchia County schools and our charter schools operate operating within the county. Each of these organizations is legally independent, but because they serve the public education mission of Valuchia County Schools, their financial results must be included or incorporated into the annual comprehensive financial report. Each component unit engages its own independent auditor, typically a local CPA firm. Charter schools are audits are required under section 102.339J of Florida statutes and the Florida and the futures foundations are also under undergoes its own annual audit as a supporting nonprofit. Once completed, those independent audit reports are submitted to the district
014finance department for review. We ensure that they meet Florida DOE and Gazsby uh requirements before including them as discrete component units within our acter. The process ensures full transparency for the community allowing anyone reading those statements can see how the that information kind of ties into the district's overall education mission. Moving on to um program audits and monitoring views. In addition to our annual financial audit, uh we routinely re go through what is called program reviews um specific for federal and state compliance audits. They are performed by agencies such as the US Department of Agriculture, the Florida Department of Education, and other federal and state entities that oversee programs we administer. Reviews are generally riskbased meaning that the frequency and depth depends on the factors such as size of the program, prior audit results or
015identifi identifying areas of concern. Com common programs that receive this level of oversight include title one, individuals with disability act or as we know it as IDA, school nutrition and other federal or state grants that require strict adherence to eligibility reporting and procurement standards. These reviews different from the annual act for audit because they focus on specific grant compliance requirements rather than the financial statement as a whole. Funding for these program audits are reported directly to the district and we prepare a correct and again we would prepare a corrective action plan for any items identified. Those responses then are verified by the grant agency to ensure compliance has been restored. Together these federal state audits demonstrate the district not only you know reports the financial results accurately but also spend restricted grant funds according to
016the program rules and regulations. This category covers what we prefer refer to as the performance and special audits. These are not routine. They're they're not routine recurrent audits like the acter would be um or internal audits. They are directed by the Florida legislature or the auditor general when statewide or topic specific reviews are needed. Examples might include audit examining effectiveness in effectiveness of specific programs or safety and security. They are typically performed by agencies such as the auditor general, Florida Department of Education or in some cases the US Department of Justice or other oversight bodies. These audits are generally one-time or per periodic and are designed to help both the legislature and the district identify areas where efficiency or effectiveness can be improved. Results are published are results are published. The district always provides management
017response and corrective action plan as required by statute. While they occur less frequently, these reviews play an important role in ensuring the accountability and transer um transparency of those local and state programs. The other reviews and studies that while not formal audits are required by statute, accounting standards or bond convenience, no support to support our financial statements. Each year the district engages independent actuaries to perform valuations for workers compensation um other postemployment benefits. The acronym there is OPEB. Okay. These studies determine our long-term liabilities which are then incorporated into that ACTUER that we're referring to that the external audit review and they rely on these reports to verify that our liabilities are accurately um presented under Gazsby 68 and Gazsby 75. We also undergo annual continuing debt disclosure reviews. We just went through a series
018of those reviews, especially when you're issuing debt in the marketplace or you're um yeah, I'll just leave it with that. And then which um ensure we meet all the SEC rules 15 C2 and 12 reporting obligations. What I wanted to say and the other thing was refinancing. Um so if you're issuing or refinancing debts that's this is all the requirements that you have to go through. So these are your um under that section rule 15C2 reporting obligations for our outstanding certificate of participation and other bond issues. So in addition to the district's trustee and rating agency perform ongoing surve surveillance of the government governance and financial position of the district. These reviews confirm that we are continuing to meet debt service coverage and reserve requirements. While these activities aren't classified as audits, they are vital
019to maintaining our fiscal credibility district strong financial position. Next one we have construction closeout audits. They are targeting engagements performed at the end of a major building project. Typically new schools or significant capital renovations. These audits are conducted by an independent CPA firm. Currently, car rigs and Ingram are contracted with the district to perform those audits and are designed to ensure that all project costs, contracts, change orders are promptly accounted for and compliant with the district policies and state law. The scope usually includes reconciliation of contract amounts, verification, retainage and final payment were handled correctly and confirmation that all required documentation such as warrantees, leans and final acceptance forms are in place. These are reviews are these reviews occur on a projectby-p project basis than rather than annually and they provide an additional layer of
020accountability over capital outlay spending. The findings are reviewed by both our facilities and the finance operations and the recommendations are incorporated into future construction management practices to improve efficiencies and control. Basically what this does is we're auditing also the contractor to make sure that we're getting build correctly. That's what this is. Okay. And then while these are not required under statute, they have become a best practice across Florida school districts to promote transparency and demonstrate the fiscal responsibility for taxpayer funded construction. So this is what the what does the auditor appine on? Um this slide just summarizes that auditor's opinion actually covered what's covered in the annual comprehensive financial report ACT forer I like to say for short the opinion covers the basic financial statements as a whole that includes all of our funds governmentwide
021statements and the accompanying notes for the management discussion and analysis that's right on the front end it's in summary form and the required supple supplementary information that's kind of in um um buried more down into the act for as you're making your way through it sections. The auditor performs what is called a limited procedures. They review that information for consistency but they do not express an opinion on that. The other supplementary information also referred to as OSI such as the combining schedules is audited in relation to the basic financial statements meaning the auditors ensure that it ties back correctly to the underlying controls. Finally, as noted, the auditor opinion does not extend to the introductory or the statistical section found on the back of your ACER. Those portions provide additional content for the reader um
022but are considered unodudited narratives. So for example, if you want to see um 10 years worth of how much revenue we receive for impact revenues, you can find that right in your hack for book in the backse section and statistical section. So how are how do all those audits come together? Again, I just like to re um kind of go back over this. I did address it um a little bit here, but I'd like to kind of rehash some of the stuff. This slide really um um [snorts] shows how the other audits activities we discussed direct directly tie into the annual comprehensive financial report. So again your stool your school's internal accounts audits those annual reviews for the school activities are consolidated in summary form and included into the district's totals that appear in the
023acter our component units which includes the futures foundation and our charter schools that are audited by independent auditors which all the are reviewed by those external audits auditors and those results are incorporated ated into the act for or discrete component units. The single audit captures our compliance with federal grant requirements and when applicable state project um I'm sorry state project funds that includes our schedule of expenditures of federal awards and any required corrective action plan which also would be included in there. Lastly, internal control and IT related matters identified during the annual audit are summarized in the government auditing standards report and the Florida management letter. All these elements float together to support the single unified financial report ensuring that every part of our organization from schools to charter and federal programs is rep represented
024transparently in a district's published financial statement. So before I turn it over to RSM, uh the audit framework that we we operate under is not only extensive but also deeply um interconnected. Every financial statement, actuarial report, and disclosures tie back to specific state and federal requirements of each government, each government by its own standard or code to maintain compliance, our finance team must navigate and apply an array of technical frameworks. uh the governmental accounting standards, Gazsby, Florida statutes, Florida administrative code, the department of education red book and cost reporting requirements under that under that book as well. These elements indic um dictate how we classify, report and reconcile every transaction and ensuring our records and withstand audit testing at the state, federal and bond trustee level. And because of these complexities, our work must be
025executed with precision and updated continuing to reflect legislative and regulatory changes. Every audit we undergo whether financial operation or otherwise relies on the integrity of the foundation as do the independent actuary studies and commissions. Each year that we are included in our act for the actuarial valuations for example feed directly into our financial audit as we mentioned and statements and bond disclosure information is shared in a separate report to our bond um we they take the our act information as as its audit. we have to provide it additional information um um in what is called the bond disclosure uh agreement that gets published annually after we release our acer. So in short, our audit environment demands expertise across multiple disciplines. Accounting, law, policy, economics, all of that really collectively influences understanding um and and ensures
026that the Valuchia County School remains fully compliant, transparent, and fiscally sound. So I'm going to turn it over to RSM at this time. >> Thank you, Mr. >> Yeah. Any questions from me at this point? Any questions at this point? Thank you. [cough and clears throat] [clears throat] >> All right. Good afternoon. >> Good afternoon. >> Thank you for allowing us to come here today. I'm Laura Manlo. I'm a managing director at RSM. Um, with me today is Michelle Copala. She's our engagement manager. She handles the day-to-day for the internal audit services that we provide to you all. And to my right, Amy Williams is a member of our independent audit committee. I'm going to talk a little bit about their function and allow her to speak to you a little bit as well. Um,
027Stan Schmidt is also here today. He's member of the audit committee. Um, been part of Alicia County Schools for a long time as well. So, as you probably gathered from Todd's presentation, uh the independent um internal audit function that Valuchia County Schools has really is separate and distinct from the other types of audits that you all undergo. All of those work together very well um to accomplish the p the the pieces that they are supposed to accomplish. But your internal audit function is living and breathing and responsive to risk. And we are the only audit function that you have that works directly for you and is designed to support you in your decision-making and your governance of this district. So a little bit about how we do that. That's what my presentation is going to
028be about today. So who are we? Who is RSM? Who's sitting in front of you? We are the fifth largest accounting firm in the United States. and we are the firm who is serving the most number of school districts as internal auditors in the state of Florida. We're proud to say that we serve 12 different school districts in the state of Florida. And um for many of us on the team, this is what we've been doing our entire careers. Um we are uh you can see on our map here where we are serving and where our offices are located. And as uh internal auditors who specialize in school districts, we are deeply embedded in several of the organizations here in Florida, including FSFOA, FASBO, and others. So you might have seen us around at industry
029conferences. Um speaking some of the services that we provide to several of the school districts in Florida, you can see in these squares here, we we do some financial advisory work including anti-fraud and litigation and dispute management services. We'll do some specialty consulting down in the bottom left. If um if you recall, we did some work here at Valuchia on student discipline, which is a really interesting topic for the state. Um on the top right, your traditional performance and operational audits. I'm sure you've seen us uh report to you. Uh like a pecard audit or a white fleet audit might be something more operational that we look at. And in your bottom right, it we also um bring you a suite of expertise in the IT realm. everything from cyber security to data protection to
030user access controls, anything that you might need. Um, we are also able to to address those needs through your internal audit function as well. Next slide. So, who are we? I did a little bit of an introduction there. The face that is not with us today, Ryan Moore in the middle, he is your lead IT auditor, part of your core team. Um, so he he helps Michelle and I since we are not IT understand the IT risks and what you're facing both internally and externally and brings his team of experts to Valuchia to help address through the internal audit plan any any risks that we might be uncovering there. You will always deal with the three of us as your core team. Although we are a large firm and we are spread across the state
031of Florida and and the US, we are dedicated to your core team and any specific risks that you might need specialized expertise for, we will bring that um subject matter expert to Valia schools through us. So you always have um one throat to choke if you if you like to think of it that way, but you still have access to the the depth and breadth of expertise that you may need at RSM to serve your needs. Next slide. A little bit about how we have uh seen Valuchia schools evolve since we have been on board and a little bit about what had been happening when Valuchia County Schools started its internal audit function. So, a history lesson for us educators in the room. When I first began here at Valuchia County Schools, it was because
032of a Florida state statute that had been passed in 2019 requiring school districts over a certain size to have an internal audit function. There were uh a number of school districts that were listed in that legislation that would be impacted by that new ruling and Valuchia County Schools was one of those that would have to create a brand new internal audit function that this did not exist before. Um, so we came along uh around 2020. You can see a February 2020 box. When we first arrived on the scene after a competitive solicitation to select RSM as your internal audit vendor, there had been four different superintendent within the previous five years. The amount of turnover and the amount of change that we walked into as your brand new internal auditors was more than I had
033seen in any other district to date. Um the wake of the turnover and the change here at Valuchia County Schools left in my mind a culture of volatility of uncertainty of siloed decisionmaking and in some cases lack of trust. lack of trust between board members and leadership, even between leadership and leadership, and sometimes lack of trust on who we are. Who is this internal auditor who's coming in and asking questions. It was really important for us to establish relationships with the board, establish relationships with leadership and help encourage and foster conversations about risk among the different stakeholders so that we could really understand what the internal audit function is hoping to accomplish. How can we help balicious schools move forward and improve and get on the same page with the mission and the best way
034to use us as your new internal audit function? Really, why did the Florida statute, Florida legislation create the statute to um to establish internal audit functions? So, it it was quite a process and uh we weren't quite done with superintendent turnover at that point. I believe I started with Scott Fritz and uh uh and uh we did have an additional turnover after that. Um Rachel Hazel was our interim for a little while and then we found uh Dr. Balgaban at this point and we've now been working with Dr. Balgaban for about three years. In addition to the leadership turnover, the superintendent isn't just the only person who turns over. When there's turnover at the superintendent level, as you all know, there's turnover in several layers throughout. It has a huge ripple effect throughout an organization.
