Volusia County School Board Meeting 01⧸23⧸2024

001e just good afternoon and welcome to the valuch County school board meeting today is Tuesday January the 23rd 2024 and the time is 4:32 p.m. in just a moment I'm going to ask you to join me by standing for the Pledge of Allegiance and national anthem our Pledge of Allegiance today will be presented by Coronado Beach Elementary our national anthem will be by new samna Beach Middle following the pledge and the national anthem we will have a moment of silence and reflection please join me at this time hello I'm Carlos Scott proud principal of corado Beach Elementary and I have with me today our awesome kindergarten class and their teachers Miss wasam and Miss Bartley we are here to present the pledge of allegiance to the FL of the United States of [Music] America One

002Nation God indivisible withy justice for all oh say can you see by the what sooud we at this Twilight ging who stripes and St [Music] the the so G streaming [Music] Rock flag was still there oh s do [Music] the of the free and the home of [Music] the thank you you may be seated at this time I wish to welcome all of you that are here or listening from home and I'd like to go ahead and introduce everyone that's here with me on my far left I have Mr Carl persus representing District 4 next to Mr purses is Mrs Jesse Thompson representing District 3 then we have our school board attorney Mr Aaron wolf over on my far right we have Miss sest Gilmore our agency clerk who keeps all of us straight and

003everything flowing then on the telephone we have Mr Ruben cologne representing District 5 then we have Mrs Anita Bernett greetings yes greetings there's a little bit of DeLay So we apologize um then we have Mrs Anita Bernett representing District 2 and she is also our vice chair for this year then to my immediate right we have our superintendent Dr Carmen Balaban and I am Jamie Haynes representing district one and the chair for this year items for approval on this agenda are items 1.03 2.02 4.01 7.02 and 16.01 during public participation times for it items that we will have public participation for any items on the consent agenda if you wish to speak about any items that are on the consent agenda you can go over here on my far right if the ladies will raise

004their hand and you can fill out a green card to speak prior prior to us voting on any consent agenda items then at 6: PM we will have items for general interest pertaining to public education in valua County a total of up to 15 minutes will be provided at that that time time will be provided for also public comment on any action item before a board vote is called on that item we have one action item this evening which is item 16.01 time will also be provided at the end of the meeting for public comment for items of general interest pertaining to public education in Valia County before items from the board superintendent or attorney are up for discussion announcement or approval each speaker no matter which time it is you will have a total

005of three minutes to speak there's time clock so that you can see the time we ask that you please respect the time clock during public participation no signs placards or other visual forms of communication are authorized except as part of an individual speaker's presentation speakers shall not engage in personal attacks abusive language or other conduct which interferes with the meeting I as the chair have the right right to terminate any speaker's privilege to address the board if these rules are violated members of the audience please you should be courteous to all speakers and shall refrain from making audible comments or applauding during the meeting you're more than welcome if you're agreeing with somebody or disagreeing to do a thumbs up or thumbs down or jazz hands but no clapping now with that being said we

006always at the beginning of our meeting once we have vote on the agenda we do recognitions during recognitions we are here to celebrate we are here to celebrate our students our staff sometimes community members that play an important role in public education and have worked hard to accomplish something during those recognition times you're more than welcome to clap and cheer on the people that we are recognizing our dist we're now on item 1.02 our district vision statement and board member comments our district vision is to create lifelong Learners prepared for an everchanging Global Society at this time I invite board members to share Mrs Bernette you may go first thank you good afternoon everybody I just want to um say thank you to the Futures team for a very well put together teacher of the

007year event the other night they looked for some guidance and um had had mentors to get there so thank you thank you Miss Thompson good afternoon I'd like to wish everyone a Happy national school choice week and in honor of that I would like to thank everyone who put together the Eastside fuchia County Schools school choice fair that was last night it was a great turnout I know my kids had a ball all the different booths were amazing and it was just so nice to see all the teachers come out because they did have teacher the year the night before so they've really had quite the week so thank you to everyone who did that and also want to give a huge shout out I know that we've been reading to schools this week because

008it's literacy week and I promised the kids at Chisum that I would give them a shout out today because those fourth and fifth graders had had some great questions they were a great audience so thank you for everyone who's participating all of our community members I know we had uh firefighters police officers uh the mayor of New samna was out today as well so thank you everyone who's participating this week thank you Miss Thompson Mr persus thank you madam chair yeah I'm going to piggy back on the teacher of the year thing as as as well congratulations to fuchia County teacher of the year Emily fagerstrom she is from Champion Elementary School math math coach now and I also want to thank Daytona mitubishi who provides a uh a car for a year for the

009teacher of the year and Daytona MIT she's been doing this now for 15 years so uh a big big shout out to Daytona mitubishi U again to Futures on a job well well well done I also think uh the Hilton ought to get a little bit of credit it's not easy serving dinner for 900 plus people all at the same time so uh I thought I thought the the staff did a phenomenal job and I also want to mention the the other finalists too uh Amy Dempsey English teacher at Delan High School Karen King a English language arts teacher at Orman Beach Middle School Tanner norell a teacher uh at cabb high school and last but not least Gina Marie Walker a multi multivaried exceptionalities teacher at George Marx Elementary School super teachers and a

010great night thank you madam chair thank you Mr persus I want to just take a moment to also add um along with this being literacy week and we're out reading um I think we've wrapped up all the spelling bees since the last meeting um because I know several of us did a few more spelling bees out there and you know when you watch fourth and fifth graders get on stage and they have studied so hard um you well what I can honestly tell maybe it's because I was a teacher for so years I can tell who studied and who didn't like almost immediately but I want to give a shout out to all of them because that's a hard thing to get up in front of other adults and your parents and your peers and

011you know have just a word thrown at you and be able to spell it because you what I feel bad for every year is those that it's like they knew it and they say a letter and then they realize I just said the wrong letter but it's ner you know there's nerves involved in that but I also want to say that um the all four of us here um we went to Tallahassee last week on behalf of our students here in fuchia county and I know last year we talked a little bit about this and I'm bringing it up now because it's a it's an issue again this year last year the legislators looked at taking away some of our options for children to earn their high school diploma and making it more difficult and

012the main option is they have to pass that Algebra 1 EOC in order to earn that high school diploma or an equivalent test so last year they tried to remove the per test for those of you that don't know what the per test is the per test is given by the colleges in order for our kids to go ahead and start dual enrollment and my thought is well if it's good enough for the college to administer the math per test to them and they get a score to go into the college classes why shouldn't it account also for their high school diploma and there's a concordance score for the ACT and sat well they're back at it again this year I'm being honest with you last year they listened because we had a lot of

013parents and students and we as board members and the superintendent we went after please don't make change this and this is what I said to a lot of them while we were up there um is none of you had to pass an algebra one exam to get a high school diploma and sometimes we lose some of our students they switch over to a private school because the private school they don't have to pass an algebra one exam to get um a high school diploma and we shouldn't be putting barriers in front of kids I'm all for accountability I was an algebra 1 teacher all right but a single test should not keep a child from walking across the stage last year when we were able to change it we basically saved almost 500 students that

014would have walked across that stage because of one test that would have kept them from earning a high school diploma and that can keep them out of going into the military and career career fields and onto college or university well the Senate is more on our side of listening and understanding that just keeping you keep raising the bar you're not even comparing you know the kids five years ago didn't have to do that so why do they they have to now the house though not so much they wanted to say the P's too easy I will tell you I've watch kids take the per to get into dual enrollment and not pass it the first few times so I don't find it to be too easy and unfortunately on a rare occasion and this is

015what I said to them Daytona State graduates before we do and it's really sad if you have a student that did dual enrollment and they earn an AA or an as degree and they walk across that stage for Daytona State and they earn that and then a week later we hold our high school graduations and they don't get a diploma because one test stands in their way so if you are a senior out there you're the parents grandparents guardians of a senior and your student still has not passed that test I'd encourage you to write a positive professional email to your local Representatives telling them how many times your child's taken the test and ask them not to make it harder and close it down to where they can't earn their high school diploma and

016I feel strongly about that and I hope that each and every one of you do too but I wanted you to share we talked about a lot of topics while we were up there but to me a student should not spend 13 Years Learning and preparing Ing and then not have the opportunity to walk away with that high school diploma when they've worked hard because one test stands in their way so at this time we will move on to item 1 Point 03 approval of the minutes board members you've all had a chance to read the minutes from the last um Schoolboard meeting and Schoolboard Workshop which was held on January the 9th of 2024 do I have a motion to approve the minutes as presented I move I move to approve the minutes from

017last week's uh last school board meetings workshop and agenda thank you Mr persus do I have a second I'll second thank you Mrs Bernett any further discussion on the minutes then I'll call for the vote all those in favor of approving the minutes from the January 9th 2024 workshop and regular session please say I I Mr clone can you hear us yes I can hear you do you wish to vote on the approval of the minutes I'm sorry I couldn't hear that do you vote on the approval of the minutes uh yay okay thank you then it passes unanimously we are now moving on to item 2.01 agenda changes Dr Balaban are there any agenda changes before the agenda is presented to the board for approval Madam Madam chair I have no changes at this

018time okay board members you've had an opportunity to review the agenda agenda do I have a motion to approve the agenda as it's presented I motion to approve the agenda as written thank you Mrs Thompson do I have a second second thank you Mr persus any discussion okay then I'm going to call for the vote for the approval of the agenda all those in favor please say I I I I thank you it passes unanimously we are now moving on to item 3.01 announcements by fire our superintendent Dr Carmen balaman Dr balaman thank you madam chair board members members of the audience good afternoon to each and every one of you those of you listening at home thank you for tuning in um I do have a few reminders as it pertains to the month

019of January as we are celebrating you talked about this um uh board member uh Thompson you were there at the fair and many of you were attended last night we had over 1,000 fames that attended the fair and we had we received last night over a 100 priority placements forms completed on the spot um so I want to thank all of our families for attending the fair you really get a true sampling of our schools and what it's all about to all of our principles and their leadership teams teachers that were there thank you for being there um also our te our students from tomorrow's leaders they were there they volunteered they served their their time they assisting families and our staff so thank you for being there the wests side Choice Fair will be

020January 29th and that also will be from 5:30 to 7 at the center for Deltona so I hope to see all of the families on the west side on January the 29th you also talked about um literacy week we know how important it is reading reading reading right in every subject matter that we have reading is important and reading to understand and Implement H accordingly so I will tell you that this this year the theme is believe in your shelf which is very creative um we want to thank all of our teachers and all of our parents thank you so very much for inspiring our younger readers to make Reading part of their daily daily routine next week we celebrate Florida school crossing guards day um that will be February the 2nd and these ladies

