001foreign and welcome to the Volusia County school board meeting today is Tuesday September 26 2023. I apologize that we're a few minutes late and starting we were waiting on some students for some recognitions so at this time in just a moment I'm going to ask you to join me and stand for the Pledge of Allegiance which will be presented today by Sweetwater Elementary followed by the national anthem which will be presented by New Smyrna Beach High and then we will remain standing for a moment of silence and reflection so please join me at this time for the pledge foreign good evening I'm Tamara Hopkins the proud principal of Sweetwater Elementary and this evening I'm here with Miss Simon our teacher of the year and her amazing second grade class and we're going to present the
002pledge would everyone please stand s of America to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all I'm Harley huddle I am the band director at New Smyrna Beach High School and this is our marching band bringing to you the national anthem [Music] [Applause] [Music] foreign [Music] foreign [Applause] [Music] foreign [Music] foreign we wish to welcome all of you that are here in the audience with us this afternoon as well as those that are listening at home at this time I'd like to introduce everyone that's here at the front with me I'm going to start on my far left we have Mr Carl purses he represents District Four we have Mrs Jesse Thompson representing District three then we have Mr Aaron Wolfe our school board attorney on
003my far right we have Mrs Celeste Gilmore she is our agency clerk then we have Mr Reuben colon representing District Five then Mrs Anita Burnett who is our vice chair representing District 2 and next to me is Dr Carmen balgaman our wonderful superintendent and I am Miss Jamie Haynes and I am your chair representing district one items for approval on this agenda are items 1.03 items 2.02 4.01 7.02 and 17.01 through 17.22 public participation times for any item on the consent agenda you may fill out a card over here with one of our Communications representatives to speak about any item on the consent agenda before we vote for the consent agenda also at 6 PM or shortly thereafter any items of general interest pertaining to public education in Volusia County a total up to 15
004minutes will be provided for public comment at that time then time will be provided for public comment on any action item before a board vote is called on that item and those are items 17.01 through 17.22 this afternoon time will also be provided at the end of the meeting for public comment for items of general interest pertaining to public education in Volusia County before items from the board superintendent or attorney are up for discussion announcement or approval each speaker regardless of which time you're going to speak we'll have a total of three minutes to speak please respect the time clocks there are time clocks located here and you'll speak from the podium there and they are set for the three minutes when it goes off we ask that you please stop speaking at that time
005during public input and this is only for public input not during recognition time there are no signs placards or other visual forms of communication 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 chair has the right to terminate any speaker's privilege to address the board if this rule is violated members of the audience should be courteous to all speakers and shall refrain from making audible comments or applauding during the meeting we do allow thumbs up thumbs down and jazz hands during public input so at this time we are going to move on to item 1.02 this is our district vision statement and time for board members to make comments our missions or our vision statement is to create
006lifelong Learners prepared for an ever-changing Global Society at this time I invite board members to share anything they'd like to share and we'll start with Mr cologne so in the past few weeks we've seen all of the amazing announcements for all of our teachers of the year I don't have the full list in front of me so I won't name them all but congratulations to all of them and we look forward to celebrating with them in the coming weeks over the weekend we had the opportunity to go to the DeLand AG Farm which I personally didn't know existed and um they had a cattle sheep here and steer show this weekend and it's amazing to see the work the discipline to see those students show those animals with great pride with skill I mean to
007see a little little itty bitty person carry a 1200 pound steer and make it do what they want them to do is really fun to watch now I'm a city boy so you know it was a kind of like the zoo for me but it was again shout out to all our FFA teachers and everyone who you know not only spends the time during the week with our students but also their time on the weekend as they prepare them for the shows that are to come and I know they've got shows almost every weekend in different states and so shout out to them thank you thank you Miss Thompson thank you so this past week in the Southeast Volusia which is in my district three the New Smyrna Beach Board of Realtors presented every single
008one of our principals from New Smyrna Edgewater and Oak Hill with checks to go towards their schools and I just want to say thank you because I know every little bit helps and every year they've been doing this so thanks for that also I went to a couple of the sac meetings at my schools and so I just want to thank all the parents and teachers who give up their time and students who give up their time to go to these Sac meetings to get information for their schools and then some who go to the DAC meeting so thank you for your participation there also both Spruce Creek and New Smyrna Beach have Homecoming this week and I know the students have been very excited they've been adorable homecoming proposals everyone's been dressing up so
009just want to remind everyone have a very fun yet safe homecoming weekend that's all thank you Mrs Burnett thank you so thank you to all of them and and kind of in your line I attended a SAC meeting as well at Atlantic and it's it's nice to see all the community participation um and again just trying to do good for the schools and there are students in there and it's nice to see them participate in that as well so thank you to everybody who's getting our schools off to a good year this year and I think we're already almost through our first quarter aren't we time just flies thank you thank you Mr persis thank you madam chair I'm assuming you're going to talk about PTA so I'm going to talk about uh I had