035Um, coupled with that, the district also was undergoing an ERP implementation. This is your main software that runs your operations and your business of the district. Um, Oracle implementation started in 2019 and was halted in 2021. So, not only do we have some turnover in leadership, culture, style, and people, but we also had turnover in our technology. So when you think about the big three running large organizations, people, process, and technology, we've had disruption in all three of those. And [snorts] I just wanted to take a moment and talk about that with you on this slide because I want you to understand that as your outside independent internal audit function advising you on risk, this is the biggest risk that I have seen in the past few years is valia schools working to remediate and
036recover from some of the volatility that it has had in its history. And the key to success um as you all are probably aware in continuing to recover and repair from this volatility is to be missionoriented and unified in support of how to move forward with your strategic plan. Working together as a cohesive board, working together with your superintendent um creates synergy and creates a unified path forward and will help mitigate this risk that I see as your internal audit function. Next slide. So what is your internal audit function? What exactly do we do for you to support you in your governance journey here at the school district? Um the mission of this audit of the uh internal audit function is like I mentioned to be your in-house eyes and ears and to be responsive
037to your needs. What does the board see as the biggest risk in Valia County schools? And how can internal audit support you in understanding facts and circumstances behind that risk so that you can make the decisions that you need to make to um to lead this district effectively. As I mentioned before, um this is a required function now by statute. So, um whether it was required or not, I do believe it's a value ad and hopefully you feel the same way. The way that Valuchia County Schools structured its internal audit function is in my mind and in RSM's mind, this is the best practice governance setup. Districts uh run their internal audit functions many different ways, but Valuchia County Schools chose to use the model, as you can see on the right, of establishing an
038independent audit committee with which um uh reports to the school board but oversees the internal audit function. And the reason why that's a best practice is because since we are an in-house function that reports to you in order to preserve the independence of this function and to be sure that we are looking independently at risks in the district and not being steered one way or another due to um whatever is you know of interest at the time. That audit committee is an outside group of independent citizens appointed by you all who directs me the internal auditor on what risks to look at. Every single year we have comprehensive conversation about what we've learned about what we see. They come to the table with their own thoughts about what they hear in the news or the
039conversations that they've had with you all. Uh we also have of course our one-on-one conversations with you all as well. But when the audit committee is uh in charge of representing you to govern and oversee me, the internal audit function, the result is an independent unbiased view of risk so that we can be sure that we are allocating our time and resources to those things that matter the most to the district. Um here, next slide. When you think about internal audit, and I won't spend too long on this slide, but because we are a school district that operates in the public sector, you really do have to think about internal audit a little differently than you would um say perhaps at a commercial entity or a for-profit company. There are considerations like public record. There
040are considerations like um transparency and accountability that don't exist in a commercial company. And uh when you set up and establish your internal audit function um it needs to to be run with the understanding that government operates a little bit different, right? And so that's what we have here at Valuchia County Schools and um we believe that we have set up the governance structure here in a way that best benefits the district going forward. A little bit about the audit committee. I know you got to see how we report to the audit committee, but I'd like to explain a little bit more operationally about what they do, what they do for you, and how they help govern um the the internal audit function here. Uh Amy Williams to my right is a member of our
041audit committee. I asked her to come today and just uh introduce herself to you so you can see um one of your members and to talk a little bit about her role on the audit committee. Hi, good afternoon. Thank you for uh welcoming us here today. I'm happy to be here to represent the audit committee. Myself and Stan are both members. Um I've been on the audit committee I think since inception since it started. Um so just a little bit my my background. I've got over I'm a CPA with over 30 years of experience in accounting both public and private accounting as well as in higher education. I've had three kids go through county public schools. So I do have a vested interest you know in the school board and in the audit committee itself.
042Um the school board is comprised of five members myself and Stan, three other members and an alternate and Miss Haynes serves as our chair and your representative from the school board. So we work RSM each year. I think Laura mentioned it and I'm sure you've seen it goes through a risk assessment procedure each year. um they will do that based on interviews with you, watching other schoolboard meetings, um their experience, what's going on in the news, that kind of thing. And they will come to us and recommend what they have identified as high-risisk areas. We'll go through them. We'll discuss them. We rank them and then we'll make a decision based on what we see as the higher risk or the more important you know based on feedback from Miss Haynes and the board RSM
043um determine which ones should we should do for the upcoming year. The ones that we don't determine do don't get lost. We have an ongoing list that we keep. Um and the decision is based on time, budgetary constraints. sometimes uh where we are Laura mentioned the ERP you know the change to the in the ERP system so it might make sense not to do one now and wait until that change once procedures are in place so those things come into play um and then from there we meet with the board on a [laughter] typically a quarterly basis I'm sorry with RSM on the quarterly basis and we go over the results of the audits that they've been conducting really good job of reporting and and identifying for address any issues high, medium, and low risk.
044We'll discuss those. We have the opportunity to ask questions. In those meetings are also um employees from the county that are involved in those areas. So, the fleet management, you know, the people from the fleet management department were there. We have the opportunity to ask them direct questions and they have the opportunity to present to us how they're addressing the areas that were identified. And then in those same meetings, we will follow up on any open items from previous audits. So we're able to continually track if there's anything open, how those are being resolved from all the previous audits. Um, so that's really the process for and then we also are responsible for selecting or recommending a selection for the external auditors. When it comes time to go out for a bid, we review those
045and recommend selection for the external auditors. We also all of the previous audits that were mentioned, we also get results of those audits those as well and um any recommendations that come up from those. We also review followup and resolution of all those areas. >> Thank you, Miss Williams. Moving to the next slide. Um, as as previously mentioned, we talked a little bit about how internal auditing in the public sector is a little different. We do have a national standard setting body, our Institute of Internal Auditors, which sets guidance for how we should conduct your internal audit function. One of those performance standards is listed here and as Amy was alluding to, it includes a risk assessment that we must perform for you every single year. So I'm going to talk a little bit about
046now mechanically what does the internal audit process look like as we move through the year um and conduct your your internal audit function for you. So on the next slide you can see my little wheel. Um let's start at the top right with the risk assessment as I mentioned. Um, this is really important and a really really critical piece of your internal audit function because this is where we decide what are we going to audit this year. And if we um u aren't attuned to the risks in the district and uh don't have our eyes on the right ball that's in play, we may not audit the risk that's sitting right in front of you. So a comprehensive thorough risk assessment by your internal auditors and with guidance from the audit committee is critical to
047success of your internal audit function. And all of you know we we have our annual meetings with each board member to get their input on risk and get your understanding of what is facing you. Um what are you hearing from your constituents? What have you run into um around town as you've fulfilled your role as a board member? we need to know so that we can bake it into the risk assessment and make sure we understand where the risks are in the district so that we can design an appropriate audit plan for you and address what needs to be addressed. Once that risk assessment is presented to the audit committee and the audit committee directs us on which audits to perform this year based on the results of that risk assessment, we then move into
048the execution phase where we kick off our individual audits. We have kickoff meetings with your process owners. We talk through logistics. We talk through how are we going to obtain the information we need? What's the goal of this audit? What are the risks that we're looking to address? Um after the audit is executed, we move into vetting. Vetting is the process by which we uh re we review our results with management. Make sure we got everything correct. Sometimes there may be uh information that might have been missing [snorts] or a piece of information we misunderstood because we didn't read it correctly. The vetting process is crucial to making sure that you get an accurate audit result and that all the information that's pertinent to that audit area has been looked at by RSM and processed
049appropriately. Um, [snorts] moving into communication. This is our final report um where we are presenting to the audit committee and ultimately is transmitted to the board via consent. Follow-up process is also a critical part of your internal audit function. We don't just issue you a report and then uh say, "See you later. Good luck with that." We do a follow-up process where we track all of the open audit observations. We keep in touch with management. We um we we might be a little incessant, sorry, to understand are they remediating the things that they said that they would remediate and are we um closing the risk gaps that we said we would close. And we actually go back and retest. We don't just take their word for it, no offense, but uh we go back and
050retest. We'll look at documents again. We'll do our walkthroughs. We'll do our interviews. We'll do look at our detailed um testing. And we will produce an additional report to tell the audit committee and tell you did they actually do what they said they were going to do or do we still have some more work to do. Um a little more on that in a couple of slides, but just wanted to give you an idea of the cyclical nature of what your internal audit function does. This risk assessment does take place every single year, but as I've always told you in our risk assessment conversations, if you uh feel the need to have more frequent conversations than once a year, we absolutely welcome it. And some board members do take us up on that and that
051is um 100% appropriate. I'm going to go ahead and skip this because I think I've um covered the risk assessment process pretty well here. Moving to the follow-up process. A little bit more about that. Um, one follow-up isn't just good so that you have a good idea of what's been closed and what hasn't. It's actually required. The Institute of Internal Auditors does require that your internal audit function does have a thorough follow-up process in place. So, you are adhering to national best practices because you have us perform this for you every single year. And moving on to the next slide, um, wanted to make sure that you had an understanding of exactly where Valia School sits today. What audits has RSM performed as your internal auditors that uh still have some open audit observations that
052management is working to remediate and we are working to test and close. You can see uh we do have several reports that are in process and I will remind you that I talked a little bit earlier about the history of change here at Valuchia and some of the um instability that that has created. This has absolutely contributed to I think the timeline of being able to close some of these audit observations with consistent change and consistent turnover in an organization makes it very difficult for management to make progress on um internal projects such as these and closing out certain risks. So I I would not expect uh a report say design and construction to always take five years to close. I think that's a little unusual. But talking with Dr. Dr. Bgaban and the leadership
053team in understanding the challenges that are in place organizationally. Uh this is why we are here um still with some open audit observations that date all the way back to 2020. I will tell you though the management and uh with Dr. Balgoven's um passionate support does know that this is a priority. They absolutely do and they are making progress. Michelle has conversations with them all the time and uh they are working on remediation plans and they are changing processes and implementing things to remediate these risks. So I don't want you to also walk away thinking nothing's being done. That's not the case. It's just taken longer than than it um than you might have expected. But we are making progress to date. And so Michelle and I are very hopeful that these will start to
054close over the next 6 to 12 months and we will be more current going forward and I'm sure management would love us to not be in their hair either. Next slide. A little bit about our IT reports. As I mentioned earlier, we also do look at your IT risks and conduct special projects in IT as well. These are issued confidentially um for security reasons and under state statute. We do not issue uh reports that compromise your security or could accidentally give away keys to the kingdom in a public setting. So, these have always been issued confidentially, but they're listed here for you to see just so you can understand what has RSM looked at and what reports have we issued um directly to your CIO and to the audit committee because you do receive those.
055So, with that, I'll go ahead and and close the presentation. I'm happy to take any questions that you may have about the internal audit function. >> Any questions? >> So, first >> Yeah. So, first of all, I want to thank you all. I know uh you all are very thorough and I definitely appreciate uh the feedback. Um we currently don't have any IT projects in scope. Correct. >> Correct. We had some good discussion at the audit committee about um allowing the district to focus on the implementation at this time. >> The ERP. >> Yeah. And so going back to the slide of things that are pending, if we can pull that back up. Can you pull the slide up of the things that are pending? I don't know who's presenting >> up on our screen.
056I'm not quite sure how to do that. So the timekeeping that is likely a part of the ERP, correct? >> Yes. >> Uh purchasing and procurement will be part of the ERP. >> Yes. >> Uh employee onboarding is part of our ERP. Yes. >> Yes. Although I I will caveat uh many of these audit observations will relate to new processes that will need to be established with the new ERP, but there are some that management is able to address now. So the ones that they are able to address, they are working on. >> Okay. Uh student discipline, that's just the one we did last year. And then so while there are some that are hanging out, three of the nine are let's hold off until the ERP year end tax der dispersements. What is that
057in layman's terms? >> Sure. This relates to how the district compiles and reports the um income to the IRS each year for the annual for each employee to file their annual taxes. >> Is that part of the ERP as well? >> So that's four. >> Yes. >> So that's >> perfect. So that's good. And what are we pending on white fleet? Yes, that one is um the closed. >> It's closed. Okay. >> Yes, we just closed this one. >> So, arguably one. So, even the at your end tax, but it looks closed, but it clearly can't be closed because it's part of the ERP. So, that's one, two, three. So, arguably we are in a good position because the ERP held up, you know, that implementation was huge. And so I I I appreciate the
058concern, but at the same time there's a lot of moving parts. And I think that uh what I would appreciate is is you know, one of the things that we've always had is great institutional knowledge for some folks, but uh not quite as many standard operating procedures that anybody can pick up a manual, learn how to do the work and work. And so that that's an area that I think is important. Uh and so as we are moving forward with the uh implementation of the ERP, that's an area that I think will be uh important for the stability of our district moving forward. Again, a lot of what you described in the volatility is because a lot of that was institutional. A lot of that was um you know everybody like you said brings their
059own people and when you depend on people and you don't have systems in place then you have that volatility. If you have a this is how we do it manual then it doesn't really matter who's there. it. And so I you know that's one of the things that I found when I came into the school district into education period is that everybody did their best. There's no doubt everybody did the best way they knew how and we were doing it 72 different ways and everybody was doing their best. And so that that's the part that I'd like to see as a board member and I'm only one of five. I don't know how everybody else feels, so it's not just on what I'm saying, but to ensure that we've got these processes pen and papered
060so that uh folks can pick that up. Thank you, >> Mrs. Brosmer. >> At the standard operating procedures and making sure there and they'll make recommendations on things that are happening that aren't documented that they should be documented. So that is part of what when they choose an area they are looking at those procedures and seeing that they're formalized and documented well. >> Perfect. And madam chair I just want to thank Stan. I Stan is my representative extraordinaire the honorable Stan Schmidt former school board member. And so again Stan thank you for for I mean your time your volunteer your time. Uh and so again thank you. Thank you. Thank you because I know you understand both sides of the business as well as uh you've sat here before. So thank you >> Mrs. Brosmer.