021and gentlemen are out there every single day rain or shine and they are ensuring that our students are getting to and from school safely every day as we've always said that one of our number one priorities is the Safety and Security of all students and staff so I want to thank you for all of you your unsung heroes being out there every single day we know how the Florida weather is it's very predictable but they're there they are there um also National School counseling week that's coming up from February the 5th through the 9th and this is a time that in which we take the opportunity to honor all of our amazing counselors who help our students navigate through their school College and Career Readiness and so so much more thank you for being there

022thank you for um listening to our students to providing the advice that they needed the redirection that's needed thank you to our wonderful counselors they are in part hearts of our school and teacher of the year I see Futures Foundation is here I want to thank Futures Foundation because they really planned a beautiful event with our district folks and all of our administrators were there with their teachers just celebrating them as I was sitting in the audience I'm like you know what this is really what it's all about right celebrating the wonderful work that's taking place day in and day out which is to enrich the lives of our students so thank you to all of for being there and congratulations to all 70 nominees because really any of those 70 would have represented us

023well but I will tell you that Emily is going to do a great job from Champion Elementary who was named the 2025 teacher of the year and we do have a very short video for you so that captures the the event for those of you that may have not been here [Music] there [Music] [Applause] she'll come in the room sometimes and she'll like she'll like give us like motivation and she'll say like you got this you can get through it you guys are on it but we just need to work on those level three four and five questions right she just gives everything to the profession she puts her all in I think it's her Hobby at this point because even when she's at home she's thinking about ways to change things at school she's

024just a solution maker she teaches me like a way to do division I can use it in my regular class to make division easier the biggest thing that matters the most to me is supporting my teachers and supporting my students I work with my teachers we look at our data we model together um but really what it is is it's all for our students you're the best teacher could ever have the best math teacher probably in like the whole wide world you're just so kind and amazing and I can't even say any more words to like describe how like kind you [Music] are so once again congratulations Emily I know that she's going to represent valua County with a lot of pride Grace and respect um I do have some graduation highlights and I always

025say that when it comes to graduation it's not just the job of of high school or a particular grade level really it's the job of every single one of of our staff members and students and families all of us coming together and understanding the importance so I will share with you that overall a couple highlights that I'd like to point out here um yesterday while we were at the Choice Fair 15 minutes into the choice Fair we heard that Doe had released an announcement um but not all of the the attachments were there so we had to manually look and and find these you know the information that we needed but long story short it was a lot to it's a lot to celebrate and I and again I want to thank everyone from prek

026on all the way I want to thank our fabulous teachers our our our leadership team at the school level our district Team all of our parents for choosing valua County public schools for your students and most importantly to our students for doing your part and recognizing that that allowing yourself with the opportunity to receive a quality education and promoting your skill set it's the best gift that you could give to yourself so with that said we have experienced here in vucha County a graduation increase of 2.7% where we went from from 2022 2023 and [Music] 88.9 sorry 2122 88.9 to now in 22 23 and 91.6 we know that this is lagging data so it's a 2.7% increase we also ranked 10 the top 10 we're in the top 10 out of the 67 districts

027in the State of Florida that's the give you a little bit of perspectives in the central Florida Coalition ouria county is part of the Central Florida Coalition of 11 districts and we had the highest increase rate in the central Florida Coalition and the second highest percentage overall [Applause] awesome all 10 of our high schools increase their graduation rates so I'm going to share some more Delona high school they had the highest graduation rate of a 99.7% which is also the highest graduation rate among all Title One schools in the state of [Applause] Florida Pidge high school they experienced the largest one-year increase in their graduation rates of 10 percentage points going from 83.4% to [Music] 93.4% so now I'll give you a quick breakdown of each School Atlantic High School they've they went from an

02889.3% to a 93.6% the land high school they went from a 92.8% to a 95% Deltona High School I've shared this before from a 96% to a 99.7% Mainland High School went from an 86.8% to a 91.5% new Suna Beach High went from a 93.8% to a 94.6% pine rage High 83.4 to won 93.4 cbze High School I see the the proud principal here in his team they went from a 91.6 to a 93.7 Spruce Greek high school they went from a 93.7% to a 98.6% Taylor Middle High they went from an 87.2 to an [Music] 89.7 University High School they went from a 91.7 to a 92.6 subgroup highlights the El English language Learners Essa subgroup uh graduation rate for Spruce Greek High School increased by 35% going from a 65% to 100% our

029black Essa subgroup graduation rate for new samna high remained a 100% for three consecutive years our atrisk Essa subgroup for Mainland High School increased by 20.8% going from a 70.1% to a 90.9% ESC exceptional student education highlights students with disability grad rate has increase every year for the past four years going from 78.4% in 201920 to a 91% for 2223 that's a 12.6% increase in four years but most importantly the gap between our grad graduation rate for General ed students and students with disability the Gap is only 0.6% that is fabulous I agree chair and those are my announcements but again I want to if I have staff members here in this audience which I do district and school based and students and parents and uh teachers all of you play an important role and

030we could not have achieved this without you doing your part each and every day thank you for putting our Valia County Public School students at the first and foremost on when it comes to AC academic excellence and we can see that the results shows that so thank you all for what you do thank you chair so Dr bman yes ma'am could we also just take a moment to highlight valua online learning yes had our very firsts first graduating class last year at an 89.9% yes ma'am 89.9% very first graduation class that has never happened before thank you chair for reminding me so now at this time we're moving on to item 4.01 administrative appointments and transfers Dr B yes Madam chair I do have uh two I believe this afternoon so I would like to

031ask drra W whiten bergger to join us you get to sit right over here miss wenberg to tell you a little bit about Miss Dedra she's obtained a bachelor's degree in Business from Daytona State College she has obtained her master's degree in business administ ation from Grand Canyon University her experience she's been with VCS since 2015 she started as a teacher at University High she served as budget analyst for federal compensatory education project manager for federal compensatory education with your approval here board this evening I would like to recommend D Dedra winberg as the federal programs and grants coordinator for um Federal compens atory education if you approve or effective date will be January 24 2024 January 24 202 first thing tomorrow morning right ear right yes all right board members you've heard the recommendation

032of the superintendent do I have a motion move approval thank you Mr perses do I have a second I'll second thank you Mrs Bernett any disc discussion I'd like to add I know what you're getting into I've been there and um I I don't think people understand how much work has to go on in federal programs and grants because anytime the federal government gives you even a penny there's lots of paperwork attached to that penny so um we appreciate the fact that you were willing to step up um for this position but hold on we've got to vote so I have Mr persus made the motion um Mrs berett made the second all those in favor please say I I I Mr cologne colog are you still with us it's okay is he on can

033you tell if he's on okay Mr cologne are you still with us I am do you approve I do thank you all right it's unanimous congratulations [Applause] Y no you no no no you get to say a few words well I you don't get off that paperwork Dr balabin Madam chair school board members I am deeply honored and humbled to be given this opportunity I am incredibly grateful for Valia County schools for entrusting me with this new opportunity and responsibility as a product of Valia County Schools it is a privilege to be recognized and given the chance to contribute further to the growth and success of the district and our students I am thankful for the unwavering support of my colleagues mentors and the entire Federal programs team thank you to Leticia Roman and Lindy

034gford for your guidance encouragement and collaboration it has been an invaluable in shaping my professional Journey thank you to my family for their unwavering encouragement and support you serve as my greatest cheerleaders and I am confident in the knowledge that you are always by my side I am excited about the challenges that lie ahead and the chance to make a meaningful contribution in my new role I promise to approach this new chapter with passion determination and a commitment to Excellence thank you thank you we're gonna make the next announcement so do not leave and then there will be photos Okay Dr B thank you Madame chair board uh this is our second and last appointment for the evening I would like to ask Miss Nicole oinn to join us I want to share with you

035a little bit about Nicole she's obtained her Bachelor's in exceptional student education from the University of Central Florida she has a master's degree in curriculum and instruction from the University of Phoenix she holds certification in the following areas educational leadership Elementary education reading English speakers of other languages exceptional student education experience she's been with valua County since 1998 and she started out as a teacher at Deltona Middle she taught at the following uh places Deltona Lakes Elementary DeBerry elementary ostein elementary Forest Lake Elementary and River Springs midle she's been around a little um she's also serve as a teacher and assignment for curriculum and instruction teacher and then an academic coach for DeBerry teacher and assignment University High teach assistant principal at Tomoka Elementary um assistant principal at at at Deltona Lakes Elementary and she

036worked as a virtual Ed uh Elementary principal at at Stride k12 and that is a Cyber Charter Academy and currently she's an academic coach at Pride so she left VCS for a little bit but quickly came back and I'm I'm glad she did um today I'm recommending Nicole Quinn as the assistant principal of Enterprise Elementary and if you approve again her start date let me say this slow would also be January 24 2024 very early in the morning board members you've heard the recommendation of the superintendent do I have a motion I will gladly make that motion he was listening you are listening all right thank you Mr cologne do I have a second I'll second thank you Mrs Bernett is there any discussion okay I have this to say when Mr West called me

037I was like she's back um because I had the opportunity to work with you at Deber Elementary years ago when we were both teachers and so when you laugh my heart you know like I understood why but my heart was like oh no we've lost her so I am so thrilled to know that you came back and um we're going to vote on this but I'm excited to be able to vote um for you to go back as an AP so board members you've we have a motion in a second so all those in favor please say I I I did he say I colone did you vote okay it's unanimous [Applause] congratulations you know the drill you have to say a few words and welcome back thank you I'm very excited to be back

038um Dr Bagan Madam chair in the board um my heart my passion is in fuchia County I've supported I've served fuchia County for many years and I am back and I plan to spend the rest of my career in fuchia county and serving um I am blessed to be encouraged by Miss R um she encouraged me to take the leadership role again I wanted to learn my path again in Valia County in four months into fuchia County I'm back in leadership so I'm excited to serve um I'm joining Libby Johnson and I know she is going to be a fabulous mentor and I hope to hone my leadership skills and serve fuchia County well awesome thank you all right at this time if you will come through and will we're going to get photos you

039and if you have any one here with you my husband all right are thank you so much you [Music] said go ahead fine nice good photograph I usually um she is you look good with with the suit too I think we're moving on to probably one of my favorite parts of every board meeting we are now at item 5.01 where we start to recognize all of the individuals that have done wonderful things from our students to staff to community members so Dr baman let's thank you madam chair thank you the a school of character as you know we were supposed to do this in December but unfortunately we couldn't um because of the weather inclination however I will share with you that for uh schools of character which is citizenship that we recognize it's an