010a great visit at to uh Champion Elementary School I want to thank Shirley Shirley grounds for giving me that tour she she got me into a lot of class classrooms but this one classroom called the in the engagement lab oh my oh my there's only one in the whole County I'm even told there's only one in the whole state could that be true yeah only one in the whole state of Florida it's at Champion Elementary School it's like you walk into a planetarium it's a classroom or it can turn into Jurassic Park the whole thing I mean ceiling walls everything music it's even another world so uh very cool very cool I want to go back to school and stay in the engagement lab forever and it's very nice the teacher running that is Sarah
011Myers so thank you Sarah Myers for doing that thank you madam chair and I will just add a few more things that went on that several of us attended we were at the Futures principal of the Year breakfast and the superintendent's outstanding Achievement Award um and that is always a wonderful opportunity to celebrate our principles and our staff that work in other areas but I will I have to give a shout out once again to University High's culinary Department because those students do a phenomenal job they cook omelettes in front of you and all kinds of stuff and I I hope we continue to hold it there also I know Ms Thompson and I were both over at Sea Breeze High since we were here last time to support their FFA program they did a
012kickoff dinner and also did a cake auction and and I did come home with a cake that I then shared with other people but sometimes we don't realize that some of our activities and our students that are involved in things especially with FFA is that it takes a lot of money for these kids to go around found to different areas and even out of state to show their animals and so one of my favorite things and this does happen every month it's just some people don't know it but here in DeLand the DeLand middle and high FFA hold a musical Bingo and if you have never done musical Bingo it's actually a wonderful fun night so watch Facebook and see when there one is for next month and if you like Bingo come join us
013and then Mr cologne and I we are happy to support the backpack for buddies which is on here on the West side of the county and kellyanne marks actually started backpack for buddies and this is where they pack backpacks of food that they send home on weekends with some of our students that maybe wouldn't have the meals that they need and they had their Gala out at the fairgrounds and we attended in order to help them raise money to continue to provide all of our children with food even on the weekends and as everybody said we were at the PTA breakfast and they were in the 50s theme this year and it was a lot of fun but thank you and at this time we are going to move on to item 1.03 for approval
014of the minutes do I have someone who'd like to make a motion to approve the minutes move approval of the minutes Madam chair thank you Mr persis do I have a second I'll second that motion thank you Mrs Thompson any discussion okay then I will call for the vote at this time all those in favor of approving the minutes for the workshop and the school board meeting on September 12th please say aye aye any opposed it passes unanimously moving along item 2.01 agenda changes Dr balgaman are there any agenda changes before the agenda is presented to the board for approval Madam chair I have no changes at this time all right so you've heard the recommendation of the superintendent do I have someone for a motion to approve the agenda motion to approve thank you
015Mr clone do I have a second I'll second thank you Mrs Burnett any discussion we'll call for the vote all those in favor of approving the agenda for tonight's meeting please say aye aye any opposed it passes unanimously we are now at item 3.01 announcements by Dr Carmen balkaman our superintendent thank you madam chair board members members of the audience and those of you listen at home good afternoon to each and every one of you so I like to also start out by by doing a big shout out to all of our parents because we did have our very very first get together gathering with her and I will tell you if you have not experienced one of these our parents really knows how to throw a get together and it was a lot of
016fun but most importantly it's the level of commitment and support that they have and they have shown and they continue to show towards our vision mission and goals I'm extremely grateful first and foremost for choosing our public school system as the the organization to to provide that service which is learning to students so thank you for choosing our organization but also thank you so very much for supporting the work that we do we really could not do it without you also our business partners as you know they're really important stakeholders in the work that we do so we had our very first west side business partner meeting and for those of you who may not know we have 97 programs and academies in our school system starting with at the at the middle school level
017so we have career Pathways CTE Career and Technical education Pathways in our Middle School matriculating all the way to high school and to be at this point 97 and still growing so our business partners they do a really important job which is to connect early with the future Workforce of this community which is our students that connect early they sponsor these these uh program slash academies that we have and they they ensure that because our goal is to ensure that our students not only they're graduating with a high school diploma but they also have the Career and Technical education skill sets to be successful in our community and that's what we're doing making that connection early so thank you for your support also a shout out to our principles as you know every single one
018of our administrators in our County for the first time in a long time they have all engaged in 40 plus hours of professional learning this past summer so what are we doing with that professional learning we have completely restructured our plcs which is the ongoing collaboration that takes place with our administrators so that there's on the job embedded opportunities for them to apply that learning so the very first PLC for our principles will be October 5th and I want to thank all of them for embracing that mindset of continuous learning because we need to model that for our students as adults as well so congratulations to all of our principals also this month October is National bullying prevention month so there are several lessons that are going out to our schools as it pertains to