061>> I just wanted to uh me too on Mr. Cologne's comments. There's a real value in having those systems in place not only because leadership might change but also in success succession planning because we may have a number of of um responsible positions that are maybe within a few years of retirement and we want to make sure that we have something that can be uh provided to whoever is coming in behind that person. So, uh the uh the creation of those processes is really valuable. Anyone else? Okay. So, I just want to add a little bit more to this because when that law passed and went into effect in July of 2019, um we had a choice. We could have sought out hiring um an just an internal auditor and made them part of staff
062or we could choose to go out and find a company that could offer those services. Um at the time, Valuchia County um the council chose to hire one single person and bring them in. we chose to put out a request for proposal to see what companies um could do this task for us and what they offered and the members that are and and Stan and Amy are both original members that were on that committee for that. Um we were tasked with reading I believe it was six proposals that first year and they ranged anywhere from 80 to 150 pages each. We had to individually read all of them and we had to individually score all of them and then come into a meeting where we would reveal our scores along with the people that had
063submitted them sitting there. But what I will tell you and the process was I mean it was very thorough. That's why it took a little while before we got them on board to start doing this. But we ended up going with RSM. They had the highest scores. But what they offered to us is they offered people that work within their company that have the expertise for different areas. So we weren't just getting one person that you hoped they knew something a little something about everything. So when we did the white fleet, we had individuals that that's what they dealt with is auditing the white fleet. When we moved over and did discipline, which was kind of a new one for you, but they came up with the people to audit the discipline, you know, they
064have the people for the financial, they have the people for the security. And why that security piece is separate is we don't release the results of those reports to the public because when they do these tests, they're testing to see if they can break through our security plans for our technology and things like that. So, we would never tell the public, you know, if there was a weakness that we had to correct or whatever. But what I so appreciate and about this group though is they they're very responsive to us. They come in and they're honest and they tell us here's where we see your risk currently are. They give us an opportunity to ask a lot of questions and rank the risk. They give us guidance on it. And on this follow-up piece, what
065I will say is yes, some of it does fall under the ERP, but if you also look, some of it they're ready for testing because when they get back to that green column, then the district has said, "We're ready for you to test that area again." So, they don't just take someone's advice, you know, they don't just listen to someone and someone says, "Oh, we we did we checked all the boxes." They come back in and they retest that piece to verify that yes, all of those boxes are now checked. We can close that piece. We can move on to the next part. And it's very thorough. And the reports, you've received the reports. You you're going to be receiving um some more because we just had an audit committee meeting this past week. And
066you're going to also see the risk assessment they did for this year. and what as a committee and we actually voted unanimously as a committee to bring forward the audits we feel that they should conduct this year at the same time while they're doing followup on the others. So, I want to thank them because I really we didn't know how it would work out, but the expertise they have in their company to address each of these areas makes me feel that we are definitely getting our money's worth and that the information we're being given is accurate because they're just not relying on even the three of them that oversee it. Um because when you talk to the people that do that IT and cyber security piece, they know what they're doing, you know, and and
067every time we meet with them, even this time, they bring in with them the individuals that just finished an area of auditing and that they and those individuals introduce themselves and they tell you here's my criteria, here's, you know, I have this much experience in this type of auditing and all. So I would just say from moving forward you know thinking in the future I feel this model has probably been the best model for us to choose and I think the committee would agree with me versus just hiring a single auditor and expecting that person to be able to you know do everything. So, but thank you because you all volunteer and without you, we couldn't do this and and I didn't know. Um Stan, I'll give you a moment if there's something you'd like
068to add because you didn't get to speak. Is there anything you'd like to add? [laughter] >> Because he came out today, >> which by the way, where's the pumpkin bread? I'm just asking. [laughter] >> I have to ask the RSM people about that. Um, >> I had to audit it. [laughter] >> Tough job. One of the things that's really nice too about using the outside experts because they work with other larger school districts. They can bring in knowledge of what other districts are doing. And I ask that question a lot. I know other people do too. Is like, how are we doing? What are you seeing every place else? What about this ERP system? Have you had experience with it? What about >> uh what was we were talking about the other day? Um >>
069that's another piece too. And how have you seen these work together? And uh it kind of gives us a bit of a check that we're not going down a rat hole. I mean, these guys do a lot of work with bigger school districts. And in Florida, all the school districts are pretty good size. So, you don't want to compare Valuchia to Flaggler. Nice place to live, but school districts a lot lot different than what we had to do with. And so, that's what's that's what one of the things I really appreciate with the model that we've chosen to go with. And um everything we've seen is they're doing great jobs. They they do great work. We get good feedback from them. Um and the the committee itself is pretty dedicated to what we're doing. We
070we uh put the time in. We see what's going on and especially as was mentioned when we had to do the selections for either the financial audit or the internal auditors. You will get proposals uh that'll be 70 to 100 pages. And uh and for some people if you're not really interested or not really having a background in financial accounting um they can really throw you a curveball like what a lot of different stuff in there. So um that's really all I have to add I think. Thank you. And we thank you and Amy for both coming today because you came on your own time and volunteered to be here today for this presentation. And so and and I'll tell you I'm happy you both serve and I hope you continue to serve on the
071audit committee. So if there's no other questions, thank you very much. And we will now move on to item 3. Actually, do you have an announcement you want to make? Go ahead. I do actually. So, in the beginning, for those of you that tuned in a little bit late, um, as you know, I'm filling in for Dr. Bugamin. She is actually on her way. She was attending the Daytona Beach News Journal 20th anniversary women in business event celebrating the most influential women in business. And so, with that announcement, chair, um, congratulations to our very own Dr. Belgrain because not only was she selected as one of the 30 nominees for the women in business awards, but she was selected as the public sector women of the year, one of the top six winners. [applause] We're
072thankful to have her here and I appreciate um our partners there at RSM when they talked about the last decade and the last five years having five different superintendent and how that is um very important for the stability of a district to have someone for the last three years um partnering in this work and making sure that things get done. So we are very very appreciative and honored to have Dr. Bogaban as our um leader. Yes. Thank you. We are now moving on to item 3.01, recruit, support, retain, update. >> All right. So, I would like to invite Mrs. Stephanie Workman, executive director of human resources, along with Miss Tiffany Fuller, coordinator of recruitment and retention for HR, Mrs. Maga, specialist for the recruitment and retention, and Miss Lauren M. Minel specialist um well um
073for wellness to come forward and share an update on human resources recruit support retain and information on wellness. >> That was a mouthful. Thank you for >> not missing a [laughter] beat. >> Well, good afternoon and um we're happy to be here to provide our usual fallish type update of where we are in the world of HR. Um as Dr. Vay mentioned I have uh coordinator Tiffany Fuller and specialist Meg Row with me as well as well as Lauren behind me. And today we want to just briefly provide you an update as to where we are but also where we're going so that that way we we kind of have our road map ahead. So with that being said um as you know we support guardrail one which after our students the most important thing
074is our staff. So, we are um here to recruit, support, develop, and retain the high quality staff. So, with that, I'm going to turn it over to Miss Fuller. >> Good [clears throat] afternoon, everyone. [snorts] So, as uh Miss Workman stated um with our office when we started this work, there was a lot of conversation about how can we expand recruitment, how can we extend retention efforts? And so, um, the quote on the screen says, "Employee retention is not preventing people from leaving. Employee retention is giving them reasons to stay." And so, when we first came to this work, we really looked at what is it that we can do to um have those conversations and look at the research about what does it take to keep our employees where they are um but not
075just from a keeping them there, but giving them a reason to stay where they're at. Um, and so we really looked at how we could expand that work by having conversations with industry leaders by doing research. Um, and then having conversations with our stakeholders here in the district with teachers and and employees and having that conversation about what was needed and what was missing and what were the areas that we could tighten up that support. And so we had several points of feedback that came out of that conversation, but the two that popped up um that were directly kind of in our area of of of impact um talked about professional learning opportunities and talked about new teacher supports. So as we talk about updates to what's happening in recruitment, support, and retention. Part of
076that update is that when I started in this office, it was recruitment and retention, and then it became recruitment, support, and retention. And so as we've looked to expand what are those supports um you'll look at how we started this was framing one of the shifts primarily was our support of our new teacher program and as we speak today you're going to see about how some of that has changed as we've come to this work and how we've gone from our tip program um to a new teacher program that has strong mentorship now that h that provides a work life balance that you'll hear about from Lauren um that offers extensive classroom management supports that provides models and examples to to support the different types of persons that we're bringing to the classroom. Um, and
077that provides job embedded professional learning. So, as we talk today, you'll see how some of this that we laid out, this is actually a screenshot of the presentation that we gave to cabinet when we started to make these revisions. And so, you'll see how some of that has manifested. Um, so here's a quick snapshot of recruitment. And so, this semester kind of, uh, we've had 29 recruitment events to date. um over 700 new applicants to come in. Um since August, since the start of school year, there's been over 166 hires. Um at the start of quarter two, as we ran into the start of quarter 2, just about a week or so ago, we were sitting with 42 instructional vacancies. And throughout this term, we've been providing leads to all of our departments, our school
078sites, um our school leaders and hiring managers with over a thousand different candidate leads to help our schools and staff and and um principles hire and fill the vacancies that they have on their campuses. And so this is just a quick snapshot of some of the hiring events that we've had most recently. Um what you'll see is that we're consistently getting feedback from um our stakeholders, from our our applicant groups, um and from our hiring managers about our ability to be supportive and and meet them where their needs are in answering their questions and providing that support. And that's important for us as we talk about recruitment and we talk about um that specifically within how it focuses in our strategic plan. um recruitment is is ongoing. Um and and so part of that is
079understanding what recruitment looks like for it to be an ongoing endeavor. And so when I talk about recruitment, I talk about it as a multi-pronged approach, right? There is ongoing recruitment. This office is never not recruiting. This office is always in a recruitment and hiring season. Um that has been a a shift, but it's one that we've risen to. But even as we do that throughout the year, all year long, what we recruit and where our focus lies and the pool of talent that comes in varies throughout that year. And so I wanted to just kind of paint a quick snapshot of what that looks like when we're talking about immediiacy and we have recruitment events and it's a we need a job fair today, right? Um and that happens sometimes and we and we
080do it. Um, but when we're doing that, we bring in a lot of immediate talent, but that talent lies in different industries. And so sometimes we have to talk about our office does recruitment for everything that hires in Valuchia. And so that's that's custodial hiring, that's teacher hiring and and so forth and so on. And so as we're doing that, that's community and regional career fairs. That's support talent. That's that's um some of our our talent that's coming in on our support pathways. Um bus drivers, attendants, custodials, pair professionals, um schoolway, cafeteria, ed facilitators, IT technicians. Um that's also where we can sometimes find some of our altcertified teachers. We talk a lot about how recruitment the way of I I chose to go to school for education and then went that way. how that
081pathway from a collegiate standpoint has changed. And so as we look at that and we've increased the people that we're recruiting into um second career teachers, right? People that have made life shifts and have come to the classroom on a different pathway, we sometimes are able to recruit these people year round as well. But the other piece is when we're talking about building a pipeline because sometimes you can't just hire today. Sometimes the talent's not ready tomorrow. We're constantly looking at how are we able to meet our needs immediately and how are we cultivating and building a talent pipeline that sustains us over time. And so when we talk about that, that's why we stay in touch with our colleges and universities. Their education programs have shifted. Um sometimes their numbers have dropped, but they
082have been they have tried to be innovative in their approaches as well. They they've done different things as well. And we work with them. We go to their events. We go to their hiring events. We talk to their their students. We talk to their education students and their other students. and we talk about the opportunities that are available whether they make the choice to be in a classroom now or possibly consider it for later. Um, and so those pathways for internships and things of that nature, those are pipeline builders. Those students that we're talking to in September at a college aren't ready to take over a classroom tomorrow, but we're talking to them to see if they graduate in December that they can come in January or come in the following spring. So, we want
083to make sure that we have that understanding that throughout the years, those things are what we're noticing. And so a lot of our elementary education candidates fall into that pipeline build where some of our secondary and other career changers fit in some of our secondary school placement opportunities with alternative certification. In addition to our ongoing recruitment efforts that are continuously happening, we've started a new application system. And so um in the past three months or so um we've gone from from zero to brand new with a with an application tracking system. Um we are now in partnership with focus. And so um we have done a lot of training and development over 33 hours of training provided in a two-eek period of time to our school teach to our school leaders and and secretaries to
084get them adjusted to what the new system um has as well as over um 2,000 correspondents with our candidates as we're shifting from one platform to the next. As we've done that though, that has provided us with a cleaned and straightforward application. Um, one of the points of feedback that we had previously about our application system was that it was um, not always clear. Um, people weren't always sure when they were starting, when they were finishing. Um, there there were challenges to it that that just didn't necessarily kind of follow a sequential order. Um, we have a very clean, streamlined application system. You start it, you hit next, you submit it, you finish it, you know when you're done, we know when you're done. It's a very clean and straightforward process. Um, in addition to
085that, we have differentiated applications because the skill sets that it takes to be um, a school cafeteria um, employee or a pair professional are different than what it takes to instruct a classroom or be a school psychologist. And so we're able to differentiate those applications so that the candidate is more informed of what they need to apply and be an eligible applicant. And simultaneously, our hiring managers are able to get a better talent pool coming into their applicant feedback box. So that's been a really good point of feedback. and with the help of it who's been really really great in their support. Um we have all of these as support resources. We have support resources and click sheets for current employees for how to navigate the application system. We have external click sheets for those
086who are not our employees and the way they navigate the system. And then we have a um a set of resources in vportal and a focus tab um so that our employees can go in and get all of those resources including video support. And so because we are a a strong and mighty team, we recognize that we are not the end- all beall as well. And so we as a part of our our commitment to our strategic plan, we have diversified our recruitment efforts. And so this is a a small snapshot of some of the partners that we work with. Um these people help us with job postings and job boards, with hiring events, um with position marketing, as well as with talent pipeline and cultivation. So, this is not all of them, but these
087are some of the ways that we partner and stretch all the ways that we recruit, particularly for for niche and really specific industry positions that are needed across our district. As we expand recruitment pathways, we know that we have extended those pathways to some of our associate um educators to begin a pathway into the teaching world. And so, you've heard us talk about the teacher apprentice program in the past. And so this is just a quick snapshot that we have continued with our teacher apprentice program. And so um we just wanted to kind of give you some of the feedback that we've heard. Our pathways into teaching are specifically another way that we are expanding the way that we recruit, differentiating the way that we recruit, but it's also a way that we're investing in
088the talent and the employees that we have to grow them professionally. And so it's a retention effort and and those that we're supporting. And so if you look on the screen, um, one of our school leaders said, "Words cannot describe the impact that our TAP has on our students." And so you're hearing from the people that are using these services at their schools. Um, one of the TAP candidates said, "It's always been my dream to be a teacher, but life got in the way. I knew I had a passion for teaching and wanted to make more difference in students lives." So we're really pouring into them and we're seeing the benefit as they're going through these programs. our VATS program was our program that we started this year specific for our ESC teacher shortage and
089so um we've had really good feedback from that as well. So, just a quick snapshot, what um they just started. They're a quarter of the way in. Um and one of them has already said, "I have found my place and love teaching." And so, you can see that we're really kind of we're cultivating what their needs are and we're growing them as they continue to work with us and continue that journey by supporting them and retaining them as our employees into other pathways. In addition to our our VATS and our TAP pathways, we continue to expand our um our intern program. And so you can see that we still have our three pathways. Two of them are paid. This semester alone, we're working with nine colleges and universities with um 38 interns in place. And
090so you can see the different pathways. We have our certified teacher interns. Those are the ones that are taking over a classroom independently. And then our traditional interns. And then of this group, eight of those interns are in the pair to teacher pathway. So we talked about TAP, we talked about that, but there's still the state supported PAR toteer program. And so eight of our interns presently were paras now doing their internship that have continued on this pathway and be ESC teachers at the at the conclusion of their graduation. Um so this is a quick snapshot. This is um one of our um interns. She is a VCS student. As we grow our own employees, we're growing our own students. And so Brianna here was a student at Deerry Elementary. She graduated as a UHS
091Titan and she is now interning back at her elementary school. And so this is how we're just showing that pathway that we're growing. And she's actually there with Miss Haynes. This is a video that community community information did for us. But um Miss Haynes was one of her teachers and so she noticed Miss Haynes at our intern orientation and said, "I think you were my teacher." And um so it was a really special moment. But we have 16 of our 38 interns are VCS students. And so we're continually to be to to get that message about and get that across that we're we're pulling from other places, but we're still growing our own even with our students. And so as we're getting ready with our ongoing recruitment efforts, we have our fall instructional job fair
092um coming up in November. This is intentionally focused for um meeting people where their needs are. We know that the middle of the year, the middle of our year, the end of the calendar year is a time of pivot and change. And so as people are getting ready to make shifts and they're making New Year's resolutions and they're making pivots in their work life balance, um we're we're there to capture them here and meet them at their needs and capture them for employment as well as our interns who are finishing with a December graduation date. And so we're able to tap in and to get ready to hire them for the start of the second semester. Good afternoon everybody. My name is Meg Rrowa, like they said, specialist in the recruitment, support, and retention office.