040employee and a student that we will be recognizing here and it's so happens that both the the employee and the student they're both sand crabs [Music] [Applause] hey so the citizenship employee for December is Sandy Bailey Sandy is according to her team the perfect citizen who takes care of the sea bra SE seab Breeze staff sand crab staff Sandy leads the school's Perfect Fit closet that supports students who may need clothing like dresses or holiday attire for special occasions Sandy also makes students feel very special and included at all times Sandy thank you so very much for being a examplar when it comes to citizenship there was so much more that was written about you but um we want to say congratulations to you for being selected and thank you for serving in the numerous

041roles that you do but also for giving back to the students in the community thank you so [Applause] much and the wonderful student that was chosen is Luke clor Luke is also a sand crab and Luke always likes helping younger students like in the photo of him mentoring a student and I think we have a photo of him mentoring a student you're going to show that in a second he also demonstrates and I've seen Luke in in there he he serves more than just mentoring he's also office staff sometimes um but Luke is always he demonstrates outstanding qualities of character outstanding uh qualities when it comes to leadership and Community involvement through all of the involvement in which he is also part part of the mentoring program at Beachside Elementary and I will tell you

042Luke that is very impressive I was able to experience that firstand so she was just in awe about the work that you guys have been doing with the little ones at at Beachside so thank you um also the volunteer program and he reads to Pine Trail Elementary students so you extend yourself quite a bit I like that um he he also AIDS and and help all everyone that that needs assistance at the school he's willing always able to assist teachers students whoever is in need he's there Luke is there for whoever is in need that's what they said about you Luke is that true he's often seen also picking up trash on campus and at at McDonald's I know exactly which McDonald's you go to pick up the trash because you guys are always getting

043lunch and breakfast from from that m MD Donald's um he also helps his fellow student understand Concepts that are might be difficult for them to understand and he holds the door open for staff members and that's quite a gentleman trait right there um we would like to say congratulations to you for all that and much much more for the ethical behavior in academics Sports and also your commitment to school and Community you are a true example Luke and we would like to um celebrate him now we' like to celebrate both of [Applause] them all right so we're gonna have Sandy and Luke both of you come forward please yeah because the other one Grace has to come up along with anyone that's here with you I brought my you brought your PR [Music] the same

044together is just so [Laughter] t ran out of now we're on to item 5.02 the next recognition thank you madam chair um I would like to invite Dr Grace Camy our coordinator for war languages to come on up um and electives she's going to share with us a little bit about this this employee of ours and I will let her tell you what this employee one okay Miss Elizabeth Maldonado Martinez that's the one so good evening board Dr balabin thank you for uh having me and allowing me to speak very briefly um as as past president of the Florida World languages Association the benefit of a lot of work is that all of our teachers get to benefit and nine of our teachers got they they applied to present and they were selected and uh

045Miss Elizabeth Maldonado Martinez her session was so popular that people were pulling chairs in from the from other areas she had the highest ratings typically when we do a conference we always select the best of ffla um we have to do some juggling to decide well which would be the most deserving we have to balance the numbers with the ratings Miss maldonado's numbers were both off the charts um from 90 sessions from presenters from California to Rhode Island so it's it's not just a vucha county thing this was a state and outside of the state endeavor um and so miss maldonado's session was about engaging small group uh instruction through the world languages and so our scol which is the Southern Conference on language teaching we all love our acronyms and education um but scol

046conference uh the states range there are 14 States in our conference from Texas all the way up to West Virginia and our conference in March is going to be in Atlanta and so as as the winner as the best of ffla Miss um Martinez Maldonado is going to be representing the entire State of Florida at the conference in March so we just really want to appreciate her and celebrate her thank you for allowing me the opportunity to to bring her and celebrate with [Applause] you but this time you need to come forward and I think I saw Mrs Chen withth is she there next to you yes come on everybody come on up for for a photo please thank you so much foreign language [Music] Jamie thank you leam this CH over here on this

047sideo in the middle all the orange [Applause] together right thank now we're moving on to item 5.03 recognition of staff for great people great Deeds Dr balabin thank you Madame chair and again this was one that we were supposed to have done in December but we no earlier in January earlier in January we have one instructional staff and we have a non-instructional that we will will we are recognizing so miss Rachel Jeff she is a school counselor of Cypress Creek Elementary and she was nominated by her wonderful wonderful principal Christina Kenya and her team Miss Jeff they've shared organized a schoolwide gift card collection to support her entire School Community for Thanksgiving season for the Thanksgiving season those in need during the holiday were given gift cards to help cover for their Thanksgiving meal and

048any other ingredient that they needed Miss Jeff then created the caring OTS award which uh hangs on the door of the classrooms that rais the most money for the cause and she's been doing this for a number of years so we want to thank her and and congratulate her and recognize her and Elevate her and celebrate her this evening we also have a non-instructional staff and that is Mr Jose Maldonado so Mr Jose Maldonado he's the head custodian at Sunrise Elementary and he was nominated by his principal Tracy Buckner and her team this story was shared with me when I visited um sunrise few weeks back so this is what was shared apparently around 6:00 a.m. in the morning you know Mr Maldonado is at the school it's 6:00 a.m. in the morning and he's

049hearing a child crying at 6 a.m. so as he he explored a little bit further what he found is that there was a toddler running around in front of the main office 6: a.m. the toddler was still in pajamas and eagerly jumped into Mr maldonado's arms Mr Maldonado immediately contacted staff and got them there and the sheriff's department for assistance and as staff and law enforcement got involved and they walked the school neighborhood they were able to locate the boys home and return him safely so we're going to recognize Mr Maldonado you know Mr Mal that's a little scary it's 6:00 a.m. in the morning you're hearing a student at child cry right but he handled it with like a champion so thank you so much for the being part of our great people great

050Deeds recognition here and the team for nominating you we have a short video that we would like to show you and then we will call you up Jeffers is here because you were nominated for is it the great people great Deeds award this Thanksgiving you collected almost $3,000 in gift cards for for families yes that's some how did you do it cuz our families are awesome and they support any initiative that we have here how how long did it take you to like go about in the community and and get this all going um well this is an annual thing that we've kind of been doing since Co we used to do the baskets and now we do the gift cards um and so every year our families kind of know and they support us

051and join to support other styish Comm families in the community you're phenomenal and you probably don't even know it but you are and I thank you for everything so much for recognizing something that we just do naturally every single day um it is an honor and I appreciate the recognition thank you for dominating [Applause] um for the toddler that you had on campus and taking the time and the care and the love to pick him up and us find his parents um and everything that you always do for us at school so I don't know what I would do if I found a toddler at 6 o'clock in the morning I probably would would get so scared the bottom line is is that you were able to not only handle that situation the way that

052you did but return that child home safely and you know what those are all the things that those dotted lines you know on the dotted lines that that we we sign up for and we do when we assume these positions right regardless of what you're called or what your primary role [Music] [Applause] is so at this time we'll start with Miss Jeff and anyone that's here with you if you'll go ahead and come on up for a photo and then we'll move on to Mr Maldonado and everyone that's here with him we also have our uh business partner Sarah Bristo Bristo from leard photography that's here and she's actually sponsored this so I want to acknowledge you yes please come forward this is for host the second keep on the top right up yep yes

053it nice conratulations Mal all [Laughter] right that's awesome hello hello hi we are now moving on to item 5.04 recognition for our safety awareness contest Dr baban thank you madam chair um our safety award contest Embraces the importance as we all all know of safety Safety and Security so we have student winners who have made posters that portrays this this year's theme and that is safely rolling to my destination so tonight we have with us our vucha County Sheriff's Office Division Chief Tim Morgan Tim Morgan Chief Morgan please come on up with our very own Captain Smith director for Safety and Security they're going to be sharing with us a little bit regarding the contest and also announce the winners superintendent Madam chair school board members thank you for allowing us to have a few

054minutes this evening for this recognition the valua sheriff's Youth Foundation sponsored a contest that focuses on the safety of riders Walkers and bicyclers our Superstars tonight are the students who have captured our attention with their creativity and talent they will each be receiving cash Awards sponsored by the valua sheriff's Youth Foundation for their work of excellence in portraying this year's theme safely rolling to my destination here with us tonight is division Chief Morgan who will assist us with recognitions how's everybody doing tonight first of all I'd like to apologize with Sheriff he of course he had another commitment but I'm happy and proud to be here and as you know myself and the sheriff are both Avid bicycle Riders so we truly appreciate these uh posters that were produced for our safety out there in

055the roads um it's very important very important cause and um we have some great drawings great posters here so with that we go ahead and want to start all right kind of hard with my back towards the crowd to announce the winners but but in third place um from Orman Beach Elementary School Luca Massie she's our third place winner with the title of look both ways and she will receive and she here Luka [Laughter] M let's let Carl Carl Mr versus EXC crossw we're going to [Music] have you know what we can pull the three students up and take a picture with [Applause] them in second place from manity Cove Elementary rileigh Evans with the title of safety [Music] [Applause] awareness I wear my helmet you wear your helmet I my helmet too you call

056him all up one group [Applause] [Music] okay don't leave course out of Orman Beach Middle just a theme of the Orman or it's a good thing uh with the title of safety rules is Karina Kahana with first [Applause] place great [Applause] job but this time we'd like all three of them and whoever's here with them to to come forward because we also have a certificate for them wow really and no no you're in here too and Captain Smith needs to be in the photo that's good that's you're going to go right behind you're gonna scooch over a little there we go and then there we go that's [Applause] are you I would ask the sherff conratulations up come on come [Laughter] on [Music] are [Applause] awesome wow you get the check get the check Che

057celebrate the little ones for being here she said that she takes it all [Laughter] right all right we're ready to move on at this time um we're moving on to item 6.01 public participation concerning items on the consent agenda and so um items for the consent agenda start at item 7.01 and they go all the way through item 14.084 point0 7 so at this time Miss Elizabeth Albert will you please come forward to speak about item 14.07 okay all right thank you for letting us know that all right then board members you've had an opportunity to look over the consent agenda Dr balam Dr balabin are there any items that you want removed from the consent agenda Madam chair I have no items that I like removed all right board members are there any items

058that you would like to have removed from the consent agenda or you would like to have a question answered about no all right then we will move forward with um since there's no changes I need a motion to pass the consent agenda as it's presented do I have a motion move to approve the consent agenda as presented thank you Mrs brunett do I have a second I'll second that motion thank you Mrs Thompson any discussion okay hearing none is Mr colone with us Mr clone are you with us I am okay then we will move forward to vote on the consent agenda as it's presented all those in favor please say I I I I it passes unanimously Y at this time we're going to take a short break and then we will come back