019respect and the importance of respect and how to model and demonstrate respect also there are lessons about bullying and what are some of the consequences of bullying I see some of our principals smiling in the audience because they probably already received it um and how to follow protocols for reporting in addition to that we also this October is Down syndrome awareness month so we also know the importance of showing being sensitive to all Learners and showing appreciation for all students um custodians fun fact we have 473 custodians working in our schools I'm proud to say that they all now they're back to where they belong to their schools it's not it's not outsourced anymore and what a difference it has made we're all seeing them as we're visiting our campuses so October the 2nd is
020National custodian awareness day and there's a message that has been recorded is going to be sent out to all of our custodians but here in Volusia County here in Volusia County every single one of us in the different roles in which we assume and we play we are important to the work and the process so thank you to all of our custodians for their diligence day after day in ensuring that all of our schools and working environments are safe and ready for students to learn also second through the third October 2nd through 3rd is Florida disability history and awareness week so again there will be several lessons going out reminding students and staff of inclusivity and showing respect and value for each other National coach appreciation day that's October 6th and you know our coaches
021if you really think about it approximately 50 percent of our our staff they model the Art and Science of teaching and learning and they do this day after day um so without them we we wouldn't have the level of Competency that is required for truly engaging lessons and I want to thank every single one of them because more than ever their roles are truly valued and appreciated in our school system so I hate to disappoint you this evening but I don't have a video for you right now but I'm sure you'll be okay with that all right although we love the videos I know you do thank you madam chair you're welcome thank you at this time we were moving on to item 4.01 administrative appointments and transfers Dr balgaman thank you madam chair board
022members I have one administrative appointment for you this evening and that would be Mr John whittick I will ask Mr whittick to join us please there he is so tell you to share a little bit with you regarding Mr whittak he's got a Bachelor's degree in Clinical Laboratory science from Santa Fe College he served in the Army from 1999 to 2002 so thank you sir for your service over five years of experience working with the city of Ormond Beach in the maintenance department he's been with Volusia County Schools since 2022 he started as a project manager with maintenance and then he became our coordinator for custodial services I am recommending Mr whittick to you this this evening to become the new assistant director for facilities maintenance and operations and if you approve board his effective
023date will be September 27 2023 and you know you already know the time Choice makes everybody come in early 11 o'clock you've got to pass that test the first week seven o'clock I'll be there thank you board members you've heard the recommendation of the superintendent do I have a motion move approval Madam chair thank you Mr persis do I have a second I'll second that motion thank you Miss Thompson any discussion I want to thank you for your service too and um this is this is a good thing so all right we will call for the vote at this time all those in favor please say aye aye any opposed it passes unanimously congratulations [Applause] it's your turn now personally I would like to say thank you for recognizing custodial Services those guys for oh
024those guys work their butts off every day and they come in and it's a thankless job and so I appreciate you mentioning sorry good afternoon Madam chair board members superintendent Dr bagelman I would thank you for your time today I can't express enough gratitude for your trust in me to be the new assistant director for maintenance and operations I'd like to thank John craft Janice Faust for their mentoring unwavering support and encouragement over the last year I also would like to thank my wife and my family for their support and unconditional love I recognize and understand the challenges and responsibilities of the position presents and I accept this challenge growing up in Volusia County I attended Westside Elementary Holly Hill Middle and Mainland High School I went to the Army as we mentioned and then
025I got my degree in Clinical Laboratory science my growth and experience professional and personal has led me to develop the skills necessary to be proficient and succeed as the assistant director of maintenance I believe we have a talented Workforce within our maintenance department who always does what's best for the students faculty and staff as assistant director I will focus on communication not only with maintenance department but all departments within the school board to ensure we are operational and we are strategically aligned as Dr Belgium would say together we are stronger go team Volusia hey [Applause] and please will his family come forward how are you doing thank you thank you congratulations okay at this time we're moving right along to item 5.01 recognition of our schools of character and this month it was respect thank
026you madam chair board members and VCS family as you know each month we honor students and staff who exemplifies the theme of our schools of character campaign and the initiative this initiative as you know it's to enhance Effectiveness safety security in our schools so let's talk a little bit about character there are certain components that that should be modeled and taught in our schools but character is equally important as the education that our students receive on a daily basis why it's the soft skills that brings it all together and it's important that students know that this is something that is important that we are looking for and that it's going to enhance their knowledge that they're obtaining on a daily basis his character my father used to say will open doors for you if you