093I oversee the new teacher academy. So, I'm excited to share all of the things that we're doing in this world. Um, I just want to draw your attention to the quote at the bottom of the screen. Every student deserves a great teacher, not by chance, but by design. This mantra has really become what has guided our work in this world. We wear the hat of supporting adult learners and we've tried to do the same thing through this program. Differentiate our support our expectations based on the levels that are coming to us not only for the teachers but also for our mentors. So, one of the new pieces of the new teacher academy that was not um included in tips is a mentoring program and we got feedback through our retention huddles like uh Tiffany and
094myself and one of the things that new teacher shared with us is I needed somebody to go to. So, that mentors program is something that we incorporated into our new teacher academy. So you can see on the screen like currently for this school year we have 300 plus new instructional hires who are who are participating in our new teacher academy. And for our Valuchia mentors program we have um in elementary we have about 80% of our a little less than 80% of our current mentors are in their third year of mentoring and then at the secondary it's about approximately 92%. So when we've asked these teacher leaders who are um asked by their principles to step into this role, we've asked them for a two a minimum of a two-year commitment because it's not that
095we're creating uh a person people can go to when they need it. We're creating a system that's really intentional about meeting our new teachers needs. And so um the way that we are supporting our mentors is they everybody participates in a mentoring book study so that we're building common language and bu starting to build our mentoring skills through that way and then we have a annual two-day summer mentoring academy where we come in and we hone our schools and we differentiate the support that we provide there. In addition to that, they also are attending monthly mentor meetups and we're really building a community of mentors where we can rely and support one another like what are the successes you're having? Where are you struggling? And we are um matching the content that we deliver in
096those monthly mentor meetups to help support and grow our mentor expertise because as a reminder, our mentors are also classroom teachers, academic coaches. They're they have their own job. they're doing mentoring with the new teachers above and beyond that. So, we want to make sure we're giving them the support that we need. You can see um on the next page that we on the next slide, another area that through our retention huddles when we talked with new teachers that they said they needed the most help with was our classroom management. And so, we have in the new teacher academy two requirements for all new teachers. It's classroom management 101 and 102 which was developed by teacher leaders in our district who have strong classroom management expertise. And so we've expanded that and we have through
097our leads program which is our teacher leadership program. We have a classroom management team made up of veteran teachers who support and lead these different um professional learning opportunities that are delivered through our summer learns institute at our new teacher academy pres-ervice event and also we do makeup sessions throughout the year that we're providing that support. Um, in addition to that, knowing that classroom management is one of our hot topics and we consistently get feedback through our surveys from our new teachers, I just need some more support. Our mentors are telling us we need more support. We've also introduced through our um, Valuchia leads group mini lesson Mondays and these are 30 minute sessions that go from 4:30 to 5 that kind of chunk out like high area needs like how do I do transitions
098in my classroom? What does it look like? um for classroom routines or procedures. So, we are averaging about 30 people per session on those mini lesson Mondays. And the feedback that we've gotten from everybody is they really appreciate the focused topic in a short amount of time and they leave with with um resources and tools that they can actually implement tomorrow. So it's been it's been a very successful um uh you know I guess new program that that we offer. And in addition we also have a classroom management book studies that are led by our classroom management team. Another um component of our new teacher academy is our showcase classroom. And I've shared some information on this before. This is our job embedded professional learning and it's peer-to-peer classroom visits. So instead of coming to
099an afterhour session, new teachers are have the opportunity to go into veteran teachers classrooms and observe expert practice in practice and then they debrief either with that teacher and or their mentor and make a plan. What did I learn during this session and how am I implementing it into my own practice? And these all of these conversations or these um examples of professional learning opportunities that we're giving our new teachers are all then connected back to mentoring conversations that are happening monthly. And I'd just like to add that you know sometimes especially in our CTE world we do get those very unique teachers who we do not have a role alike in the district. So we have partnered with surrounding districts to be able to send those teachers to see a rollike program. so that
100they also are getting the same uh type of activity as our traditional teachers. >> Thank you. Uh I want to just say one more thing about that. Um, we really consider this one of our retention strategies as well for our office because when they're going into those veteran teachers classrooms, you the feedback we get from the veteran teachers, they're like, "Thank I can't believe that you're recognizing me that people are actually coming into my room to see what I've been doing and then that and how much they're learning both from and with the new teachers. So, we've been filling buckets, you know, across the district in many different ways. And thank you. I did forget that we were doing that. that they went to other districts. I'm glad you remembered. Okay. Um so one of
101the other um areas that we implemented into our new teacher academy is called our best self. It's our wellness program because we really recognize and if you are familiar with some of the research and we talk about new teachers and the phases they go through, they re like right now they're coming into that phase where they need to they need someone to dig them out. They're like in this disillusionment phase and they're like this is not what I thought it was going to be. So, we really are trying to encourage that work life balance. And this is another retention strategy as well because we look out into our current district and we ask veteran teachers. We find those who have some expertise in certain areas that will support um new teachers like we have like
102Jamie Monahan is someone who does sound bowls with our new teachers. We have Mr. Brennan from Delana High School who is really proficient in um talking about stress management, time management. And so they come on board and they they get these tips. So our best self is one um opportunity that we provide for our new teachers to find that work life balance along with our educators thriving program. Uh this was brought to us by futures through um LA summer not not this summer the summer before and we have grown this where we now have our Valuchia leads members have been trained by have uh facilitators have been trained by the educators thriving team who now are the trainers in our district and we offer 12 different topics for like time management self-management tech finding that
103work life balance and we offer those in the fall, spring, and summer for our new teachers. Actually, we invite all K12. We had a principal join this last cohort session and I saw her at the job fair last week and she was just raving about like just taking the time for myself through educators thriving just filled her bucket and she did it on the recommendation of a teacher who had participated earlier. Yeah. Okay. Um our new teacher teacher leadership pathway is a component um we're two years in the making with this for our Valuchia leads uh teacher leadership pathway has been in existence since 202021 school year and so that was for veteran teachers. So we were thinking like how do we ensure that our new teachers feel connected and that their voice matters as
104a new teacher as a year 1 as a year two as a year three teacher. So what we do at the end of the like around Aprilish we invite everybody who is a novice teacher who was um nominated for the futures first year teacher of the year award and also rookie of the month that we host through our office. um we invite them to join this teacher leadership pathway and what that means is when they join they are growing their practice through a support system with veteran teachers in Valuchia leads along with their cohorts that they work with. They attend a summer a week-long summer academy where we focus on classroom management skills, teacher clarity, edte and engagement strategies. And the whole goal during this one week that they're together um they are creating a
105we call it a teaching sprint which is equivalent to like a DPP. So they're asking themselves where do what do I need to improve in my practice out of all of these strategies that I have learned this week? What am I going to implement next year into practice? What impact do I want to see? what evidence am I going to collect to make sure that I've shown that I've shown that I've made a difference in the lives of our students? And so we have about 25 um teachers who are in year two, three or four who are on this teacher leadership p pathway. And our first cohort has 13 members who actually led this past summer's cohort. And so that to see the teacher leadership skills that they have was really impressive. You all need
106to come next year. I will make sure it's on your calendar. [laughter] As I've been mentioning, Valuchia Leads is our teacher leadership group that we have in Valuchia County Schools. Um, it started with uh from Futures brought this to us through a grant from the Consortium of Florida Educators Foundation and we started in 2020 2021. Currently, we have 55 members. We have 35 elementary school teachers who are involved in this and they represent 20 of our elementary schools. And then for both um middle and high, we have 10 members each and they both are representing six of our uh six each of our middle and high schools. Our goal is to have representation for each each of our schools. This is an invitational. So we reach out to our teachers of the years. We invite
107them and it's their choice if they want to commit to this. Um the folks who are um who are involved in this are highly involved. It is a commitment. We we have monthly meetings and you can see on like on the left hand side with all the different colored it says teacher leadership pathways. We are providing opportunities to fill buckets like where do your interests lie? Do you want to be leading professional learning? Are you do you like to do um retention huddles like the the community district liaison? Like so we're trying to fill those buckets. Do you like to be behind the scenes and be on the tech team? So we want to find opportunities for them to share their teacher their teacher voice and lead their colleagues in their field without leaving the
108classroom. That's the whole point. It is not an opportunity to go into an AP position or principal ship. It's I want to be a teacher leader remain in my classroom but represent my colleagues and share and grow my colleagues. On the other side on the um right hand side I think there are like nine things there. These are different um professional learning activities that leads is uh promoting and leading just in the fall. This these will be replicated in the spring and some of this will also happen in the summer. Again, retention strategy for our folks. And as we talk about that, like those leadership pathways are part of the conversation that we have when we're out doing recruitment, when we're talking to candidates about, well, if I come in, what's going to be there
109to support me? These are the conversations we have. And as we meet people in different areas, there are different levels of needs and conversations. So career changers have questions about what that support will look like transitioning one career to the next. Those coming out of college have a different conversation about what ways that they can grow and expand. And that's really a conversation that we're seeing gener gener gener generation generational generational. That's what I wanted. Generationally, we're seeing those differences in conversations as we're recruiting those different generations that come into work at different times. Um, in addition, we also obviously have our certification support. We know that there is no teaching instruction without certification support. And so, we continue to expand those pathways. And so, we're seeing more and more um people reaching out and
110asking for support. And then we've expanded that support beyond just our TLLL supports. We have webinars at least four times a year. We offer it during um our Felicia Learns sessions in the summer as well. And then we do a lot of one-on-one case by case support calls. uh when uh when folks join Valuchia Leads, we have those pathways, but we also are willing and interested in adding like new opportunities like what are you passionate about as a teacher leader? What are some things you want to share with your colleagues? And so we we've introduced a few new series and in addition as a reminder, Tiffany's first slide, one of the things that people were saying they wanted was different professional learning opportunities, different formats. And so these all three of these um lend itself
111to that. So we have our tech talk series that we just started this fall and we have some teacher leaders who are focusing on canvas in near pod and again these are bite-sized uh 30 minute sessions that have a specific topic and they walk away that they can do something with that in the next day and improve their practice. And our podcast PD is another format. It's similar to a book study. Um, but not everybody has time to go home and read a book, but they do have time to turn on a podcast as they're walking or in their car. And so we're using that. And the teacher toteer podcast by uh Dr. Carol Pelleter Bradford is our main uh content for that because it offers practical wisdom, strategies, and self-care. Okay, at this time
112I'd like to ask Lauren to come up for just a moment. And for those of you that have not met Lauren, this is Lauren Minel. She is our wellness specialist and I believe she left you all some treats in Miss Celeste's office with the fresh pick and stand. So Laura, >> thank you everybody and I hope you enjoyed the snacks. I am the wellness specialist here and I'm also a licensed mental health counselor. Um, and I'm here to update you on some of the things that I'm doing in the wellness department. So the focus this year or this past year has been on mental health. I think that's a really important initiative to make sure that our staff feels supported with their mental health. And we're focusing on making sure that each one of those
113staff members feels valued, seen, and empowered with what we're doing. Um, I want to make sure that we're building a culture that is rooted in compassion and accessibility and proactive care. Um, with that in mind, I designed a new logo uh with one of my friends over in community information. And our new motto is a vision of care and support. that way we don't forget BCS. Additionally, with the new logo that we designed for wellness and our new mission, I also had the honor of hosting a small competition for our upcoming uh wellness 5K and we had a winner which was uh really awesome and her name was Emily Meyer. Um, this was an opportunity for us to bring the community together to kind of have an opportunity to work with students because I don't
114generally get to do that as I am doing staff wellness. And I felt like it was really connected to the district's um mission of connection. >> And this is where I jump in and give a plug. If you have not registered, please register for the 5K, which will be on Sunday, November 16th at Gemini Springs. It is free for all staff and very minimal for family and students. >> Come on, Jamie. [laughter] >> You can walk, you can bike, you can >> Can I just come and share? >> You absolutely. [laughter] >> I would love that. I would love that. >> Yes. The one we did last spring, we had over 600 participants. Um Jesse and Ruben both were there. >> Um hello, I placed. THAT'S RIGHT. YOU DID PLACE. I FORGOT [laughter] YOU RAN
115IT. >> She was busy running. >> Well, yes. Thank you for being there. That was awesome. Um, something else I am very excited about is I had the opportunity to work with CTE to develop a wellness tile on the V portal. Um, you know, sometimes just being one person uh seems like it might be tough, but not here. Um, we have such great departments that work together and have really supported me. Um, and building this wellness tile was huge for me and I'm very u passionate about the direction that we're taking in wellness in order to make sure that everybody has access. And on this wellness tile um I've created a wellness booking uh link so people if they're struggling with our EAP um potential resources, mental health resources and consultations, they can book one-on-one
116sessions with me so that we can walk through the steps that they need to be their best self. Um, additionally, if we need to do an extended time because they've had a situation that maybe feels like a little bit of a crisis, we have those extended times as well as wellness clinics that the schools can schedule. Um, and then faculty meetings. So, this is something I'm I'm really passionate about, very excited, and I hope to see that the principles are utilizing it for faculty meetings as well, so we can get the word out. >> With that, that concludes our presentation. Mr. Thompson. >> Thank you. And yes, I will be one of the people walking thanks to Miss Goodrich who has encouraged me to be part of this. She'll be running. I'll be walking. Um