059in to start a public input section for the public input section I have six cards I'm just telling all of you and so we will return here at 6: pm thank you e good evening welcome back it is 601 or or 602 p.m. at this time we're going to move into the general public participation peace I want to remind you to please be respectful and there is nothing to be held up when people are speaking and I'm going to go ahead and say this if you're still in the audience and during the recognition of our students and teachers you chose to hold up materials that distracted from those recognitions that was absolutely wrong and if during public speaking you choose to hold up items to distract from the public speaker I will stop and I

060will ask that you will leave this area our highlight of any meeting is the recognition of students and staff and community members that have done wonderful things and when they and their family and administrators come to recognize them I would hope as adults we could act appropriately so we're moving into public participation and we are going to honor who ever comes forward to speak so we have six cards normally we only allow five at this time but since I only have six we're going to hear all six speakers you'll have three minutes on the the timer I'm going to start with who the first person is I'm going to go ahead and announce who the second individual is so that you are ready to come forward when the first person finishes speaking we will start

061with Laurel Robinson followed by Elizabeth Albert welcome yes thank you uh my name is Laurel Robinson I live at 192 Royal Doom Circle in Norman Beach Madam chair board members and Madam superintendent the Valia County Citizens for truth and Justice and education an affiliate of the kids right to read Network which is a subset of the National Coalition against censorship and the central Floridians for social equality let our kids read Delan Quakers and Delan Pride were all here today to participate in the National silent reading protests taking place all over the country as well as here in Florida ours is a quiet demonstration and the point of using silent reading is twofold one to draw a sharp contrast between the shock and appall that board members registered when they were recited out of context salacious

062words and phrases with those of us who seek to remind the board that a valuable book A book with a purpose is a complete entity worth far more than the sum of its parts two to draw attention to the experience of the palpable power of Silence itself our Quaker friends have known this power for over 300 years and for all of us silence can open spaces in the human brain for Learning and understanding to take root so while we read and contemplate we will look that and look and read volumes that are no longer available in school let's note that those books whose themes touch on lgbtq and other sexuality issues as well as some of the more horrific realities of our nation's history those books were never written for very little kids not then

063and not now however when we purge the shelves of volumes that are age appropriate for older students were setting the precedent to remove books that little ones do need to read stories about Ruby Bridges Harriet Tubman and yes a story about a loving family of penguins whatever a student's age we should not fear young people exploring life between the covers of an age appropriate book what we should fear is that later generations of public school students won't be able to read at all so during our silent reading protest I urge board members to take courage reread The Crucible I'm hoping it's still in our library there are a lot of people in belalia County some of them here today who will have your back and give you their support if you take this courageous path

064if you do we'll put down our book and get to work thank you very much thank you next is Miss Elizabeth Albert followed by Karen weinrich welcome right good evening Madam chair members of the board superintendent Dr balaman as you know know the valouch United Educators have filed paperwork for recertification for our instructional and educational support bargaining units part of that process means ensuring that our member count or the density is accurate and truthful not just because that is our duty but because it is our legal necessity and the way we pride ourselves on doing business however you as the Valia County School Board decided to send a formal notice to perk the governing body that handles Administration for unions in Florida to insinuate that somehow view has done something that is outside of the

065letter of the law when I heard this I was shocked and disappointed let me be clear the valua County School Board have taken it upon yourselves to Lobby unfounded attacks on the members of view for no reason other than to stoke suspicion where there is none except there is a reason we believe and I want everyone in this room to hear me and everyone that's listening online the reason the valua County school board has launched an attack on our Union is to make sure that teachers and support staff no longer have a voice that we no longer have contractual rights and that we no longer have the ability to fight for better pay benefits and working conditions the Valia County School Board you say you Pride yourselves on collaboration yet you continue to move the

066goalpost on how we need to communicate when you created this issue for view we were ready to collaborate to ensure that we provided all the data necessary and in fact our lawyers talk to your lawyers to ensure that the proper understanding of the park guidelines were met at that meeting or after that meeting the VCS School Board decided to throw collaboration out the window and instead moved forward with your unfounded false allegations I've called several of you to discuss this yet the calls go unanswered and UNR returned some of you were even card carrying union members back in the day so this is a clear signal that tells me you are no longer interested in collaborating but instead more interested in picking a fight with the teachers the parents and the office Specialists who teach

067our children and run our schools let me be clear when I say this to you if you want to take away the voices of the teachers and the support staff that work within VCS you're going to need to try harder we will not sit idly by while this board refuses to listen to those who show up each day to do the work of educating and supporting our children the actions of the valua County School Board have been deceptive mean-spirited and misleading and we will not allow our teachers and staff to have their voices and their rights to a contract Stripped Away we are all accountable for our actions and you must be accountable for the outright attack on the employees you thank you Miss Albert next up is Miss Karen weinrick followed by Miss Jennifer

068Kelly good evening I'm here heard a piggyback off of what Elizabeth just said I I had an eye appointment today left at 5:30 made my way here because I thought it was very important to speak I want you to think why do you think I and and hundreds of others choose to be a member of our Union because I choose to have $31.50 paid twice a month every paycheck we choose to do this why it's because we want our schools to be better we are here here for our students and as a union it gives us a voice and when I heard the paperwork that was filed it I I was astounded I shouldn't say I was astounded I unfortunately I wasn't totally surprised but it's still it felt like a punch in the gut

069because we are here for our students and by going after you you're going after each and every one of us you know that's why I come to every meeting you know I'm here I'm here asking about testing by by the way next week my fourth graders take two more County mandated tests two weeks after we did the fast test I'm emailing people about my air conditioner that hasn't worked since August we are because that's going to make my students life better we are also here yes because we want to be paid better how do you expect to keep employees if we're not paid well and we appreciate the contract we got our longevity supplements we're about to get another one we appreciate that we worked together and by going after us you are going after

070all of our union members and even the teachers and the other employees who are not union members because we speak for everyone whether or not they choose to pay union dues we are here as a voice for them we know that there are so many positions you cannot fill this is not going to make it easier this is going to make it harder thank you thank you Miss weiner up next is Miss Jennifer Kelly followed by Miss Sheila butcher good evening chair Haynes board superintendent um I just wanted to address everyone tonight and ask again for policy 320 to be brought up for revision that's all thank you thank you next up is Miss Sheila Butchart followed by Michelle debler good evening superintendent Madam chair Schoolboard members and members of the audience tonight I come

071to you in solidarity with my view family even though I'm not wearing red I chose to wear black tonight because I'm in mourning I'm mourning for all the members of our school community that have proven that they are distinguished Educators but yet they've been passed over for district positions for people outside our community who have no stake in the game except to make themselves look better I'm mourning the loss of books and hidden books from our media centers and librar classroom libraries all because of a special interest group has such influence over some of you and those in control of our district I'm mourning the fact that these special that same special interest groups feels they speak for our community and that our Schoolboard members seem to side with them instead of with their trusted

072employees this mistrust only serves to harm the relationships of in fuchia County Schools I'm warning for the students who will not be taught by highly trained teachers because so many of my colleagues continue to leave valuch County I'm warning the new teachers who will come here to work in valuch County only to find promises made are not always Promises Kept I'm warning the fact that two of you are sitting here tonight were union members and in fact I bet at least one of you had the union intervene on their behalf at some time in your career I'm warning the fact that at least two of you took funds from our Union to support your campaign but claim ignorance to what's going on right now in the school district I'm warning that overall good relationships that

073have been built over the last few years is going to be lost over something this District really should not even be involved with in the first place I'm mourning the loss of the misallocation of funds in our district which is taxpayer money so that you can hire lawyers to challenge an honest reporting of this valua United Educators membership I believe that was mean-spirited and malicious attempt to break our Union and have the full power in the hands of the superintendent I can tell you that what was and is reported are the facts and only the facts I as an eboard member have been focused on membership for the last three years and I can assure you I have never been a liar I'm mourning that I used to believe that the school board and the

074District employees were working were willing to work collaboratively with volution ited Educators to do what is best for students support staff and teachers please rethink what is in the best interest of teachers support staff cafeteria workers bus drivers warehouse workers fmts Guardians and any other Schoolboard employee that I might have missed thank you thank you next up is Michelle deeper welcome good evening Dr Balin board members I'm here today we are View and we're just trying to find out why you want to take away our contract to take away our voice to take away our Union our job is very difficult we are here to support our students we are here to support our co-workers please consider what you are doing when you attack them you attack us thank you thank you Dr B can

075you have somebody follow up with wi about the a okay thank you all right at this time we are moving on to item 16.01 request for adoption of proposed amendments to policy two 208s and 208e the student code of conduct and discipline this item was heard um in December um and was voted to put it out for advertisement and we have exceeded the number of days that it needed to be advertised so board members as you know um I asked Mr Wolf to be prepared to provide us with a legal opinion this evening about this I asked him to look into all of the different parts and so I'd like um we do have public input so we're going to go ahead and hear the public input and then we're going to start after the

076public input with Mr Wolf's legal opinion unless someone wants to differ from that all right so I have one two three four five C oh I have another one is that for the same item okay all right thank you I have six cards we're going to start I'm going to name the um first two speakers so the first one can go ahead and come forward to speak and then the second one will be ready so we're going to start with Miss Ashley Jackson if you'll please come forward welcome uh I didn't didn't plan to speak but then I read what was on the agenda and I just wanted to express some concern um the one specifically that says the random searches of visitors can you that mic a little closer oh sorry um I don't

077know if visitors mean all visitors if or if it includes students but my concern is about a how do you guarantee that it's random what are the requirements for searching people's persons is there an expectation privacy at all what happens because we all know that everyone has biases if we find that there's a pattern of who is being searched and who is not being searched which would open the school board to litigation um who is the one that's doing the searches just a lot of questions that I realize you guys can't answer but I want to highlight this decisions are often made based on personal opinion and not based on evidence or research I know people have talked about books books being banned and not based on EV evidence and research about what's in the

078best interest of the students so it's not a far leap to assume that random searches are not going to be random or based on any sort of research um I have a six-year-old son who's just changed from one valua school to another he's autistic and those that were in uh the power to do the disciplining were not really familiar with what manifest what behaviors are manifestations of autism so we had to remove him and now was somebody who's in charge of discipline who's in charge of making decisions about what happens on campuses so I'm really concerned he's somebody who when he doesn't feel safe his behavior he's got big emotions and uh he's tall like a lot of the men in my family and so what happens if he has big emotions um because he's

079not reading social cues well and he acts out and then he's one of those who gets searched and then he gets searched and he reacts as if he's being attacked um I just see a lot of decisions or events happening that's just a Cascade that's going to lead us to really a really dark place uh he's in a great school now love the school with great teachers but I just want I I'm hoping that when this decision gets made you guys are very transparent about how are you going to make it random who's going to decide who to get searched and why they're searched um and that it's based on things that are not personal opinions that's it thank you so much thank you next up is Miss Karen Clark followed by Donna brire good