027show or demonstrate the right characters traits so as you stated respect so the student for this month is no other than Camden Sutton Camden attends Volusia Pines Elementary I see his principle is here in a recent lesson on emotions that was taking place in the classroom cam Camden volunteered and asked the teacher to write a positive affirmation on the board so that students could always remember the importance of respecting each other isn't that wonderful love it Camden also patiently and respectfully teaches his classmate sign language so he's a little teacher already and candle Camden also he always has a smile on his face and he encourages others even in the hardest of time so he already is a role model also thank you Camden for caring about others and being a role model of respect
028cam Camden is going to join us with his wonderful principle Mrs Gordon who's here Julie Gordon and his grandparents so that he can be recognized also in support of Cameron this evening we have his teacher Ms Jamie Carson and his former teacher look how popular Camden is and his former teacher he's got a whole Entourage Jessica ribress as they join along with his para Alicia Smith so this kid is super famous a true VIP we're going to recognize them can I talk a little bit about the uh the staff member and then we can do one at a time okay so now the second is a staff member and the staff member who best exemplifies respect for September is Mr Jose Rodriguez Mr Jose Rodriguez served on the custodial staff how appropriate right on the
029custodian staff at Citrus Grove Elementary he's incredible according to his principle and the staff there this they describe him as incredibly helpful and has such a respectful attitude he speaks in a in a kind and respectful manner always to staff and students Mr Rodriguez also lets his team know that he's happy to help with whatever is needed at the school thank you Mr Rodriguez for exemplifying respect within Volusia County Schools and for all of our students and families and partners thank you for modeling that now I'm going to say a little bit in Spanish here because Mr Rodriguez understands Spanish that's his first language he's working on the English part aita okay so this is okay we'll go with the Student First Student First yay [Applause] um I can't understand I can walk through right
030now all night don't worry we get paid by the hours [Laughter] thank you take your time okay oh yeah okay okay that's right and congratulations thank you communication congratulations we are now moving on to item 5.02 for recognition of our Volusia County legislative delegation in attendance tonight we have representative Webster Barnaby and we also have Duncan demarsh the legislative aide for representative Chase Tremont if all of you that are here would like to come forward and sit right in the chairs did I miss anyone Dr balkaman thank you madam chair as our chair has mentioned we are very very excited to have this opportunity where we're able to recognize the members of our Volusia County delegation to the Florida legislator and obviously all of their efforts for the 2023 legislative session so to share a
031little bit with you and and chair I know you will share a little bit more along with our board members house rep uh Barnaby he fought and put on a really good fight to improve life for Florida families from school choice tax relief programs to protecting parental rights he supported local Volusia businesses supporting the economy and blue collar workers and aiding veterans in conjunction with the legislative priorities for Florida families so thank you so very much house rep paraby we know that Mr Duncan thank you for being here representing Chase Draymond to share a little bit you know trayman is a former High School history teacher and a basketball coach of Volusia County so you know we can always call on him if we need to fill a position yeah I'm just saying right his
032number one priority has always been fighting for Florida families as well last session he passed legislation to inform foster care students about their rights to provide much needed care to physically handicapped children as we know that's an area he's very passionate about and to also strengthen the services provided to or the department of Elder affairs so I know that also I would like to mention and they couldn't be here with us but we couldn't go without mentioning Representatives Stan McLean Thomas sleek and also Senator Travis Hudson and Tom Wright so now chair we do have a presentation at the end but I know that you and the board would like to say some words this evening so we are so appreciative of both of you along with those that could not join us tonight because
033they already had other commitments but we appreciate and honor the fact that whenever we come to Tallahassee you're always so open and available to be able to speak with us and be supportive of what's Happening Here with education and it took all of you this past legislative time in order to help us do away with the DCd which had been harming Volusia County for a very long time we sent our dollar up and we only got like 96 cents back and I know even tonight there are some retired Educators here in the room that even helped Champion you know that if we send our dollar up could we have our dollar back and so we are so appreciative of the work all of you did under the guidance of Representative leak to get that changed
034so that Volusia County then would not continue to lose the money that we were losing but we also want to thank you for the things that you did where you also brought some funding back into the district for our education programs and we were recently all up at Sea Breeze high with Senator Tom Wright when he presented the money there for the welding program under the FFA and so the fact that you you look around our community and you look at the things that are needed and you support the education of our children which are our future and you take the time to meet with us and hear us out and we don't always have to agree but the nice thing is is that we I believe all of us feel comfortable that we can