117I wanted to go back to slide Oh, does this slide not have it? Um it's going back to recruitment and how we have 42 vacancies. Um is that instructional only vacancies? >> That was instructional. >> Okay. Do we have a total for total vacancies? Not for all vacancies. I know we are sitting at roughly 70 para vacancies. I could but I could get you the number before the end. >> How many para vacancies >> and this is a random question but I know there's a lot of job fairs and a lot of opportunity. Are there any specifically where we are going after since that is kind of a high number of vacancies for paras is there anything specifically or anywhere specifically we are going for paras or is it just kind of whatever falls in
118that category. So there there's layers to that. The we have a lot of people that are interested in pair the pair pool, right? It's an entry level um position that's like a teachers aid position. It has a lot of people that will come in to look at the job. Couple different layers. Um one, it requires at least an associates degree or you have to pass the pair pro test. >> The pair pro exam is something that we used to offer here at the district. And so when I'm hiring you as a pair, if you don't have your associates degree, you can schedule a pair of pro exam. um the owner of uh ETSS the owner parent company right of the parro exam they changed the rules for how the exam is administered which removed our
119ability to give that exam on site so now those people who don't have that um that that credential to start now have to go through to ETSs to schedule their own testing it's another barrier in the place right so now we're we're running into that just this year um and so in addition to that um we we do have opportunities to do that. But we're also talking to different staffing agencies where we're able to recruit through some of their mechanisms to bring in additional talent as we're working through that change to kind of the PAR onboarding system. >> And I just want to add about the test. Um with the testing piece, they either have to go to a testing center to take it, which I'm sure many of us have had to do, or
120they can take it at home. But when you take it at home, it requires a laptop. And I don't know how many people no longer have laptops with cameras and all that kind of stuff in their home because most people depend on their phone or a tablet or something like that. They've also increased the price of the test. It used to be 55 I believe is what they paid when they took it here on site and now it's 85. So in asking someone to come in and take an entry level position, but then before they can even start have to pay for the test, fingerprints, drug screen, all that kind of stuff. That in itself creates barriers that we're looking for solutions to overcome, but some are just beyond even our control. >> So those
121just presented themselves this year. So we're working through some of that. Okay. >> Financial assistance or anything that the state would provide or any grants that >> not not at this time there there isn't um we have worked with individuals on the things that we can like with the fingerprinting and the and the drug screening and and those things but when that test came into play that's completely outside of us and they had to pay for that before they could take it. And how do we have any way of tracking how many number of people have turned away from that specifically because of that testing and the barriers that are there or do we have any way to track that? >> We might be able to now in our new applicant tracking system because we'll
122be able to see immediately whether or not they meet the criteria. But but I can tell you, you know, I I just had a conversation with the principal yesterday and they're saying, "Well, can we change that because she has someone who's been working as a subpar >> and who would be phenomenal, but English is not her first language?" Well, the test is only given in English. >> Okay? >> And so she's like, "Have they changed that?" Well, that's a federal law. That's not that's not a Valuchia. That's not a Florida thing. That is part of the old old no child left behind that has hung around all these years. Okay. All right. Those are my questions. Thank you so much. >> Hey, Mr. Cologne. >> So, in our old system, when you went to apply,
123the first thing it asked you was for your social security number. Has that changed? >> No, it's still a part of the start when you're creating a new application for the very first time. >> So, that was the first thing it asked. Is it still the first thing? >> It's not the very first thing. No, I mean Yeah, >> that that right there was very discouraging. Like we >> No, it's on It's on page one, but it's not the very first thing that's >> And so that's that. Um which my understanding was part of the reason why we asked for that was for, you know, double-checking things that would be later on in the process. And so, um that's a thought. Uh then the other part uh references always holds people's up and so do
124they have a way with the new system to see if their references have verified or not or because that's where people get stuck is they don't know and they've sent their emails they supplied the two or three people and they never heard back again and it's because one of them never responded and >> yeah so and there's and and that was still true in the previous system but you can when I submit my here's my worked for principal A B and C these are my references when I submit it. While I can't see what my principal wrote back, I can see that it's submitted. It was returned, right? So, I know who's responded to my inquiry to submit their their reference request. >> So, they'll have the ability to see that. That's good. And then
125[clears throat] I think you answered this towards the end. So, that parapro test, is that the only test and the only uh provider of that test in the entire country? That is my knowledge for the provider here in this state. Um, and again, if they've got an associates degree, they because they have to have 48 hours. If they got 48 hours of college, then they're fine. And we have a lot of people that they come through that way as well. But if they don't, this is what they have to do. >> So my question is, do we have the ability and is it cost prohibitive to become a testing center? >> We were until Right. We were >> They just changed this. They just changed it to where school districts cannot be testing centers any
126longer. >> So they have to go out similar to like uh when our teachers go out and take their certification exams and they have to schedule it. They have to do it like that now. They they are treating those two tests identical in testing requirements. >> But you did say there was a proctor ability and so can we set up a testing center here that has the computers? >> We cannot. It cannot be the school district cannot be involved at all in the testing process the way we understand it. >> So they can take the proctor test at home but they can't do it here. >> Correct. Because they would there is a proctor on the other end that watches them. They they um they register on their own. They don't associate it with a
127school district. They don't do anything. It's it's no different than if you were in a college class and your professor was was watching you specifically, >> right? But you could go to the library and do your test while you're there and be >> honestly we don't since we have been removed from the process. We don't know what options they're given for that. But we just know that Valuchia County schools cannot be tied to the process. >> I would question whether or not we could provide a room with computers where they could do that so that that's not an obstacle. >> And that's what we did before. We actually had a room in um >> Right. But they would be >> in HR. >> But they weren't being proctored in HR. >> Yes, they were. We
128proctored them. I had I had one employee that that was part of their job is if someone needed to schedule that test, they would call, they would schedule it, they'd pay their money, and that person would sit there and proctor while they were testing. >> So, you mentioned the laptop. That's why I'm saying it would be individual to the process. They would still register. They'd do everything like they >> You can look into it. I'm I'm not opposed to anything you suggest >> and I'm not say at that point we wouldn't even be proctoring them. they would be proctored by whoever's there. But at least we would have a computer with a camera that they could take their test and come and you know for those who don't have it and and I again sometimes
129even laptop cameras are not good enough because they don't provide enough of a >> a wide enough lens >> wide at least I've taken lots of tests recently and so I you know and of course it always depends on the proctor. So maybe having that space would be a plus. Again, >> we can research it and see if we can do it that way if they take care of everything and we're just providing them the equipment and the space. >> Yeah, I think I'm not that may be able to close that gap. Uh and I want to appreciate what you said about back there said what you said about generations because right now we probably have four different generations in our school district. And when you think about those generations, something as subtle as communication,
130which there's nothing subtle about communication, you know, you have one person who would loves the handwritten note and you have the next person who says, "Why'd you bother writing this?" You know, you could have sent me a text. Two extremes. And so, uh, finding the ability to teach the adult learners across four generations is quite the challenge. And so, thank you for acknowledging that because that is something that a lot of businesses don't get right. They think that there's only one way to do it. There's only one way to uh, you know, even telling someone, "I'm going to schedule a meeting." Well, in some instances, you know, some folks won't sleep for days if they have a meeting scheduled. Other folks sleep just fine and they're like, "Whatever." And so, again, that's generational. And so,
131uh, I want to thank you for that because that's a huge component of this. So, thank you. >> This is good, Rich. >> So, the test for the pairs, um, it's the a state requirement that they they take this test. >> It's federal >> federal requirement and the federal government only allows this one company. am with you in g in Florida. >> So the requirement is that they have to have 48 hours of college and right got that part. So if they don't then they have to pass the parapro exam. The ETSs is the system that I know in the state of Florida that provides the test that we're sanctioned to give. >> Correct. >> And I'm going to agree with you Mr. Cologne. If you can take it at your laptop at Starbucks, why
132can't you take it here? I think we need I do think we need to look into that further. And it may it sounds like it's valid, but maybe we need to reach out to that company and push that issue because that's if that's what's holding us up from getting parapros. There's an easy easy fix for that. So, I'm just going to back up what you said. You said it before I got to any anyone else. I'm just still thankful that when this entire piece started because our parents used to not have to have an associates degree or 48 college credit hours, we were able to hire them even with a high school diploma um for those positions. And then when this came about, they granted us the ability to grandfather a small group that had
133been in there for a while. But everybody else at that point, they gave us the pair of protest. And what they told us even then was we weren't going to have the pair of protest for a long period of time. It was just going to be like a gap so that people could get their degree. The fact that we've been able to keep the test is a blessing because it meant everybody didn't have to go and get 48 college credit hours to be a paraprofessional. Um, and we were a testing site for I think from the time we started it. >> Yes. >> And so I'm disappointed to hear that they took it away that ability away from us. I'd like to see if there's something that we can do, but somewhere along the line
134somebody made a decision that to take the school system out of that being a site. I and it is a barrier. I mean, if if we look at the individuals that are applying for these jobs, if they, you know, have the high school diploma but do not have yet the 48 hours or the associates degree, they are ready to if they a lot of them want to earn that degree, but they don't have the money to do it. And so now we've put another barrier and you add the fingerprinting and the drug testing and all that that's a lot of upfront money to be able to then take a position to work in our schools. So and I will tell you one thing that we do offer even now without offering the test itself is
135we do have a Canvas course that is free to anybody who needs it to try to help them with with studying. Um because I will tell you math is is just like with most of our elementary ed tests, the math is is the hardest part. So So that is something that we share with any applicant who says, "I need assistance." >> Thank you for continuing to do that. If there's no other questions, then we um we are going to take a short break. It is 2:58 and we will be back in here at 3:10 for the next group, which is the elementary vape. >> [laughter] >> nominated. It was a nice Oh, sorry. >> That's awesome. >> Okay, welcome back. It is now >> 3:14 and we are moving on to item 4.01, the elementary
136vape program. Dr. Balabin. >> Thank you, Madam Chair. As you can see, we already have our executive director for graduation assurance and student services, Mr. Mike McAfee, along with Miss Jessica McIntyre, our coordinator for mental health student services. They will be sharing with you a presentation that we have regarding Vape. As you know, we've instituted Vape, the Vape program in our secondary, but we also have implemented that program at the elementary level this year. So the team will give you an update not just on how we're doing at sec secondary level since it's been implemented but also how it's coming along uh at the elementary level in our fifth fourth and for fourth and fifth grade. So Mr. McAlliff go for it sir. >> All righty. Thank you ma'am. Thank you madam chair school board
137members Dr. Balgabin. As Dr. Babin stated yes this is a course with the elementary division that we've created to kind of mirror our vape program that we had 6 through 12. This is for grades four through five. And we're also going to cover something new that we started with our mental health students um which is called my words my power which is a K2 3 through5 educational initiative and we'll tell you the reasoning behind that uh where we where that came from. Uh this policy aligns with uh student code of conduct and discipline for policy 208E. We are going to provide conditions that enhance student learning. And all these courses that you guys are going to see today are self-guided uh Canvas courses that work at their own pace with the students. Um so why
138do why do we get this? We were seeing a a rising concern with elementary students being caught with vapes with fourth and fifth grade students primarily. Um it's a concern I think when you have one or two in that level of an age it's it's should be a concern. So we had to look at kind of our outcomes and things that we were doing and how can we change this the the outcome of it. And we looked at some of our processes. We were just suspending kids. We weren't trying to educate them. We weren't trying to do anything out of the norm to change that behavior because they're picking up this from either older siblings, brothers, family members, or things like that. So, we looked at our processes and we had to decide what we
139were going to do. So we mirrored the same approach that we took and you guys will see later with our vape course and it's for fourth and fifth grade students and it will pretty much go over that whole educating first holding the kids accountable and also bringing awareness to them of what actually is takes place and what's this can do to their um do to their body as well. So this is about personal responsibilities that these students choose. Jessica is going to talk to you guys about uh the K through2 3 through five my words my power which is all about school threats and when a student makes a threat towards school. I don't know if you remember last year we wanted to be very consistent across the board with all of the schools K
140through 12. If a student was making a threat on the playground at kindergarten or first that he was going to kill or shoot somebody, we would be putting that student up for DSPC which is our district placement uh committee and they would decide the outcome of it. So, we saw a huge amount of that and we know we saw a huge amount of uh students being put up for that at times. So, we knew this year we had to change something going into it. So, she's going to talk about the educational process of where we're at with that and why we developed this and where we're at here. So, it's a two-program approach. You guys will see. Vape is a Valuchia assistance and prevention education. It's for fifth and fourth and fifth graders. As I
141stated prior, um this is all about understanding the devices. And then the threat and wellness program is K through 2, 3 through 5. Um, and Jessica will get into that a little bit about students who have made threats or demonstrating concerning behaviors for safety. The vape program and overview, it's similar to the to the secondary level, but not extensive. Uh, this one's only six courses to where there's 11 with the 6 through 12. So, like I said, we wanted to still hold kids accountable, but also make sure that we're bringing awareness to them while we're educating them as first. So, students learn about the harm harmful ingredients of vapes. uh they develop health healthy coping strategies, commit commitment to vapefree choices, understand health, academic and social legal consequences, and then the school rules of course
142will follow with the law. This course is for any student, fourth or fifth, who gets caught with a vape. Um just so you guys are aware, we've had about 21 to date uh for this school year. So that just kind of shows you where we're at with that with fourth and fifth graders. So, we have 21 of those students that have been caught um with that and they are given the option to go into this vape program, which is uh they have nine weeks to complete it, but they don't need that long, but the parent has to provide permission. And if the parent does not give consent, then the student goes up to DSPC, which is our district placement committee and will normally be off-campus instruction or go to an alternative site for 45 days.