080evening everybody thank you for letting us do this um regarding to the searching it says do not approve the proposed amendments to policy 208s and 208e no random searches without cause it could also stop a lot of possible lawsuits and everything else the lady that was just here she had had two paragraphs worth so you have a lot on your plate if you approve this just don't approve it thank you so next up is Miss Donna brosme followed by Miss Elizabeth outward good evening the resurrection of this proposal follows what appears to have become a consistent pattern with this District administration and by acquiescence with the board it's become increasingly clear that the district considers Florida Statutes and the US Constitution to be merely suggestions to be considered but not necessarily followed we've seen this

081here before in both individual schools and in the district as a whole rules are adopted by this board but when they aren't enforced there's no administrative follow through one example was last fall when the board debated the issue of dress codes and one member uh one board member Shrugged off enforcement and just said the principles won't do it it didn't matter what your own rule said and enforcement remains inconsistent we saw it again then with library books Florida statute prohibits the provision of porn of of pornography to minors it provides criminal penalties for violation and also a simple procedure to follow for removal instead of complying the district has created its own Arcane network of of procedures to slow walk removal and to justify its non-com excuse me its non-compliance this new proposal UPS the

082ante by defying both sex setion 12 of the Florida Constitution and the Fourth Amendment of the US Constitution they both forbid the violation of a person by search without cause this is just lazy on the part of the district the district has the statutory authority to remove disruptive students from classrooms but too often fails to do so and just makes excuses for that failure that in turn jeopardizes the safety of the students and teachers and makes it difficult if not possible for teachers to teach and students to learn we end up instead with more deputies on school grounds we look like armed camps because we didn't do first what we could have done and now this apparently the opinion of the board's previous attorney who told parents that they had to check their constitutional rights

083at the door has become the consensus of the board and of the district to subject our kids and any adult who goes onto school grounds to Illegal searches and seizures makes as much sense as disarming the law-abiding public because of the actions of one person I'd be curious to know if you raise your own children this way where the actions of one child assumes that all of the family is going to possibly be equally guilty if we wonder why young people disregard the law and disrespect both history and in institutions we only have to watch this school district you have set the example for them Benjamin Franklin famously your time is up oh I'm sorry I didn't notice thank you please reject this language next up is Miss Elizabeth Albert followed by Jennifer Kelly good

084evening Madam chair members of the board superintendent Dr Balaban so quick question what happened why now so uh schools are supposed to be environments of encouragement empowerment enthusiasm in love this agenda item is creating or has the potential to create a culture of fear and intimidation have you stopped to consider the potential trauma that allowing random searches to Children could potentially result in I want to tell you a very quick little story so I used to work at Palm Terrace element as with all elementary schools we have certain procedures for walking through the hallway right but Palm Terrace is a very wonderful unique phenomenal school but we stopped for a moment and we took into consider consideration how we were asking the students to walk down the hallway without really thinking about it all of

085us asked them to put their hands behind their back voice level zero or bubble mouth for the little ones right familiar with that but in certain communi ities hands behind your back has a very different connotation and results in a very different outcome you and I might not even stop to think about that but it it does matter have we stopped to think about the implicit bias that perhaps we have when we're writing something on paper that is perhaps very well- intended but we haven't vetted what the results are I got just a couple more questions on Logistics how will students be selected the random searches I'm hoping that the conversation that ensues will talk about that will there be Equity throughout all of the schools in our districts or will we see that certain

086schools in low socioeconomic areas have more random searches than other schools in higher soci andeconomic neighborhoods will you be tracking and documenting these things um have you stopped to think about the concerns and the impact to the learning environment every minute counts in our classrooms every minute and we already have schedules that compromise the Integrity of the learning environment how can we afford to do this as well and just another thing here the Guardians they don't always look like the kids in the schools where they work so again let's stop to think about the message that we're sending if we go forward with a randomized search without provocation without cause and what it what it could potentially do again there's a lot to consider when you put something on paper you might think it's great

087but the reality of those actions often times leads to very different outcomes a lot of students in our school suffer from trauma have you thought about how this could impact them I hope so if you haven't maybe us that tonight thank you I apologize next up is Miss Jennifer Kelly followed by Jeff Miller good evening chair haes board members and superintendent I am requesting the board please Workshop this policy change before the vote is taken to approve there are too many questions what does random searches without cause for all visitors using metal detectors look like what impacts will this have on the students is this constitutional is this a violation of parental rights what danger does this place on the site administrators are they on board with this will they be trained if so what

088does that training look like have other options been researched for example using K9 officers several other Florida counties use them with success they are also a great deterrent what is the cost related to this plan this policy change says all visitors it does not mention students however most of the conversations and cited case laws all pertain to students only the school district attorney said in the December meeting there is case law to support random searches at school however he did not mention which ones in my research I found in 1985 there was a Supreme Court case new excuse me New Jersey versus T this case involved a 14-year-old student in school the opinion of the Court was the fourth amendment does apply to school administrators not just law enforcement and they must uphold it too

089School authorities do not need to obtain a warrant or have probable cause before searching a student however they do have to have Reasonable Suspicion the Court established a two-part test to determine reasonableness of a search it must be justified at the Inception and as the search is conducted it is reasonably related in the scope to the circumstances that justifi the interference in the first place the Florida school search reference guide which also only refers to students and not adults saying says in the determ determining whether a particular use of the metal detector to conduct searches is constitutional the court will balance the students privacy interest the nature of the search and the severity of the need met by the search in my opinion finding 39 weapons this school year out of 62750 students is not

090reasonable enough to allow for random searches without cause for anyone and or everyone going to a school campus or event how many of those 39 weapons were brought with the intent to cause harm forgetting you had a pocket knife on you is very different from bringing a gun to shoot someone I agree there is reason for concern but there has to be a better way I also found two very important cases that went to the Supreme Court malberry versus Madison in 1803 the Supreme Court's opinion all laws which are repugnant to the Constitution are null and void and Miranda versus Arizona in 1966 where rights secured by the Constitution are involved there can be no rul making or legislation which would abrogate them so please have more conversation about this there's a lot of questions

091thank you thank thank you up next is Mr Jeff Miller welcome hello good evening board um we're pretty much new to vucha County we've only been here for a few years so we've only been in the school system for a few years um this is our first school board meeting that we've actually paid attention to we didn't know about this um Amendment until the news reported it last night um we're very involved in our child's School um he's one of those kids that gets A's and B's and if he gets a c we're calling the school to find out why so you know he's not really a bad child um but we do have concerns against basically violating of the Fourth Amendment we have enough problems right now going on in this country with a

092lot of amendments being violated and people not doing what they're supposed to do so that's basically our thing no search no search without any you know without probable cause um basically what we're doing is we're at this point in time what we're noticing valicia County you guys are setting up children to be put into the criminal system we need a ton of criminal reform in this in this state and all we're doing is seeing kids who getting arrested for simple fights in school I understand it's an issue tensions have gotten high over the last few years especially after covid but when we were all kids kids used to throw hands in school it happened you got suspended you went home you came back now kids are getting hauled off a school bus in handcuffs that's

093a little ridiculous so that's all I have to say at this point Thank you are there any more cards okay then at this time we're gonna um if the district team wants to come back forward but we're going to start with Mr Wolf thank you madam chair um I have researched uh the legality and constitutional ity of the proposed amendments to policy 208s and 20 208e student code of conduct and discipline uh and I find uh the proposed amendments uh to those policies are constitutional uh and legal in all respects uh the United States Supreme Court has held that random suspicionless administrative searches of students are constitutional also the Florida Third District Court of Appeal reviewed Miami Dade school board's policy which authorizes Rand suspicionless weapons searches of uh public high school students using portable

094wands uh and the court found that policy was reasonable and constitutional in all respects also the Attorney General Florida school search reference guide states that the use of metal detectors uh to conduct random searches of students for weapons uh has been upheld in Florida so the courts have uniformly recognize the need for randomized safety screenings uh as reasonable and necessary to further an important state interest in keeping schools safe for weapons uh so for these reasons I do believe the proposed amendments to the policies are constitutional and legal uh in all respects thank you um Dr balabin thank you madam chair board members I have members of my team here who have done um they will present to you the policy the timeline in when when it was first presented um the reest that was

095made for in terms of revision and they have also done research uh as it pertains to this policy and they're willing to share and some of the questions that were asked that we can frontload the answers to I'll ask that you guys please do that also at this time so Mr pendley thank you Dr bam Madam chair board members item 16.01 on tonight's agenda request the board's consideration for adoption a proposed amendments to policy 20 208s and 208e student code of conduct as it relates to randomized security screenings on campus you will find that the item had been previously brought before the board and authorized for advertisement the advertisement has been published uh as of December 17th the time period for uh that has now expired and the policy is right for adoption tonight the

096changes uh there have been no changes made since the board's authorization to advertise U at the uh November meeting okay board members is anyone have a question that they would like to ask of anyone on the team or something that they would like to say Miss Thompson I know since this is Safety and Security there's a lot that we can't reveal because of safety issues however is there anything that we can say just to possibly answer some of the questions that were asked in a public comment um so this is a part of our Safety and Security plan which um we are we don't publish to the public for obvious reasons however um Miss core did work on some procedures and we'll share what we can good evening sorry it's coming over in your space

097good evening um board members Dr bgav and chairwoman Haynes um we have a safety security committee that's comprised of principles and other Personnel in the district and one of our Middle School principls heads up and leads that committee um so they've been having these conversations and their meetings in addition um we me to go over some of the procedures that we could use to put in place to make this as um seamless and and not affect you know disrupt the schools you know too much um so the randomizer is a computer program that we have it's it's a web- based program where you put the schools in and you literally spin the wheel that's the random and whatever School comes up that's the school that's that's going to have the screenings um based on the

098procedures that the team put together um and it's the student services team that's leading this um my in my current other hat of assistant superintendent of student services so uh Nate Anderson is the lead for the team but there are members from that team that will go out to the school um and support the um the procedures and so that we're not just saying every high school already has uh metal detectors on their campus middle schools there are some Logistics there so they'll plan for that um and and our team will be there to basically run run the procedures with the principal of course or his his or her design there on the school base side to assist that team is will go to each of these for consistency of implementation and that way we

099can ensure they have been trained as well and we will also be training um the principles at the principal's meeting but but the team will be the one implementing since they're to ensure consistency of implementation and it is the use of metal detectors and so the team will be the ones that are conducting the search not the administrative teams or it will it be a combination the well the principal and or the principal's designate will be there but it will be the student services team that will be running it so we show up and run the whole process and then Madam chair I I the policy I understand the reason for it I know not everyone might but I'm going to bring it up again I I know that some of us went to margorie