035reach out and have nice open dialogue and discussion so we wanted to take this chance before you head up and kick off this year's session to just say thank you thank you so very much for being advocates for our children also do I have any other board member that would like Mr cologne so the one thing I want to thank you all for I know it was a last minute thing was uh as you know the requirements for graduation uh the scores for the testing were upped after having been level for many many years and this was the last group of students who initially started during the covid times and so um I I think the difference that it made for our community or for Volusia County was close to 400 and some 470 300
036and something students who otherwise would have walked out of school with a certificate of of attendance rather than their high school diploma and I am hopeful that we will once again consider or reconsider those cut scores to be level as they've been before so thank you Miss Thompson good evening and thank you both for being here I really appreciate it it's great to see you guys um I Echo the sentiments of my board members I'm so thankful for everything you've done but I'm also extremely thankful that I know if we have issues that we can call you I've spoken to school board members from around the state and not everyone is as fortunate as we are to have members up in Tallahassee that we can call express our issues that we have here at the
037school board and who will care and do something about it so thank you so much I'm looking forward to this session because I know we've all discussed our last meeting the issues that we have and I am going to plug again that we need to save chocolate milk thank you so much laughs just in case you missed that she does not want chocolate milk taken away oh sad Mrs Burnett thank you I just want to express my gratitude as well I know that the DCd has been a a topic for many years well before I even came onto the board about bringing some more money back to our our County for our students and our school so thank you for your support on that and look forward to coming up there at the beginning of
038next year and discussing some new opportunities that we can work on together again so thank you for your support Mr persis thank you thank you madam chair and uh thank you gentlemen uh tell representative Tremont to keep his certification active we can get him back here uh of course I couldn't let them go without an ask right right Dr valderman so uh keep in mind that this year we are starting that Community School at Campbell a middle school and we would really like to have one at Holly Hill school too they deserve that you know Holly Hill schools the only School in the city of Holly Hill and it would just be the perfect perfect place to start that the next school year so hope you can keep that in your thinking as you go
039back to Tallahassee thank you all again so much so at this time we'd love for you to you because for photos but if you'd like to say anything before we do that we're happy to also give you a few minutes to speak I just want to say thank you to all of you for what you're doing for all of our students in Volusia County uh it Thrills me to to think how important education is and I'm excited that The Best Is Yet To Come I was so happy to get that DCd situation squared up fixed and we're going to keep chocolate milk we're going to make sure that uh all your requests are are honored uh certainly the Appropriations for the community program at Campbell school is a great request and you're welcome to come
040to my office and see me my legislative aide could not be here this evening Mr Drake Wyman and we'll be happy to carry that in Appropriations for you Mr purses thank you good good request all right thank you Dr balderman thank you so much I'm so honored for the great work you're doing for the county and you represent us well at the school board thank you sir it really takes a village so I'm equally grateful for all of us and the work that you're all doing to support us thank you I'm having that over here I know thank you [Applause] okay at this time we are moving on to item 7.02 approval of the consent agenda items oh wait for approvement Dr balkaman do you have anything you'd like to remove from the consent agenda
041Madam chair not that not at this time no board members do you have any items you'd like to remove from the consent agenda for discussion no ma'am but I would like to make a comment regarding 9.01 9.01 for Mr cologne anyone else want to make a comment on an item okay then Mr cologne so it's it's kind of hidden under approval of graduation venue but ladies and gentlemen the graduation schedule is on this agenda item and uh if approved there you have it because I've had lots of people reach out to me say what tell me about the graduation schedule so it's there yay and if you haven't looked at it yet it is the week running up to the Memorial Day weekend this year but please be assured after this year we'll be back
042on track and it'll follow the Memorial Day weekend so we apologize for that but that's where it's at the Ocean Center was already booked any other items for discussion then at this time since there are no changes I'd like to call for a motion to well wait do we have any cards okay I'd like to call for a motion to approve the consent agenda item do I have someone remove approval of the consent agenda as printed and presented drive a second I'll second thank you Mrs brunette since there's no other discussion at this time I'll call for the vote all those in favor of approving the consent agenda items please say aye aye any opposed it's unanimous then we are moving right along to item 17. no 16.01 the project oversight committee annual report for
0432023. at this time with the members that are present that are on the project oversight committee please come forward with Dr Hazel thank you all right good evening chair Haynes board members and superintendent valgabin it is a pleasure to be here to present the annual report of the project oversight committee for the fiscal year that concluded on June 30th 2023. joining me tonight to present this important report is Mitch ayton director of CRM systems at Embry-Riddle University and he is joined by Jason Meyer I would like to take a moment to acknowledge our committee members both those who are in attendance and those who are joining us remotely we also in addition to the two gentlemen with me we have Miss Sandy Bishop Mr Jake Lammers Miss um and Mr Todd cease who couldn't be