143And the reason why we do that piece is because, like we said, we're trying to educate and bring awareness to the student and the family um to change the outcomes of what we've been seeing. they have nine weeks to complete it. It's got to be an 80% or higher and any incomplete work may result in additional consequences if they choose not to do it within that time frame. So, here are the the components of what you guys will see the modules. The module one is um what's really is a vape and it goes into what they have to do with it. Like I said, it's not as extensive as the 6 through 12, but this is kind of just scratching the surface to bring that awareness piece with it. Module two is is vaping addictive
144and then module three is what vaping does to the body. You will see they have a reading, they have a video and then they have a mixed format of quizzes that they normally have to take and score an 80% or higher on those. It also continues with rules and consequences and smart choices and then concludes with final checks of doing a vapefree pledge that they will honor hopefully and not make the same choice again. So this gets us in now into our elementary wellness program. So, we took the same identical format that we were doing with Canvas courses with vape 6 through 12 and now four through five. And then what we wanted to do was we were actually tasked by uh the board to see if we could come up with something different instead
145of putting these kids up for expulsion. And Dr. Beat tasked us with that saying make it happen. So, we got to work this summer and this is what we were able to come up with. Yes. So, we were able to do this and it's it's a good thing. Jessica will get into the the nuts and bolts of everything about the threat and wellness program, but it's it's a good little thing of what we're seeing because yes, it's minor of what we would say growing up, but the day and age we live in now and the world we live in, things have changed. So, you know, this is where we're at and this is where our new approach with it. So, Jess, I'm going to turn it over to you. >> Okay. So, this elementary threat
146and wellness program is really embedded within the broader district efforts to support students and wellness. Um, so as Mr. Malliff said, "These goals are really to help students understand the words and the impact of their words and their actions. We want to teach strategies for making safe, responsible, positive choices. Um, taking those responsibilities for the decisions that they do make um developing that emotional regulation, expression skills, and overall working to foster that culture of kindness and respect. So very much again like the vape program, we have our participation criteria. So this is for firsttime offenses for those students who maybe have had possession of toy guns, knives at school, um making malicious threats of violence, um threats of harm to the school or the community. Um again, we must have that parental consent or they
147might be put up for the OI or um DSPC for alt ed. Um for this program, however, instead of nine weeks, it must be completed within two weeks. Um again requiring that passing grade of 80% or higher and that failure to complete. I can say that currently in K through 2, 24 students have been enrolled and 10 have completed that. And in grades three through five, 30 students have been enrolled with 16 having completed. What's interesting though is I will share that um second grade and fifth grade have been our highest um for the enrollment. And it's just interesting because it's such a key developmental time with social peers deciding kind of your own kind of ways of thinking that that development is so key in those two ages. So it is very interesting that
148those are our two highest points there. So to go over the basic curriculum guide um K through second goes through what is a threat um age appropriate explanation of what is a threat using simple language. Um why threats are harmful, why they make people feel bad. We have stories in there for the students to read and answer questions and some interactive activities. Um we want to talk about tattling versus telling. what's the difference? Um, teaching them how to report those concerns of behavior that we do need to look at. Um, the impact of bullying. This is definitely something also that we wanted to bring into this um, this education. Simple explanations, impacts, effects that it has. Um, helping them talk about their feelings, identifying their emotions and feelings. We have a couple activities for them
149to kind of gauge when I do get upset, perhaps on a thermometer. Where do I land? Why do I feel this way? Um, and then also choosing kindness. And with both of these, also with the three through five, we also have several safety pledges for them to do as well. Um, very similar third through fifth. What is a threat? Except here we're going into more detailed explanations of various types of threats. Um, why they again are harmful? Looking at the psychological, social impacts of that threatening behavior. Um, again, what do you do if you hear a threat? We always talk about Fortify Florida. see something, say something. Giving them um ideas of who is responsible, who can they go and talk to, who are those safe people on campus or at home. Um why it's
150important to express those feelings. Again, the intensity, the strength of different emotions, and why they might react the way they do. Again, choosing kindness, building that culture, and promises to make safe choices. So the implementation process again for VATEP and the um threat and wellness is really looking at that early identification. We want to be able to track student safety. We want to be able to analyze some of these trends. We want to be able to ensure transparency with our families by again having them be a part of that decision-making of do or do I not want my child to participate in this program, knowing what the other options are to be a part of that. And that's also empowering them to participate more with what we are doing at the schools. So traditional versus
151educational. Um so the traditional disciplinary actions are often removing students from schools from their learning environments sometimes failing to address the root causes of these behaviors. Um and that's not providing any of those supports. And again, it might stigmatize some of our students from coming forward and and maybe continuing some on some of these negative patterns that they're they're showing. So, we want to do a strategic shift in our district philosophy emphasizing the importance of those educational interventions. That's a broader strategy to support student wellness and hopefully reduce um or eliminate those repeat offenses. And I'm gonna do a little bit of a plug real quick that I added this. It's some dual enrollment numbers that just came out last week. So, I thought I'd share with you so I don't have to come back
152up here and do another uh workshop. So, we're adding it to the end of this. But, this is just an overall um enrollment status of where we're at with dual enrollment for all of our students uh that are currently dual enrolled uh 6 through 12 with it. And you can see that we're we're steadily increasing the fall of 2025 that we had uh 1729 students. Um and last year we had 1567 students. Um this is kind of just a breakdown of where students sit and how many students that we have um in these courses on our campuses. So every uh high school offers SLS 1122 which is the entry level um student success course for Daytona State. They have to take that course first. So you can see the numbers here that are broken down
153and where we sit kind of um as a whole from the district and you can see individual schools as well. There are some middle schools that have identified students who are over the age of 14 that have passed the per score that are also able to do this. Those students are doing those online at the middle school. Just so you guys are aware, our success rate of a C or better, they have to have that to earn the credit. Um, within our dual enrollment courses, you can see as a district overall, we're at a 94% of students that are enrolled into those courses, uh, SLS 1122 and 2301. They have a 94% with a C or higher, uh, pass rate, which is up for the last two years as well. And then just some vocational
154enrollment numbers that you can see. They're not huge, but they're moving in the right direction slowly but surely because it takes that identified student of who we want and what they are actually interested in going that trade route instead of the traditional uh college or service route. So, you can see where we're at. We're at 23 students that are actually vocationally enrolled with Daytona State currently, up 17 from last year, and then 16 in the 2023 year. And here's the number by students, just so you guys can see by school of where it's broken down as well. And then this is just some good news with our graduates that we we got from Daytona State. Just so you guys are aware, we had 131 students graduate with their AA degree last year, which is awesome.
155Uh two students associate of science. We had 11 with their vocational certificate, and we had no with a bachelor's degree, but we did have 144 total um receive their AA diploma prior to um graduation. and 109 of those students completed that with honors as well. So questions, >> thank you. I wanted to thank you guys and your team for putting together the vape course for elementary. I know it's sad that we have to go there, but I am glad that they have that because I feel like if we do reach those students at a younger age, we won't have to deal with this in high school and they'll be be better off for it. I also really really appreciate the my words my power because I know we all see the issues that happen and
156I feel like sometimes kids say things that maybe they've overheard on video games, movies, TV, maybe other older people and they don't really know what they're saying. They don't know the impact. So, thank you guys so much for doing that. Uh my questions are I'm guessing all of this has been distributed to all the elementary school counselors, principles, everyone's already seen this. >> Yeah, everyone's on board. Yep. >> Perfect. And so also is this for just the first time only and then afterwards it's traditional discipline? >> Yes, it would be. It would follow our discipline matrix. >> All right. Thank you. That's it. >> Yep. >> Anyone else? I want to thank you. Um it is sad that we've had to take a vaping program to elementary school. But you know, it started showing up
157two years ago that the vapes were there. But I do want to say I also thank you because I really think the whole part of my words is very important because I think sometimes the most complaints we get is like the bullying piece and and I also think they need to understand the difference between just they they disagree on something versus what bullying actually looks like. Um, so thank you today and I do like the update on the dual enrollment because both of my children did dual enrollment and it's a wonderful way to start off. >> Agreed. >> Thank you. No, I I like to mention because even though captain is now sitting with the team here, captain was actually invited last week to speak on uh regarding Valuchia County Schools to the lieutenant governor
158and uh did a phenomenal presentation. So I want to thank you T captain because you're part of student services. Uh to Mr. Califf and um Miss McIntyre. You know, for those of us who understand the back history here of Felucia County, the back history, present, where we are, and the vision for the future, I think it's an understatement to say of the incredible work that you and your team are spearheading in this division. You know, I I have to applaud our commissioner of education because he made a very v bold and valid statement. We are in public education and as adults, we know that our children are exposed on a daily basis to examples, good examples, and also to non-examples. That's how life is and that's how our community, you know, those are the realities.