100stowman Douglas and a lot of this is inconvenient I have a six-year-old and a nine-year-old like I I don't like the idea at all at the same time I never want anyone to have to walk through 17 murder scenes ever ever again so I can understand the need for this the policy is one thing the procedures are a completely different thing and I think that some sometimes those can get confused I I wouldn't mind workshopping some different procedures and moving forward because I do feel like this is kind of a step one I think that we can fine-tune this and make it better as Technologies evolve and as we find different things so that's just my opinion thank you thank you Dr Balaban yeah Madam chair and board members the the last time that the

101policy was here and the suggestion for revisions were given I spoke to cap our captain who is Al also our director for safety and a couple questions that I've asked him to do some research on and I I think he can share the answers to those questions for you for example I wanted to look at at our proposed policy and how does that compare to some of maybe other policies that are out there in other districts where are these policies what are those districts um what is it that they have been doing and I think doc uh Captain Smith spent quite a bit of time um researching speaking to other counties and going in depth looking at their policy looking at the implementation of those policies and so forth so I would like for him

102to share that with you because I don't know if you you've received that information previously go ahead Captain what are some of the districts what does the policy how does it compare to ours and what is it that they've been doing so ours is very similar um the vast majority is that is the procedures which obviously are private um but our ours are very similar to multi other counties throughout the state can you share some of the counties that you've researched yes we uh spoke with Lee County Orange County and Oola County and they are currently they have this policy and they're imp implementing procedures to those policies correct correct all right I'd like to say a few things first of all I'd like to clear up I I if you don't mind um I'd

103like to start with you thank you for sharing about your son all right and then and if you don't mind I'm going to use that as a piece to clear up some misrepresentation of what has been stated here I will say that during covid the world changed and in the school system we have seen a lot of what happened during Co but I think sometimes when you make a general statement or you make a statement that is not specific like you just say you know every place is like this then you're you don't have a clear understanding so during covid everyone's life changed I don't think there's a single person sitting in this room whose life did not change none of us saw it coming none of us knew what the outcome was going to

104be believe it or not it probably impacted our children more than sometimes what we realize there's a lot of us that spend time on campuses for whatever reason throughout the week we see it okay I can say that I see it because I spent how many years teaching in classrooms at all different levels here in vucha County but to say that we are not handling discipline problems correctly as a general rule of thumb is inaccurate and it's taking every student and lumping them into the same group every student is different we have students out there that have high IQs and believe it or not there is a reason why when you look at the IQ scale of students that our gifted children as well as our multi or learning disability or speech and language kids

105or autistic kids all fall on that Spectrum to receive ese Services gifted classes are still part of exceptional student education and with every child it comes with what is their background what is their disability have we placed them in the correct placement and sometimes it takes a while to figure that out all right even for a gifted child even within our gen egg classes we have kids that they could be gifted in Reading and have a learning disability in math I've seen that happen and every child faces something differently where we're at right now is and I'm going to give credit to one of our principls who's overseeing the largest high school right now that we have in vucha County Mr Mike djalo at D land High has cleaned up that behavior on that campus

106it got bad during Co we all saw it we saw videos posted posted of what students were doing teachers were trying to stop but he has cleaned up that behavior and he's cleaned it up because he brings to the table in that job role he's worked in elementary he's worked in middle school he's worked in high school he's worked with ESC students and he has an understanding of children and he looks at the child and he knows how to interact with that child he has learned and developed those traits and skills and he's taken a high school that's over 3,000 students and it's running so much better it's probably running better than what it was eight years ago even with behavior but that's because he's committed so the last thing I want him to hear

107is that he's not doing a good job because he and his teachers and staff on that campus are doing a good job sometimes some of our students that act out act out and it is a part it's a manifestation of their disability and we cannot treat those children the same as a child who doesn't have a disability who knows exactly what they're doing I'm going to matter of fact and I know there's some people in here that will write me and say you shouldn't have told a personal story but I'm going to I have three grandchildren one of them is Autistic one of them is one year of age and is running her house okay and I will tell you right now she knows what she's doing but her brother who's autistic has to sometimes

108put up with her deciding to throw herself down and throw a temper tantrum because she's not getting her way and bless my daughter and son-in-law okay but the thing of it is I personally know there's a difference between those two children and my grandson if he decides to get upset because the one-year-old is screaming and throwing a temper tantrum it's not an active choice that he made to get upset it's part of what happens because he doesn't like noise and his little sister has already figured that that's a way to trigger him and that's what happens on our campuses so when we hear about you know we can hear a story about a student I taught fifth grade and had a student bring a knife to class and let me tell you knives are just

109about as dangerous as guns because if any of you were following what happened earlier in the fall we had a student that another student took a knife to and he just missed that child's eye by this much he cut him here so weapons do not belong on our campuses they absolutely don't belong there and I'm old enough I remember when cabine happened but you know when it really hit home was when it happened here in Florida in Broward County and children and staff members lost their lives that day we have issues with weapons coming on campus and you talk about numbers those are the numbers of the ones that we have found okay we don't know about the ones we haven't found and years ago you know you can go hey you know 30 years

110ago yeah we had dads pull up and high school students pull up with gun racks in the back of their truck because they went out hunting and they knew the rules that's not what we're dealing with right now we have children that are having mental health issues that are in crisis and they don't see a way out and they see the way that if I bring a weapon I can have some control that's truly in my opinion what happened in Broward County our number one goal is yes to educate children but we can't educate them if they're not safe on campus we have followed every piece of legislation that has come out we you know we scan any body that comes on those campuses we don't allow people on campuses that have certain things that

111show up when you scan their driver's license we have single point entries we have fenced in we've got metal detectors on every high school campus we started checking people coming to football games because weapons were coming into football games and why because we want to keep everybody that's at that football game safe there are already we are checked in so many places where we go I can't board a plane without being checked I can't go over here into the court without being checked we were last week at the capital can't go into the capital without being checked matter of fact we I I chose not to even go into the opening of the Senate section because I had two sealed water bottles with me and they won't they not only check every part of you

112they open your bag and they start pulling things out and you can't go sit in the balcony at a senate session or House of Representative session they take all this stuff away even if it's sealed and I'm sorry with my allergies I was like I'll sit out and I'll take everybody's water or whatever you've got so that you don't have to throw it away but I can't even walk in there with a sealed bottle of water and that's right there in tallah so if they're checking my bag and checking everybody else and not even allowing you in or you it's like there's the trash can throw it away why are we not as concerned about our children now I believe there's a safe way to do this I don't want to traumatize a child we're

113talking about the bulk of the places where our weapons are coming into our campuses our middle and high school school I asked a lot of questions and to know that and I don't know I mean I've seen lots of groups use you know technical virtual random generators so if you push in for next Thursday and it randomly generates I'll use the land high for an example it's randomly generates the land High gets checked next Thursday and it selects a classroom or it selects a bill building and it says you know this is the time you're going to check it here's my thing as long as it's not impacting student instruction it happens before class starts or as class is dismissing five minutes early and you even find one gun one switchblade one large hunting knife

114which by the way when I taught at Piner High I had a student with a duffel bag with a large hunting knife in his Stuffle back and it's done by a District student services staff that does not know those children and every child in that room is treated the same and they've shared with me how it will be done here's where I stand if it saves us from a child being harmed and ending up in the hospital or saves us from from a child being killed I'm not going to lose a life but I need all of you to understand not every child is the same and when you see a child act out if you don't know that child's background or you don't know why they're melting down please don't just assume that that

115child has made a choice to be that way because they may not have the ability to control their own emotions when other people trigger them and believe it or not I read this morning to a bunch of elementary schools and one of the books that I read it talked about a young girl who was an orphan and she was having to go live with her uncle and she'd never met him before but her grandmother was going into her retirement home so she couldn't go with her and she showed up and her uncle said well I've heard you're kind of smart like your mom used to be which was his sister but I really don't know much about you and she said well I've always done well in school and my teachers were always happy but

116lots of times my classmates weren't nice to me so you know what I did I talked with kids about is this happen and they said yes and I said so why are we not nice to someone who studies and learns and raises their because the kids came up with it she's probably somebody that raises her hand and answers the questions and studies and I said so why would we pick on her and I'll be honest with you sometimes I think the students get it more than what we get it as adults and so I mean my thought is I'd like to see a little bit more language in here about the way this is going to be as much as we can because there are laws that cover what we're allowed to release for Safety

117and Security we can't release maps of our campuses anymore we can't release sometimes who's on the safety teams and things like that but I also want everybody to understand not every child is the same but they all need to be respected and we do have administrators out there that are doing a phenomenal job of dealing with behavior and I will also say just as in any field you'll find someone that doesn't do it the right way but that's Dr balam and her team's job to continue to provide them with the training and if we've got a kid not in the right place it's also their job to then figure out the best place for that child so Mr cologne I see you want to speak yes so I just have some questions I know it's

118probably been mentioned but I just wanted to be very clear so Mr Wolf in your understanding is this within our power and is it allowed by law yes uh without question in my opinion it is uh legal and Allowed by law yes all right Mr pendley the same question for you sir I concur I'm sorry I didn't hear you I concur in Mr Wolf's opinion wonderful thank you uh Chief do you think in your opinion that having this additional measure uh in our district uh is important for keeping our students safe yes this is one piece of a very complex process to keep our kids safe wonderful and are you familiar with other school districts in the State of Florida or anywhere in the country that have done the same yes thank you uh and

119for that reason I am supportive of this thing thank you next up Mr persus thank you madam chair I uh I'm not challenging the legal opinion of U Mr penley or Mr Wolf however just because we have the legal authority to do something that doesn't always mean that we should do it um I wholeheartedly support uh searching students when we have a reasonable sus suspicion that uh they may have something on them that they shouldn't have and we get those kind of tips all the time uh which is great that we have students uh telling us when uh they see something that isn't right and they are telling principles and so forth and um that's the best and we have all those tip lines and fortify Florida and many other social media sites that are

120giving us information and when we received that in information I uh wholeheartedly uh Su support the action that we have been taking uh have taken in the past uh and taking it very seriously and searching um students and notifying parents and and everything I think we have a great history of of doing that however when I've done uh my research around the country uh about random searches at school sites uh there is [Music] no in my mind no sufficient evidence that proves that they are effective um in fact uh what is is consistently said is that random searches can be very dis disruptive um they can take away staff time um they obviously will interrupt learning time uh and and and so uh from where I sit um uh I don't think uh I don't