044here tonight as well they're valuable contributions Have Been instrumental in shaping this report that is about to be presented the presentation of course aligns with Goal 4 resources and operational processes and just to give a brief history the project oversight committee was established to report on the implementation progress status and completion of the half cent projects as required by the referendum it consists of six private citizens and one member of the Volusia County School administration which is me the committee is required to prepare and present an annual report within 90 days of the fiscal year and I am now going to turn it over to my partners to present you there with their report good evening Madam chair board members Dr balgeman it's good to see everybody again um as we covered already there's there's
045six members a little closer to you a little closer sure six members of our project oversight committee my name is Mitch ayton I'm the director of CRM systems at Ember riddle Aeronautical University which she missed and not with us tonight but Sandy Bishop she is a Florida real estate broker she's quite knowledgeable in the commercial real estate industry Jacob Lammers a CPA Jim Mather is president of Patos home so he's a home builder Jason Myers who's with me today he's the CEO of synergy billing and Kim short who was on the committee for quite some time she is actually no longer on the committee she's recently taken a role with the school district and then of course Todd slice who is the CFO and has been representing and I wanted to make sure that we
046highlighted that because it kind of demonstrates the broad array of individuals that we have on the committee and quite a bit of different backgrounds I have a background in technology educational technology we have an accountant we have a commercial real estate broker so quite a bit of knowledge that we bring to the committee and it's it's really interesting to see how things kind of shake out whenever we're having conversation and and who's able to provide their expertise whenever we we meet um this is just a record of the the meetings that we've had over the last year the last fiscal year looks like we have about eight meetings there's a couple that we take off during the holidays and whatnot but we try to meet almost monthly to make sure that we have a good
047um Cadence going the referendum covers six categories new and replacement schools significant specific and significant Renovations technology security science classroom you're Remodeling and then the Athletics and phys Ed uh uh called the um Fields tracks and Fields thank you um just to kind of highlight some of the major accomplishments in each of those areas so Deltona Middle it was actually completed last year but we had a phase two of that project that kind of carried into this fiscal year Beachside Elementary opened in January of 2023. Woodward Elementary obviously just recently was renovated and opened in progress we've got Tomoka Elementary which is expected for July of 2024. Stark Elementary which is expected July 2025 and Orange City Elementary is also expected in July of 2025 so that's some of the major accomplishments in our new
048and replacement schools when we're talking oh and uh dollar amount we had nearly 40 million dollars spent in the last fiscal year for those projects for security we continue to improve our security fencing camera systems door locks installation of something that was new to me which was bi-directional amplification systems which is basically our emergency response radios and improving our Communications with our local law enforcement so we spent about 1.6 million dollars on that over the last fiscal year technology about 3.4 million dollars primarily for about 17 000 student workstations for the elementary schools we did refresh about 500 staff devices for the Athletics and phys Ed about 620 000 for resurfacing tracks basketball tennis courts and we've installed a couple of sand volleyball courts which I just happened to notice one at DeLand High School
049right out by the road there so that was very nice to see and then specific and significant Renovations those are specific items that were earmarked or in the referendum for things like HVAC improvements new ceiling lighting roofs fire alarms gem bleachers those types of things and so we spent about 10 million dollars on that over the last fiscal year so all said and done we've we've had about 55 million dollars over the last fiscal year our original project budget was about 480 million dollars and thus far since the Inception of The Haves and sales tax we've spent 297 million dollars so we're well into that that's money that hopefully has made an impact on the county and the way that the schools are are being run um our sales tax revenue for this fiscal year
050was about 64 million dollars which was a little bit shy of our 65 million dollar projection so 90 just a little shy we'll take that well that's right um moving on so um I think this is just a recap of some of the numbers I just uh a second ago I forgot that slide was in there so I'll move on um we always like to highlight some of the internal and external influences whenever we do our report there's many things that affect the way the the half cent sales tax dollars are spent um so these are the types of things that come up during our meetings one of the most important things that we've talked about is our deferred maintenance of major systems and that's something that we've asked and inquired about quite a bit
051over the years we're encouraged this year to hear that the district is doing an assessment they've outsourced a professional firm to come in and make some assessments of some of the major systems so we're looking forward to see the outcomes of that and how that might influence or inform the decision making kind of moving forward um the ripple effect of growth you know Volusia County is a great County I've lived here my entire life I love it here apparently so does everybody else and so you know the University of Florida had a study that they did recently and on the low side they expected growth of about 10 percent on the high side about 25 so if you can think about 25 percent more people coming to the county that spent another 125 000 people
052that's quite a significant amount of growth over the next several years um and so we wanted to highlight that because things like that are going to play an important role in zoning and busing and where are we going to put these kids when they when they show up so making sure that we have seats available for the students when they arrive the science classrooms we call this a lost opportunity because we have about eight million dollars allocated for science classroom renovations and thus far we've effectively spent none of that money and not only have we not spent it but it's not even allocated for anything and so that's a um something that we want to call out as an opportunity hopefully using the word lost is not totally descriptive of it hopefully it's something we