159One of the things that we do know for sure that it's imperative for us in public education, those of us who are adults and especially especially in leadership positions where we have the opportunity to shape lives that we always become the role model for our students. And I have to applaud our commissioner of education because in a very recent meeting that we had with him, he made it very clear. He said his expectation is that everyone who serves in public education is a role model for children. So the work that we're doing, it's pretty incredible. But we have to live that work, us adults, all of us, every single day because children will always remember what they see even more so than what they're being told. So thank you. >> Yep. Thank you. >> All
160right. We are now moving on to item 5.01. 01 career and technical education update. Dr. Bakovin. >> Yes, madam chair. I'm very excited to call this team also um Dr. Drayton and Dr. Pierce. And I think Dr. Pierce, if you will come up. Um Dr. Tamira uh Baker Drayton is our executive director for secondary schools. Dr. Kristen Pierce is our coordinator for career and technical education. She's coming up with with some of her team members that she will introduce. Again, you're going to find that they're going to share with you a presentation of what's been happening and what is coming our way for our students here in Valuchia County. Again, this is another team that has been doing pretty pretty incredible and remarkable work, leading the work of CT in the in the in the
161state of Florida. So, thank you, Dr. Pierce. And >> thank you. >> Take it away. >> I have an AV specialist here. She's going to come up and be my clicker. Well, good afternoon, Chair Haynes, school board members, Dr. Baligan. I'm Kristen Pierce, the CTE coordinator, and I'm pleased today to do an update for career and technical education to share with you how we're growing, how we're innovating, and how we are incorporating our programs into the needs of the workforce. [cough] So, CTE supports our district strategic plan by expanding opportunities for high-skll highwage careers, enhancing learning environments, and building strong connections with community and industry partners. Our mission and vision really come down to this. Skills build futures. That's why we're here. every program, every partnership, every certification. It's about students walking across the graduation
162stage ready for both college and careers. CTE Growth is focused on giving more students more access to accelerated credits, industry credentials, and work-based learning opportunities like internships. You all have seen a rendition of this slide before. I update it yearly, but it really does give a well-rounded at a glance of of the numbers of the different programs um that that we offer. Through the partnerships, we're also making sure every student can graduate and can move into the next chapter with confidence. Our growth in programs and pathways and certifications isn't happening by a chance. It's very intentional. A recent report by Litecast confirms why this matters. Florida for the third year in a row is ranked number one in the nation for workforce talent and that really um I think our governor with our different workforce
163grants I think that really has transitioned to workforce education. This means that the programs we're building aren't just keeping pace we're aligning directly with what the data shows and where the talent is needed most. Our careermies represent a commitment from both schools and from our business partners. Are four-year programs of study that make learning meaningful by linking rigorous academics with hands-on career focused experiences and ensuring that they have work-based learning opportunities out in the community. These are Oops. It's okay. Every year for the last three years, we've added one academy at each school. We're actually up to 46. So that's impressive. Um, you know, we're working hard with our facilitators and school-based personnel to ensure that our evaluation systems represent um that rigor and that relevance. So let's talk about a little bit about strategic
164focus and what it is that career and technical education is doing and where we're going. We know that innovation is reshaping industry and the labor market and workforce education must evolve to meet and to anticipate those future job growth. Sustaining industry alignment is essential. Maintaining modern lab modern labs and equipment with a partnership with our facilities is important and adding certifications that reflect current certific. Additionally, other [clears throat] strategic focus areas, pathways, recruitment, training, and engagement are areas that we're focused on. We want to make sure that we're all about expanding access for our students. Innovation opens doors to new programs, but we also need to ensure that our students know what their choices are, that our teachers are supported, and that our partnerships are in place to ensure that students have those opportunities. These
165strategies make sure opportunities reach our students. I want to talk a little about program planning and implementation. Our goal is simple. We want to give students choices that matter by aligning programs to both student interest and also to local job growth. Looking at the occupational demand list locally, talking with our business partners to identify areas where they're trying to find employees and can't. We make sure that our pathways are relevant, forwardlooking, and grounded in opportunity. We're also focused on high-skll, high wage programs. Some of the new programs that are coming uh are your way um are artificial intelligence. We're looking to add those at Seabbze, New Simra, and Pine Ridge. Know that those are all in the works at this point. Definitely looking at aviation maintenance at Atlantic High School and working to add that
166based on our cap grant from last year, the $3 million we got for engineering and aerospace, cosmetology, potentially mainland and Deltona High School and plumbing. That University High School would be the last school that we want to add a trades program. Every other school has a trades program. We've added one every year, at least one for the last four, five years, actually. So some other thoughts are sometimes we also have to do career cluster realignment. So when you're looking at the workforce and uh looking what the job opportunities are out there, we may need to restructure some of the programs. Sunset programs offer new programs. We call that career cluster alignment. We're looking at additionally adding to our agriculture program. Uh a sales and services. Entrepreneurship is incredibly important in every single career area. entrepreneurial
167thinking um is is is definitely something that our employers are looking for with that innovation. We're looking at natural resources, incorporating some of that water reclamation and flood water type uh technologies that some of our cities are grappling with at this time. Um and also looking to add a nursing assisting program to the east side of the county. Talk a little bit about entrepreneurship and how we're advancing Entrepreneurship is definitely the engine of innovation and teaching resilience. It teaches resilience, adaptability, problem solving, and that every employer values and it's thriving locally. Do you know that we have over 12,000 small businesses in Valuchia County? Many of those are entrepreneurial uh businesses. So, we need to make sure that we are empowering our students to be builders of opportunity, not just seekers of opportunity. CTE continues
168to expand our entrepreneurial opportunities, as you can see on this slide, and connects classroom learning to real world business creation and community growth. We've added um expanded entrepreneurial curriculum to agriculture, business, building construction, early childhood education. All of those different programs offer students an opportunity to run or own their own businesses. So understanding those entrepreneurial concepts very important. Vince is our Vince Roshank is uh is the one who uh works with the entrepreneurial um speaker series at DSC and also runs our nifty pitch competition. So he's working hard to um to make sure that those programs are offered now at all high schools and also looking to bring that into our middle schools with that curriculum. Uh we also have to make sure that our industry certifications are aligned to our programs and to our
169local workforce. Certifications are proof of readiness and a key measure for college and career acceleration. So by embedding these uh industry certification test standards into our curriculum maps and pacing guides, we ensure that instruction is aligned with those workforce expectations. I can tell you that with over 200 CTE courses and 126 industry certifications, I feel like this is going to be something that we'll be working on indefinitely. We also have to look at um acquiring seed and sustainability funding. My team has worked really hard to ensure that we are writing for grants and we know that innovation does require investment. So through these grants, we're not only renovating facilities and building pre-apprenticeship pathways, we're launching some of those bold new programs and expanding the programs that give students a competitive edge. You can see over
170the last four years how we have built that seed and sustainability funding through workforce uh and pathways grant opportunities. This year we're looking at potentially bringing in $7 million that we put right back into the classrooms and into those programs and the students. Talk about innovation and action. So looking at the different funding opportunities and how we are spending the money, we really do look at the programs and make sure that they're aligned to the workforce. So you can see that our investment last, this is just last year. Um it's not random. We're definitely trying to align it to those high-skll high wage occupations in Valuchia County, aerospace trades, IT, um, archite um, I'm sorry, agriculture. So, by investing here, we're making sure students are prepared to step into the very jobs driving's economy. So,
171excitingly, I think Dr. B sent an email recently, but we did get awarded another cap grant this year. This one's for $2 million and it's to modernize all of our health science programs andmies. What we really want to do is make those look like mirror clinical labs. So, it's going to look like the, you know, a patient care room. Um, there are going to be nursing stations. So, we're really excited. We're working with vendors. We're working with our partner Advent Health to help um determine what those programs are going to look like and to develop those different floor plans. So, to be continued. That's going to be a three-year modernization. Again, looking at our facilities, we are so incredibly thankful for the VCS facilities department. Miss Patty Core, thank you so much to your team.
172Um, I can't tell you a time when that team has not been available to help CTE, whether it's an at the a farm or it's something happening in a construction lab. um they are always um available and ready and willing to help make sure that our labs are up to standard. So when you step into one of our CTE labs, it really doesn't feel like a classroom, hence the new welding lab that everybody got to see a few weeks ago at that grand opening. It feels like the workplace and that's what we want it to look like. We want it to look like and feel like and we want teachers to look and work with students in the way that this is an actually um a workplace program. So from flight simulators to welding stations
173to patient mannequins, students are practicing on the same tools that they're actually going to use within their different careers. I did a little checking on wages locally for some of those high-scale high wage occupations and areas that we're expanding that I just spoke about. And these wages show what our return on investment is for our different programs. So if you're looking at um the engineering and aerospace cluster which is represented on this slide, these are entrylevel positions that a student who comes out of our high schools completing one of our aerospace or engineering programs with an industry certification can step right into these occupations. So um um pretty impressive the salaries um that those students can earn right out of high school. take a look at one of the other areas that is growing in
174not only in Florida but nationally is those construction trades and manufacturing with the aging out of some of those workers. Um and it is the backbone of our economy as well. So we're continuing to grow those opportunities and again you can see in construction skilled trades in manufacturing the different occupations that students can walk right into after earning one of or more of our industry certifications. um even in entry- level roles, you can see that students can earn a sustainable wage right out of high school. Another area that is fast growing, healthcare and IT, two of our fastest growing in this area, but also nationally. Um salaries speak for themselves. The one that's pretty impressive is the one uh if you look down at it, there's one that they can make 65 to 86,000 a
175year right out of high school as a cyber security analyst. We're also adding cyber security security programs. By the way, we have two, but we're looking to expand those as well. So raising the awareness that CTE pathways can um uh really do provide students those opportunities right out of high school is is one of the other areas that we're working to make sure that students and parents in the community understand that that's what we're doing with our programs. Moving into career pathways then um the focus on pathways is on building those clear connections so students understand their options, see the road ahead and they recognize the opportunities that are available to them. We need to raise awareness of CTE pathways because it helps families see how early choices can connect to future opportunities. So we
176are uh aligning additional programs at middle school that will connect directly to our high school programs and of course we always look at those um seamless pathways from high school to post-secary if students choose to move in that direction. And we are our emphasis this year is on marketing and recruitment in the middle school and ensuring that students understand those opportunities and that they're able to move right into those areas. So currently we have 67 middle to high school career pathways that help students develop um their direction and explore and prepare for future careers. By introduc introducing CTE career exploration in middle school, we help students discover their interests earlier and make intentional choices. Um, but you need to know that we haven't stopped there. We're also looking at adding STEM programs at elementary school,
177our first one at Stark, and there are discussions to do additional site development to build that early curiosity and foundational skills um for innovation and moving into those programs at Middle and High School. So, we're excited about that. CT is excited to partner with um STEM um and the uh elementary team to help do that. Talking about expanding career pathways from high school to postsecary partnership with Daytona State College is super important to Valuchia County Schools. We have an amazing partnership um with that post-secary institution and helps provide those seamless pathways to uh post-secary education. And so we're trying to align our programs with the career certificate and technical programs at middle at I'm sorry at high school to postsecary where it helps students save time, reduce costs and they graduate with that competitive edge.
178So my team works tirelessly with with Daytona State College to add those opportunities to all of our articulation agreements yearly. We're also expanding career pathways in our aerospace and engineering area. So, Emory Riddle, another strong partner for Valuchia County Schools. Um, we do have multiple dual enrollment courses on the Atlantic High School's campus currently. And we are building Dand High School's aerospace program. We'll be offering those as well. Um, from pilot training to unmanned aircraft systems, um, these experiences really do set students apart in college and when they move into the workforce. I mentioned a minute ago a little bit about strengthening our marketing and recruitment. I've got one of my team members whose role this year is to work directly with our middle school counselors with our teachers um and bu is building a
179cadre of professionals to help us look at how we can make those connections more intentional getting into the middle schools lunch and learns working with Mr. Mil Holland and social studies team to get into UZello um and to provide them that information about the opportunities in CTE. We want our students to understand and our families to understand that full range of opportunities that that our students have um so that by the time students reach high school, they already know what their options are and they're ready to take advantage of those pathways that we've built. So you can see some of the things that we'll be doing here in middle school to help um to help make sure that we've got that emphasis. We're also of course look looking at digital media and looking at marketing
180and partnering with community information and developing videos. We know that stories inspire and we want to make sure that through our alumni spotlights, our studentled content and our new skills build futures um video campaign that we're showing how classroom skills translate into careers. I learned this skill in my course. Now, how does that translate to an occupation and then having a business partner share with us what that means when that that student will come actually become an employee there. So, I do think I've got a video. I think we got that squared away. Or do I have one more slide? N video. Okay. Yes. So this is the learn here, earn here video. Shows you what students engaged in hand hands-on internships because in Valuchia we want to grow our own. >> PK we have
181with the program through four to 5 year olds. It's mostly an interaction thing. [music] So, we get to know them one-on-one, know them in groups, in a bigger group. We read to them, have different activities every day, and just get to know them more. Teal Academy is uh provides an exceptional opportunity for our Teal seniors. They get to choose to spend their internship in our VPK program here at Atlantic High School or with South Daytona Elementary, one of our local elementary schools. Also, another benefit to the student internship [music] program here with Teal Academy is our district provides them letter of intents to hire. So, after graduation, [music] they can go and get their degree and come back and they have a guaranteed job here in Valuchia County. This has really given me the experience
182of how being a teacher would be, [music] especially for the younger ones, and how to deal with difficult and not so difficult situations. >> [music] >> Yes, we have our good days and our bad days, but we also know how to like turn them around and make them all good in the end. >> Like the classroom [music] experience was very helpful for me learning all the classroom management, teacher support, emotional student support, everything that goes [music] along with being a teacher. It helped me learn how to deal with situations hands-on versus ways that they say in the books. It shows you that there's a lot of experimenting into teaching and that you have to like experiment the little different methods between the students. [music] It's taught me a lot and definitely solidified my decision on
183wanting to be a teacher. Our student interns are fully immersed. I feel like there's nothing that can prepare them um for the real world classroom environment than just being right there in it. They're learning how to collaborate, teamwork, um all the great things that uh the internship provides. There was another video that I was going to show, but I can see that in the essence of time, we'll I'll move on and then I can show one other. I don't want to go over my time or do you want to see it? Okay, >> let's do it. >> Okay, so this one is a glow-up video and it features one of our This is a draft. I want you to know that this is raw video. Um, but I just wanted to share with you that
184we are looking for those graduates who went out into the field after they actually finished a CTE program. So, this is Ariana. Hi, my name is Ariana Towns and I studied uh at the prehealth academy at Pineriidge High School and I'm currently a PA student at Advent Health University. So, I'm currently a physician assistant student at Advent Health University and I am currently in my clinical rotations on the last month of my uh clinical year and I'm currently in thoracic [music] surgery which is what I would like to do in the future and I'm excited to go into the workforce and uh work as a physician assistant [music] in uh the central Florida area. So the CTE program at Pineriidge High School was prehealth and at the time um the biggest part of the pre-health