121think amending this this this policy uh is going to have a or serve as a great detriment um to to any student that for whatever reason uh wanted to bring a knife to school or or some other kind of weapon um usually students that do those kinds of things uh either they're bringing a knife to school to protect thems elves because they think they're going to be in some sort of an altercation perhaps after school uh and uh they have it there um I think the I think the odds of just when you think about it just the odds of doing a random search and catching a student with a weapon I think would be astronomical um that we would actually find someone given the large numbers of um students that that we have particularly

122at secondary schools and the way they change classes and different places they can hide things uh I just think the disruption and perhaps the the lack of trust that this could produce with with some of our students uh not really understanding in why they have to um get searched or go through a a a metal U uh detector uh some of them just don't have that uh um emotional stability to understand you know why you know what is going on I didn't do anything wrong uh so I wouldn't want to put uh students unnecessarily through that uh kind of stress so uh for those reasons and perhaps a few more I'm not going to be supporting this thank you Mrs brette thank you so I I have been back and forth in my mind over

123this the last couple of weeks to be honest with you um feeling that one as you me mentioned Miss Thompson I don't want ever to have a situation where we have a um a bad outcome on our school campuses that we can prevent um I've talked to you all I've uh emailed questions I'm not in favor of the way the written the policy's written I shared that today I did not hide that I didn't like the way it was written I listen to you Miss Haynes and I'm like thinking okay I can support it and and I just I honestly I I have no problem with the using of the metal detectors I really don't um I want our kids to be safe one of somebody I was talking to today said please do everything

124you can on our campuses to make sure my kid is safe and this is somebody that has somebody in elementary school um and and I want us to do that and I want us to support that I do think that we could do a little bit better of a job on the writing of the policy um I do appreciate Mr Wolf and Mr penley you providing us with information that the state would support us doing this um so if anybody happened to um file a complaint against us we would have the support of the state doe correct that's the way I understand it yes Department of Education we would have their support the case law certainly supports this policy yes and Mr penley yes let me just read the uh the language from a case

125that Mr Wolf cited State versus J which is a Florida third district court of appeal decision the court there said The Logical way to keep weapons out of school is to let the students know that they may be searched for weapons and the court emphasized May and that possession of weapons in a public high school is not underscored in the Court's opinion they emphasize not permissible and will be seriously sanctioned so that's what the captain has told us as being the the purpose behind this change to the policy is to put people on notice that if you bring a weapon on campus you may be subject to search and that if you are possessing a weapon on campus that will be seriously dealt with that is the purpose of this change in policy is the

126notice provision thank you um again I I want us to be safe I want us to use as much as we can to be safe but I don't like the way the policy is written so I will probably not support that tonight and I would be happy that we could bring this back and maybe find some better language for it um with metal detectors in there thank you Miss Thompson yes um and thank you everyone for really taking it seriously I I can't stress how serious this decision is um I did want to go over and look at both policies um because it does say all visitors to Valia County schools are on notice and so we have all talked about students repeatedly but our visitors subject to search so it was was like building

127our classroom and say I was volunteering in that classroom so are you then taking volunteers and also putting them through the metal detector since it says visitors I would apply it to all individuals on school campus and then um once again I'm just I feel like there's a lot of questions and a lot of things because we don't get to talk about this you know outside of this room I I feel like there's a lot of questions that if we could Workshop this or do this in a session to really get all the pros all the cons all everything out I think that we would be better informed when we were voting that's once again just me yeah go ahead so my question is we already put metal detectors at all the high schools for

128sporting events and we've been using them for the sporting events for anybody that comes correct that's correct Okay so we've had have we had any negative comment at sporting events where people have said I'm not walking through a metal detector to go onto the field I haven't I don't have the information for you madam sha to find out my understanding though is the reason why we went ahead and moved forward with that is because we had weapons showing up at sporting events that is correct okay I know that also in the fall we called the police department and the and the sheriff's department I don't remember which group showed up to one of our high schools and they walked the entire parking lot looking in or at vehicles and found weapons matter of fact even

129weapons that were in an open truck bed correct Captain says yes okay the question also came up tonight about Kines and Captain Smith my understanding is you have already researched the cost of Kines yes I was asked to research it by obviously the schools and these are approximate but through vucha County Schools if Valia County Schools implemented their own K9 program it would be just under $100,000 startup per K9 so these Kines are single purpose you would need one for Vapes if you wanted to do Vapes or one for firearms they can't do both um for a deputy K9 you like to hire a deputy kind of like you do the srds you'd be looking at a startup cost of around 248,000 approximately I didn't get a specific uh quote for that um but it's

130based off of previous quotes Okay so a startup of approximately $250,000 to have the deputy and the K9 and that's one set and we have 10 high schools and that's just one per high school so that doesn't cover the 14 middle schools where we're also having problems that would just I mean I don't think you'd need a k9 for every single School financially right now Dr ban the eser money is ending correct and even though and I'm not blaming you because you were not sitting in that seat when this was done even though I repeatedly and I think other board members did too said please do not use that money for reoccurring funds we have $47 million right now that has reoccurring funds that have to move somewhere to the best of my knowledge because

131I chair the internal audit committee and I work with Todd ceas we don't have the money to start a canine program no okay all right Dr baman what would you like to add so just a couple things I think you talked about some of this already but I want to make it very clear that behaviors Nationwide has escalated this is no secret we all know this and as you know chair and board members I hold periodic listen and learn with every division with my principles my APS ju as recently I had one with 248 um office Specialists that attended I hold them continuously because it's important to hear from all of your stakeholders and also as you know we also have I have a super superintendent advisory leadership team you have met those students from

132every high school they're part of it and I have a number one thing or what's what's something that's keeping you of at night something that you worry about consistently you would hear their Safety and Security and that of their peers consistently as a matter of fact Mr colong had attended one of those um listen and learns with me with with our assault he heard it himself when I came here to vucha County as you guys know I think everything happens for a reason in life when you when you reflect and you understand the why I had always been very a big Advocate when it came to Safety and Security always but when I went to Broward County for those three months it opened up my senses at a different level at a different level because

133although those occurrences that occurrence occurred before covid to date it's very much alive the effects that everyone has felt and I vowed coming back here that I will do everything it takes to ensure that every single student and I'm talking about 64,000 students feel safe on their campuses but not just our students our staff deserves that as well you talked about the differentiated approach and that not all CH children are the same you're absolutely right even in our families they have experienced quite a bit of trauma due to covid that they're still trying to get themselves back together it is our job and our responsibility to ensure that every single staff member and I'm talking about 8,700 student uh staff member and 64,000 students that they feel safe every single day on our campuses is

134is there one methodology or one approach or one strategy that will cover the entire safety gamut of students and staff no it's a compilation and it's the same as when we were building and flying during covid that we had all of those mitig mitigating procedures in place but it was not one singlehandedly that would cover the entire body when it comes to Safety and Security it was the combination of it all so I say this to you because when when the policy came and I heard about the suggestions that were made I wanted to make sure that I understood clearly if we were embarking on this journey what it would look like and that we were not the only District that's going to be embarking on a on a journey like this for the first

135time I also want to clarify something it was stated earlier because I I I have to speak for our administrators they are working day in and day out and their entire staff including our teachers to do everything in their power to keep our students safe so I take a little bit of offense to the statements that were made that you know it could be better I I our team is working diligently because that is our number one priority so I had Captain mention of three districts but that's not the only three districts there are a whole lot more Miami dat is many districts are doing it I need to make sure that I understand clearly from the board here tonight what are you asking me to do next I need to make sure that I

136give clear direction to my staff I want to add a couple things Mr persus you and Mr colone and I attended cosba last year correct were you in the student Le session with um Mr cologne and I I think so that at that the one in Tampa you talking yes did you go to the student panel session that Andrea minina the executive director overa I know Mr clone did Mr clone if you're on there and I know there's a bit of delay would you mind sharing what the number one concern was from the student panel that they put together from a variety of counties where high school students came to speak and tell school board members what their issues were and what was working well well in that in that conversation uh again we had

137students from multiple districts uh in the State of Florida and the number one concern in all of their schools was their Safety and Security they did not feel safe and you know I'm not saying that this is as Dr B just mentioned this isn't a solo thing that's going to by itself make a world of difference because we know it's random we're not talking about about airport style checks every time students walk into school uh that's just not but to hear those students talk about Safety and Security and how a lot of them did not feel safe and you know it was very eye opening because at the time one of the big topics in the world was books and I thought for sure that would be their number one thought process and they weren't

138even concerned about that and so uh I I I I concur with the chair and and bringing up this topic because we heard it from kids across the district I've heard it from my community as well um you know we just recently had a scare at uh Galaxy and you know the parents were asking for more we need to do more and again this isn't a silver bullet but it's just one more thing that can serve more so as a deterrent uh for somebody bringing in something they should not be bringing into school thank you thank you the other thing that I want to um State because I'm not sure if everybody here knows this we already have Vape detectors in all of our schools so we are already checking to see if they're using

139Vapes because we have a vape problem already in elementary and I'm going to say it again the only way I know kids Elementary School have Vapes is somewhere they don't have money and they can't go buy them is somewhere along the line an adult has purchased them and shuffled them down to that age level so you know we can only do as much as we can do but I'm saying this tonight parents it's your responsibility to know what's in your child's backpack it's your responsibility to know if you have listen I grew up in a family they hunted they do all this stuff everybody in my family but my mother and I have a concealed weapons permit you to care I I have no interest never have um but everybody else has it but they

140know safely how to use those but they also know they can't walk on a campus my son was driving me one day and I said I need to stop at that school he said Mom I can drop you off out on the road and you can walk in and I'm like why can't you drive me up there he goes mother he goes I can't enter that campus and he's 30 by the way okay and I was like okay that's right so he knows what the rules are but here's the thing parents if you have weapons in your home and your children have access to those weapons and they bring them on campus yes it's our responsibility to keep them safe but this is on you too because it's your responsibility as their parent to make

141sure they don't have access and you have to keep open lines of communication and you have to explain to your children because they play video games all day long and you guys can all think I'm crazy but when they shoot the people and they pop right back up they don't have an understanding or reality of what they're going to do when they have a gun in their hand and so but we already have Vape detectors we're checking for Vapes we're trying to head that off but the bottom line is the weapons are increasing and we're not giving them weapons we're not telling them it's okay to bring them on campus that's not on us we're just trying to keep them safe when they get there based on who's bringing them on and we're trying to

142keep the weapons off I do think the language could be cleaned up the fact that we're already using metal detectors at all the high schools for sporting events and we don't even really have that written in here I think we need to spell this out a little bit better that's what I'd like to see but I don't know ever want to get the phone call or the text but a single child has lost their life because another child brought a weapon on campus and I don't ever want to have to look a parent in the eyes if they lose their child it's bad enough that last summer when our kids weren't even on campus we lost a student due to the drugs that were sold to him and he lost his life that I have