053can recover we think that there's some some progress being made on that we've recently heard that they're doing some reevaluations and maybe their the need today is not as great as it once was and so we're looking for the school district to provide some opportunity to provide some evaluation to maybe Identify some other opportunities for that money one thing that we did want to highlight there was the mobile science classroom that you guys may be aware of and we did agree that that could be funded out of out of the half cent sales tax money it's very much in line with the science classroom um initiative there or that allocation and so we felt that that was a good intent for that money but that was only a couple hundred grand so that and say
054only a couple hundred grand but out of the the big picture that was just a small drop in the bucket um cost of inflation obviously we're all affected by inflation um federal government raised the interest rates many times over the last fiscal year so it went up to five and a quarter percent during the fiscal year I think now it's up to five and a half percent another 25 basis points obviously this affects our consumer spending um so we we all feel that impact consumers spending of course is direct reflection on the amount of half cent sales tax that is collected um so we do have that to to consider but then when it comes to new construction we have things like the cost of construction such as wood being up on average about 16
055percent uh steel up 22 percent concrete at 15 percent all of that just means more dollars flowing out and uh less flowing in and we're always again up against the Race Against Time too right because with a lot of these projects they're time driven we're trying to get everything done by the new school year so we've got those Rising costs along with the timetable so it's really a delicate Balancing Act that's so our recommendation for that is to work very closely with the contractors I think the school district does have some relationships with some contractors that they've worked with in the past and I think building those relationships and making sure that we're putting pressure on those contractors to really work hard for us and make sure that they're getting us the best prices and
056so that's really important to make sure that that's passed along to the to the residents of the county and then last we wanted to call out the state of the project oversight committee we've had quite a few changes over the committee the last few years we are a volunteer committee we represent the residents of Volusia County and but one thing has always remained is that we remain steadfast and making sure that we hold you guys accountable hold the district accountable for the spending of the half cent sales tax making sure that we remain transparent and that information is Flowing to us in a way that we can then present it every year and we can make sure that we're you know giving the citizens of Volusia County the confidence that the money is being spent
057the way that it was intended just just to add to that so we make recommendations not decisions right but this is this program this referendum is really a gift for us to be able to enhance the spaces in which we all grow and learn I mean growing up here in Volusia County attending Tomoka Elementary being able to see that school be rebuilt with new imagination and it's going to shape lives for generations to come this is really a an awesome opportunity for us and for us we're just we're trying to be good stewards because nobody wants to pay more taxes than they have to so our job is to kind of be the Watchdogs to make sure that good decisions are being made and make sure that those dollars are being spent as originally intended
058and so it's exciting to be a part of that and see how it really is shaping and technology and security and Facilities to see a lot of our young people be influenced by the evolution of our school system which elevates the game for everybody as we wrap up today I'd like to commend The District staff we we work very closely with several of the District staff I think they have to put up with us sometimes you know we ask some hard questions but they always provide us the answers that we need they're respectful with the responses um I wrote down just uh they uh our efforts or collaborative efforts so the district have resulted in effective communication allowing us to fulfill our oversight responsibilities and so I feel like that's a you know a great
059Testament to the relationship that we built over the years and I look forward to continuing that I did want to close with one more statement this is basically I'm going to read the last paragraph or so of our conclusion because I think it kind of sums up the way the the committee feels and then I'll open it up for board member comments after that our shared goal is to ensure that Volusia County taxpayers have confidence in the responsible management of their resources as the district continues to navigate the challenges and opportunities that lie ahead the project oversight committee stands ready to support initiatives that prioritize the best interest of the 63 000 students of Volusia County we look forward to collaborating with the district in the pursuit of educational excellence and fiscal responsibility responsibility in
060the year ahead as we complete our seventh year of oversight on behalf of the taxpayers of bush accounting we reaffirm our confidence that our tax dollars are being utilized in a responsible manner and with that I will close it do you have any final comments thank you Mr cologne oh will you guys switch places Mrs Burnett he's switching it up on us anyway I just want to express my gratitude I know that it's a volunteer committee that uh that you all set on and it's very important for us to hear from you and I appreciate that you guys take the time to give us thorough input and and I like to hear that because it helps me make decisions so thank you so much for your time appreciate it and I do want to thank