185academy that helped me moving forward into my career was the volunteerism that I performed at Advent [music] Health Fish Memorial Hospital in Deltona, Florida. I volunteered there and that really helped me figure out the [music] path that I would like to go down. I intro I was able to volunteer at nursing facilities as well as laboratory sciences [music] and I ultimately decided to um consider going the physician assistant route using the experience that I gathered from that CTE program and the volunteer. [music] So, regarding advice moving forward, anybody who is starting high school and considering uh joining a pre-health academy or a biomedical sciences academy, I definitely suggest it and continue moving forward with it because [music] it'll help you really navigate your um passions and decide if you really would like a career in
186healthcare. And for me, it really did. And it helps you >> [music] >> um gives you the opportunity to volunteer, to learn anatomy and physiology and [music] to really um explore those paths. And for me especially, the CNA program offered through Pineriidge High School helped me gain hours that were helpful to applying to the physician assistant program. Just want to remind this is not has not been refined. This is raw video. So, we're going to go back and rework it. But I wanted you guys to see that we are working on that glow up and finding those students that we can share with other students how it gives them that advantage when they finish that CTE program and earn the industry certification. So share a little bit more about some of the other uh areas
187of growth and some of our focuses this year. We are really looking on new at new teacher support. Um and I think that we Miss Workman mentioned uh CTE teachers and how they they are a unicorn out there. sometimes it's difficult to find that technical skill. So, we want to make sure that we keep them and ret retain them. Um, and I did look at three years worth of data and we went from a 54% retention rate for new teachers to last year up to 88%. So, we are looking this year to improve that. Um, we want to keep all of our teachers. So, looking at new teacher action plans, our facilitators work specifically with our specialists and our teachers. um getting a ready set teach new training series for them to understand what is
188CTE um what is an industry certification how do you use it in your classroom because remember a lot of those are second career educators they came from the workforce and they are indist certified based on their technical skill also looking to elevate community engagement this one is exciting um my department has really been invested in this the last couple of years but um last couple of months But um Dr. Baligan had launched this last year um leading us to really take charge of that community engagement component. Make sure that we're not just going to events but we are collaborating with business partners. We're bringing back information. We're seeing how those partners can connect in our schools. Um and then we're looking at that data and and making datadriven decisions about where it is we need
189to go, what other events we need to to go to. So our goal really is to create those lasting partnerships that support student success and to make sure that our communities are involved in our schools and the only way for us to do that is to get out there and share share that word. So our action steps were to build a an event master list which uh many of the schoolboard members have seen and developing a unified calendar. We meet weekly to review that calendar and determine what are our actions this week and then creating an accountability accountability log. Anytime anyone goes to an event, uh they come back and actually add content to that log which we review. Um and then again the weekly meetings and providing summaries monthly for um the superintendent and
190senior staff so they can see what it is we're doing out there in the community. So we are really involved in that. The other piece of that is is the business partners did weigh in like what what is it that we want to share about Valuchia County schools in the community and who better to ask that question to than our business partners. So out of those different interviews that we had with business partners, three speaking goals came out of that and that is connect students with community but also connect the community with the schools so that it is a two-way street. it's not just a one-way street that we need to help the community see that we also need them in our schools. We also need those work-based experiences and then to share the many
191roads of student success. And that means that there isn't just one way to graduate from high school. There are multiple programs. There are many different opportunities depending on what your passions and your interests are and and the assistance that you need. So sharing that we have a plethora of opportunities in VCS for students to get across that stage and then of course celebrating our A rating and I was interesting that the business community realizes that they're a part of that A grade. So sharing the message that this is not just our A. It's a community A. It's an A from parents. It's an A for our students. It's an A from our teachers. like we all worked together to ensure that we were moving in that direction um to become that that A-rated district. So
192I just wanted to share with you and I was supposed to present last month. So this is August data and since then I do have updated data but in the two weeks that we actually launched this engagement program we went two weeks to 18 total events and those are spanning all schoolboard districts. So we've got the events organized by schoolboard district. 10 chamber events, seven business and industry associations. Then we identify the different engagement types. Was it a meeting? Was it a presentation? Many times the superintendent is with us and is presenting in the community or afterhour special events. Um we got three new business partners and we identified multiple work-based opportunities for our students. What you don't see here is a September summary, but I will tell you that my team went to 37
193different events in September. We got 15 new business partners. Our goal was five a month. 15. Um, and then the work-based learning opportunities, we had over 25 different work-based learning opportunities. But now what I'm hearing when I'm out there is, "Oh yeah, we saw you guys yesterday at this event. Oh, we loved your presentation. That's amazing. Wow, you're doing such great things. So, I can see the value in this already that we're really getting the word out and our business community is seeing um what we do and how we do it. So, we're excited to continue to move forward with that and see what our our September our October results look like. And we're also, of course, looking at our strategic partnerships always. Um we're looking to partner with Space Florida Consortium as one of
194our newest strategic partners. We're looking at JetBlue, the state attorney's office. We're working with student services and the state attorney's office to develop some new curriculum and have uh those folks as a strategic partner. Duke Energy Construction. So, um Denise Roberto is another one who was always out there looking for our strategic partners. Universal Studios, we're very close to finalizing a strategic partnership with them as well. So, you can see our goal is to connect three new business partners per month, but we have absolutely blown that one away. So, I think we're going to have to change that goal. um and then securing those different student opportunities and then submitting to the superintendent. So, we're very excited to continue to share with you those updates on our strategic partnerships and opportunities. Um and and really
195the other most exciting piece of this is we just were asked to be a part of a NASA state hub which is a spin-off of the space Florida consortium. We were asked to write a letter um a letter to them saying that we would be involved. So it is going to serve as a key partner for helping NASA connect with our students in specific programs, cyber security, aerospace, engineering, IT even um and offering then work-based learning experiences um to our students. So it really is a talent pipeline. And our first event with the NASA orbit hub is um November 12th. I've got a representative from our department who will be going down there um to to hear more about what how that's going to unfold. So, I'm excited to share more of that with you
196as that gets rolling as well. Again, building partnerships. So, we do have toolkits and information that we share. It is a a toolkit that is uh if we're we're adding we're one brochure here, we're doing the same brochure somewhere else. We're trying to make sure that our message is intentional, but it's also consistent and that we're sharing the same information um out in the community. Tiffany McCann is our community engagement specialist who works with developing those work-based learning opportunities. So looking at field studies, guest speaking, internships, mentors, and volunteers. So ensuring that we continue to grow that. We're trying to make it easier for our partners to connect. We've got scanning codes now, the QR codes that they can connect and connect directly with us and they will get a phone call or a teams
197or meeting with with our staff within 24 hours. All right, we've also got some exciting events coming. Some of you were at the welding ribbon cutting a few weeks ago. Our next one is our level up, which was the soft skills summit. That's November 4th, sponsored by the Daytona Beach Chamber. I think we've got over 140 144 students who will be attending that summit if you're available to come check that out. And then we've got some other activities that will be happening throughout the year. Just wanted to make sure you have those dates. I know that we have shared those um with with uh I think the soup the secretary who does your calendar. >> We got them on our calendar. >> Thank you. >> Um and then we have a new initiative which is
198really exciting which is looking at the um VCS leadership. So taking um uh a page out of some of the chambers and bringing our business community in to us and having share with them the behind the scenes. How are our schools and departments really work? It's been very successful the first two. U we got lots of rave reviews and we're looking forward to our next one in November with student services. We know that mentor coordinating and mentor coordinating and mentor retention is very important. So, um, last year we noticed that we didn't have the mentor retention that we had in previous years. So, we're really looking at strategically realigning with what is it that we need to make sure our mentors are engaged and to make sure that our mentors um stay connected with the
199schools. So, holding an annual training, making sure that there's a um an online ability for the for those mentors to to um train to be able to go into the schools, help our schools understand what their role is, and making sure that they make those mentors feel welcome, showing appreciation, involving them. Uh so, we're going to be working really closely with those schools and those mentor um those mentor PE folks who run the mentor program on the campuses to do that. Um also I want to share that you know I know that one of the superintendent's pillars is the reading initiative and reading is competency is the foundation for learning and CTE does strengthen that in many ways that go overlooked. We actually had a study conducted here in Valuch County several years ago that
200was published in the Journal of Career and Technical Education Research that found when literacy strategies were embedded into integrated CTE courses, students made statistically significant gains in reading compared to peers who were in the non-integrated um courses. Um, and that's because CTE literacy comes alive in authentic ways. What are the students doing? They're analyzing medical charts. they're reading and interpreting blueprints and they're working through technical manuals. So, it really helps them stay connected and passionate about reading um and and it's a way for us that we can reinforcement reinforce those strategies. So, CTE is excited to be able to partner with the reading initiative to do that. Our our industry partners are also a big component of that. They're helping to make reading exciting and rewarding and are going to be working with us to
201motivate students to read through some um literacy rewards and different activities, books, small engagement rewards, bundles, field trips, and enrichment experiences. So um again, Denise is working hard to get those business partners connected with us. So I appreciate your time today. I believe that our ideas spark change, but it's really the people who carry that torch and our CTE team in Valuchia County I I think is number one in the state. We have some amazing talented folks um who come from all different walks of life. And I would like to just introduce them to you quickly so that you can see the people behind all all of this great work. Cecille Carile, you guys stand up, don't be shy, is our health science, culinary, education, training, and criminal justice specialist. Christy Gresowskis, Mrs. G, because
202her name is hard to pronounce, is our industry certification specialist. She works with all the program areas. Tiffany McCann, she's our community engagement specialist and she works with the work-based learning opportunities and connects those business partners um to students and vice versa. Um, Nora Patty, she's our A arts AV and JOTC specialist. Lisa Taylor, engineering, aerospace, and all of our trades programs. Denise Rivero doesn't really need any any of this, but she's a strategic and business partnerships, mentors, volunteers, and events. We all know Denise. We see her everywhere. And then, of course, Vince Roshink, our resident DJ and IT marketing and finance specialist. >> [laughter] >> Um, so today we've highlighted growth and where we're moving and innovation and how CTE is connecting to the community, but at the heart of our message again is
203that every success story is that skills build futures. And with looking at marketing and and recruitment at middle and elementary school, we do have a brand new team member that we would like to introduce you to. This is our inaugural team member. This is, drum roll please. This is Casey the Career Cat, newest member of career and technical education. >> Come on in. >> Casey is going to be attending events at middle school in the community, sharing all sorts of amazing opportunities in career and technical education. >> That is awesome. and Casey is delivering to each of you a 2526 CTE Skills Builds Futures t-shirt and a toolkit as a symbol of our appreciation for your commitment um to career and technical education. So, yay Kazy. [applause] So, every one of our teachers got a
204skills builds future toolkit and we want to make sure that you have one as well. So again, any questions? Um, I've got the team here to answer those for you >> or we're going to roll right out of here. >> We're going to start with Mr. Cologne. >> Wow. Wow. Wow. >> First of all, I want to apologize to DJ Vince here because I should have had the music cued for you. [laughter] I let you down, brother. And so, please forgive me. But that won't happen again. I promise. Uh, your presentation was amazing. More importantly, the work that uh you all are doing here in our county is amazing. CTE is a is an essential part of our success uh and for for lots of reasons, but more importantly for students like the young lady
205who you saw up there whose proud mom is sitting right there. Uh >> Ariana's um mom is Cecile. >> Correct. However, Cecil, can you tell us what your other daughter is doing? She teaches elementary CTE program. >> Perfect. And so I mean that that is why one of the reasons why we're all here I think. And so you know it's it's not an you know anecdotal. It's it's living proof. If you saw the one daughter, the second daughter and like that we have thousands of students across the many years that we've been here who have benefited from our programs. But the level in which this is going is next level. And I appreciate you and your team because I I do truly believe we are leading uh despite you know one of the challenges we
206have is that we don't have a vocational hub or place and Jamie I see you looking at me. Uh however despite that challenge what we are doing in meeting where students where they are is amazing and so thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. And you could have all night long to keep presenting because what you presented was just wow. And so that's all I have. Thank you. >> Thank you, Mrs. Brosmer. >> I second that. I loved all of this, every detail, and in particular how comprehensive your approach is to all of the opportunities that the students have. I will say as a point of personal privilege that you know I've already talked about agriculture and and my and my love for that but in addition to the many years where I worked
207with natural resources that included nine years as a water lobbyist. So the fact that you added water, wastewater, storm water to to this extremely long and comprehensive list really jumped out at me because we were talking earlier about succession planning and that's an area where there is a lot of retirement and the technologies have changed and younger people are needed to come into that um that whole profession. session. So, I was especially delighted that you've added that. I just want to commend you. This this was outstanding and thank you for everything you're doing. >> Appreciate your support. >> All right. And I'd like to close. Um, thank you for everything and I love attending all of the events and I um have gotten pulled into quite a few of them and it is so nice
208to be out there and hear the stories from the public who their children are um, you know, in programs or them learning about the programs that we have. I would, you probably knew I was going to ask this, but on slide 22, and it's just something you can email me, that is the middle school to high school career pathways. Yes, you list the number of schools, but you don't list which schools they are. So, is there any way because you don't have enough space? >> I can. So, I have a whole presentation where you'll have the middle school to high school connection and I will send that to you. >> Okay. I would love to see that. And then do we have any programs ormies right now where we are missing a teacher or are
209we fully staffed with our programs andmies? Do you know? We as of Monday we were fully staffed. We have two JOTC positions that are open, but you know those those folks have to actually >> Oh yes, that's right. We had a DVT at ZB High School just two days ago. >> Okay. And >> other than that, we feel good. We started the year like almost fully staffed and we've maintained that, >> right? Because it's hard because you have people that specialize in this. And so my third question, and it doesn't have to be answered here, but in the event that we do have, you know, because they are specialized in we have someone that is specialized in an area and they have to go out for an extended period of time, have we figured out
210a plan for that? Um because I think we have a situation like that out there right now at one of the schools and I'm happy to talk to you about it. >> Okay. >> But I just want to know, you know, what do we do in cases like that? because it's it's a little different when you need somebody to just come in and sub and you can find somebody that you know has the credentials to be able to sub in an elementary classroom and thing, but what you guys do is so specialized. It's not necessarily where people can walk into >> and it does make it difficult because think about, you know, if it's culinary, we're we're talking knives and so we don't want someone in there if it's not going to be safe. So
211typically what we do if it's a highly technical area is provide our CTE facilitators that's their role on the campus is to make sure that they continue with those lesson plans um make sure that there are activities for the students that align to the curriculum but there are opport there are occasions where we we just can't have them you know with saws and things if the teacher is out of the classroom. So we try to make sure that we balance maintaining the curriculum and keeping the students learning with safety. Um and our specialists and the facilitators work directly with those schools to ensure that that continues. >> Thank you. And so if there's no further questions, then it is 4:16. This meeting is adjourned, but we have to be back in here at 4:30. >>
212Thank you all so much for your support. We appreciate you.