143a hard time with because no child should die on our watch on a campus Mr persus yeah thank you madam chair uh I guess when I first saw this change you know it says all visitors and at first I just thought well that's not students I mean you know I think if you want to say all students we should say all all students all students all employees all visitors I mean that's that's everybody right students employees visitors but it's just says visitors I don't I when I think of a visitor I don't think of a student I think a student should be I mean if that's what you want to do then you should put the word in there students not visitors um but just getting back to the whole notion of of it everything

144has to be judged what what's the risk what's the benefit what is the outcome you wish to achieve by by saying students should be randomly searched what is the outcome and if the outcome is that you think by doing that you are going to significantly reduce the number of weapons that are brought into school I think you're kidding yourself because if you look across the country where this is done and you ask those you look at what the data shows there isn't anyone that is saying that that because we did randomly random searches of students you know x amount of weapons were were this were discovered or or violence was reduced it just you know what you will see is that the risk was evident there was psychological harm there is a social stress there

145is the the IM the embarrassment Factor uh it does affect students with disabilities different than students without so so those are the definite risks of doing something like this and then you take that compared with well what's the benefit going to be and to me the risk clearly is greater than the benefit Mrs Bernette thank you um and Mr persus you made me think of something when you said all visitors all students whatever I work at the hospital and if you are an employee and you come in that interest entrance you're going through the metal detector too there's no bias it's if you come in that entrance you're going through the metal detector too so I mean we we shouldn't have any bias and it should be if we're going to you know scam people

146we're going to scam people again my my opposition is to the writing of this and the the verbiage and and I mentioned that to you guys today when when we had our one-on-one I um conversation so um I don't think I'm hiding anything from from you that I um that I said that I mean I was kind of clear when I said that so no but this was the reason we're here with this because this was what was advertised um absolutely so if if the board's wish is to change the language after it has been advertised then I guess we would need to know what that language would look like to determine if it's um substantive or not and I guess we can Workshop that or we can sit here tonight and do it whatever

147but um but I agree we probably should have said something last time and I think more of us had at least for me I can speak for myself I you know reflected on it and the last two weeks I've been thinking about it because you know we put this up in December honestly there's been a lot of things happen since December like Christmas and vacations and honestly kind of forgot about it till we saw it again and and um you know I reflected on it and and I have a problem with the verbiage I don't necessarily have a problem with the metal detectors okay it's the it's the verbage of this policy so if there are material is it Mater what's the word I'm looking for material changes that are going to be made then

148that would have to be made and then read vertis absolutely I mean basically there are three options we we don't make any changes to the policy or this changes that are suggested or we have to determine whether they're material or not Material um and if it is as simple as um changing the language from changing visitors to individuals to be more specific I I would leave that to the lawyers to determine if that's material or not and that or we make those material changes and come back I tell you where I have the biggest problem is the word random search okay so I don't understand why we can't just say anybody stepping on property is is potentially going to have met you go walk through a metal detector so I asked that question also and

149what it comes down to is my understanding is they've researched additional even types of metal detectors and at a high at a high school with 3,000 plus students told me about that which we have three that kind of hit that range we can't get them on campus into class in time think about when you just go to an airport how long it takes you with only how many people standing there to get through the airport metal detector or scanning thing that they do now to get to class and and we we can't get everybody through because my first thought was make everybody walk through the metal detector okay every day and that's going to be our best bet but there's not a there's not a metal detector out there even even if you set up

150how many places and opened up more points of Entry that we can get 3,000 kids we did research with other counties and um who are implementing that Captain Smith has we have large schools I'm sure we can find other verbiage such as maybe even a weapon detection device I I'm I'm just saying the word random searches is where I get it and and so that that is my point Thank you madam chair maybe it might be good if we just um since Ruben isn't really here too that we just I know you're here in spirit Ruben but uh uh if we could just just table this till our to our next workshop and in in February and we can weigh in how many items are already on for the next Workshop too okay I know

151what one of them is I don't I won't know till tomorrow or the next day what the other one is do we have a time frame on how long those two will take it probably will take we were just talking about that this week it would probably take the whole time well I think if Mr penley met with us individually and got a sense what we wanted then then we got to the workshop we probably wouldn't take the only so here's the thing if we're going to put it on a workshop okay the next Workshop sh is on February 13th and already has two items that the superintendent says will take the full time of what the workshop is I I do know what one item is I don't know the other item yet um

152the next time we would have a workshop would not be until March the 12th if we push this out to March the 12th to rework this language knowing we already have metal detectors that are on the high school campuses already being used yes um and it's and we do conduct searches and we do conduct searches um if we workshopped it on March 12th and agreed on what the language was then it still has to go out to be advertised so we wouldn't be bringing it back until April 23rd to meet the days realistically it'd be a policy for next school year I mean by the time we advertise it and you know it'd be May almost by the by the time we put this into effect I need each read to weigh in on how

153you feel about that I'm fine with it I'd rather us do it right than rush through something I agree with Anita think that we I would like whether it's an executive session or a workshop I think we need to be able to really talk to and get on language that we can agree with Madam chair we cannot take the policy language to an executive session only security plans and protocols can be discussed in a Security executive session the policy language has to be discussed at the table I I still agree with Anita I think we should talk it out and get all the pros all the cons get get everything out and get the language where we can all agree on it so would you guys like for me to table this and whenever you're

154ready I am I'm not going to bring this topic back up whenever you're ready for it you let me know I need to hear from Mr cologne Mr cologne my my thought is you know again at the end of the day we're working towards an end of doing random searches in our schools no matter how we massage the language um the bottom line is um is that right there so I'm supportive of uh workshopping it whenever it's Avail uh next available I wouldn't want to put it on an indefinite uh bring it back whenever I'm I so I will make a motion that we table this and that we bring it up at the next available Workshop so that we can discuss this and uh come up to a resolution if that be the decision

155of the board all right you've heard from Mr clone and he already went ahead and made a motion do I have a second I'll second all right so the motion on the floor is that we table this and bring it up at the next available Workshop which I will work with um Dr Balan and Miss Gilmore we will Workshop it to talk through the language which at that time um if you have done any further research or you have any additional questions you wish to ask the school board attorney the district attorney Captain Smith Dr Hazel or Miss core please send that or Dr bamman please send them your questions um also um Miss core I'm going to ask can you share with us who's on the principal committee for safety and in security like

156like send us an email just telling us in the event that we wish to speak with any of the administrators that are overseen the Safety and Security committee that are on the front lines every day at our schools yes trying to keep them safe and make sure our students yes learn yeah I'll send you there's two principles per level there's also someone from Transportation um and some other District Personnel that are on the committee so I'll send you the whole list okay Mrs Bernette thank you um kind of um weird ask but I'm going to ask anyway um would it be possible to have maybe some of the student government Representatives attend that or or maybe um asked in advance and they can video it or video zoom in with us at that workshop and

157we can hear from the students what they think too I don't know that we can zoom them in um because that would be during their instructional time but um Dr baman would you mind bringing it to um your student leadership team and asking them once again you know Madam chair I mean I want to be specific about the metal detectors oh the metal DET okay I want to be specific with asking them what their opinion is and what they feel about that and you know if we can get and the student government represents the student body right so if they can kind of do some due diligence too not to put this off on them but if we're impact ing them let's hear from them well maybe we could get the principles that are on

158the Safety and Security committee to go back and speak like if we if we have a set of specific questions and everybody asks their Student Government groups the same questions and gets the feedback I i' I'd be interested in hearing that also Miss Gore make a note about that you'll share with the lead because I I was really surprised last year in Tampa by the student panel and what I didn't see that coming as their primary concern and they gave details as to why all right so we have a motion and we have a second at this time I'll call for a vote all those in favor of tabling this to bring it back at the next available Workshop where we will um Workshop it here in the boardroom for everyone to hear and also

159if Dr balamin if you and your team can get a student voice piece on this to be able to share with us at the time and any additional information other counties or things like that we would appreciate it all those in favor please say I I I I I any opposed it passes unanimously okay we are now moving along to item 18 well no item 17.01 Danielle do you have any additional comment cards thank you we're now at 18.01 at this time are there any board members that have any comments about anything else uh Madam chair yes Mr cologne we'll start with you and I want to thank everyone who made this available for me to be able to attend I am so sorry I'm unable to be there um I also wanted to give

160a shout out to Jerry and Chad thanks to them from across the country I was able to watch every second of the uh teacher of the year event I was cheering the neighbors probably thought I was cheering for the football game but no I was cheering for our teachers so Chad and Jerry you guys are my heroes I let Dr be know that and I look forward to seeing everybody back in the boardroom at our next meeting thank you thank you Mr colone Miss Thompson um yes I just want to make a quick announcement I know that everyone's pretty familiar with the oopsy project we have that delivers the female products to the schools and even male they have deodorant and such um they have a stuffing party coming up on February 25th if anyone's

161able to ever contribute to that group I highly highly encourage it the work that they do at so many of our schools is phenomenal and that's all okay Mrs Bernette thank you so Dr B this kind of goes with uh what I brought up at the end of the uh the meeting would it be possible to have um a student representative attend the the Schoolboard meetings very good question Miss Bernett they were supposed to be here tonight we were going to do a recognition and have them speak to you however because we have been so behind with the recognitions going back from December to January we had to push them back but they were they actually they were supposed to be here thank you and um VCC PTA is this week um the reflections and

162that's always a nice um event to recognize the kids and there's so many that come from Orman for this that are on these that that make it to the uh to the reflections event so they um but some some amazing artwork and um so that's coming up this Thursday yeah it's G to be fun night Mr persus do you have anything yeah I was just thinking um about the uh executive session dealing if if we could have one dealing with the procedures of whatever it is we decide to do after we decide whatever that is because that's where I think a lot of us had the questions and we couldn't talk about it in the public because it's a it's a security yeah issue but it would be good if we could have an executive

163session to work that side up that's no problem the committee did meet and came up with the procedures but that would be something that will have to be discussed okay executive all right um Dr balamin good everybody have a good night Mr Wolf nothing nothing all right so I just want to thank the three of you that are covering um at VCC PTA the reflections piece I will be covering um a meeting at Stark Elementary that night where the new principal's being introduced to all the parents do do you know the time is that 7 starts at 6 6 6 yeah I'm gonna also have the tal I'm gonna be there for the beginning and then I got to go to a Orman ch all right okay um but thank you because I'll be at

164Stark Elementary okay there's a lot going on okay at this time we are adjourned