061you not only for the time you know last year this time when the recommendation came we were sort of Rocky at the time and we were sort of you know we didn't know where we were um you know there's lots of transition and change and that was one of the concerns of the oversight committee and I'm glad to hear one year later that a lot of those concerns have been uh healed the other thing I want to thank you for the recommendations you know uh it's a lot of times folks think these committees are rubber stamp committees but you know you're pointing out for example the the fact that we have money allocated for science labs that we had not taken advantage of that's huge and so um I I want to thank you for
062for that recommendation because you know what good is a report if it doesn't help you be better and do better so again thank you for that and and I look forward to uh spending that eight million dollars in our science lab so thank you I I thought you were going to say something else go ahead the person yeah I thought you were going to say I want to use that eight million dollars in the Deltona area or something like that Mr that would make me predictable now however I know I know uh I do want to thank you it is a volunteer committee it's a huge responsibility though I mean you know you're overseeing 65 give or take million dollars every year so uh that is that is huge I would ask you to as
063you're looking at things uh uh think about Equity uh think about particularly at high schools uh you know if if you're if we're lighting feels let's say does every High School have lighted Fields if you're putting in volleyball whatever does every High School have it just kind of just take a take a snapshot and look and and just see I think that would help that they could be a good use of our of our funds and um we're always trying to keep things you know as you know Equitable and try to keep it as high up level as possible because we want all of our students to have access to the same sort of things everywhere whether they live in Deltona or New Smyrna or wherever so we have such a great I think we
064have excellent facilities uh here and uh this thank you to the community that votes for this half cent sales tax which oh probably now it's up to what the 35 percent of this tax is paid by tourists I I believe so thank you tourists even though they can't hear my voice right now but yeah so it's it's just a a wonderful opportunity and we're grateful to have the revenue and grateful to have your service on the committee I thank you both Dr Balkan thank you madam chair so Mr Meyer it's so nice seeing you again and I want to thank you also Mr atten and the entire committee I mean you guys work putting so many hours behind scene and it's you know when you're retired usually you want to travel and have a great
065time but we've got some retirees on on this committee that really are volunteering their time and they have been steadfast servicing our students here in Volusia County so I want to publicly thank them and for those of you who still have a job and also finding the time to volunteer thank you for doing so I made a big notation here about the eight million dollars I want you to know because you've made my night if it's I don't know what time it is because you have to watch one of our upcoming board meeting where we're going to be unveiling and talking a little bit about a stem lab that's going to be on Wheels and actually I was talking to staff I'm like we have to find some money because we're going to be doing
066XYZ with with this mobile app so thank you so much because this money will will be spent for our students and staff great yes Mrs Thompson and I would be remiss if I tuned in thank you guys the whole committee for everything you do and Mr Lamers from District 3 appreciate it I know he's not here tonight but um I appreciate url's work especially with the volleyball courts I'm glad you got to go see him I went to see him as well and they did turn out very very nice and when they were talking about that I too thought of that new project that you're talking about so I'm excited to see all this work together so thank you for being here tonight and thank you for our staff as well who's participated so I'll
067finish this up with a big thank you because I know that whenever you step forward and you volunteer your time you we probably sell it to you that it's oh just going to be a little bit of time and it's it's a whole lot more than a little bit of time and the fact that truthfully you're you're a small group that meets together but your responsibility to oversee that the tax money that is raised is spent correctly is a very huge job and the time that each of you give and some of you have served from the Inception of the committee um I want to thank you and I want you to I I want you to know that we do appreciate and we are here at any time you know to also answer any
068questions you have and I know sometimes we come and ask you questions about things that are coming up or share information but what's been nice to me is that there's also been at times some flexibility where you know when we've seen that a school needs something that we weren't expecting it's nice that you'll hear out what needs to be done and work with us so that that like area can be addressed and corrected or you know and and even though I know that the Haves and sales tax money is not funding to reachey right now um you know at that push to mocha back just a little but we do appreciate how everybody worked together on that so that we could address that community and get all of our Tori T kids back home to
069go to school instead of busing them out but we do appreciate everything that you do and we thank you and we hope that you will stay on the committee and continue to volunteer your time to serve Volusia County in this way well I'd be remiss if I didn't acknowledge my colleagues and just they are so passionate about this and as we sit in and listen in on these committee meetings there's I've learned so much about our district they know so much right so it really is a group of people that is passionate and committed to the district to our children so it's just I they work so hard especially Mitch here I mean I just want to recognize him especially I mean he really does and those that are not here Sandy Kim the other
070other colleagues that are just so active in this they do put a lot into this so I just want to make sure that that you all have recognized it but I've seen it firsthand as well great all right thank you very much and at this time we're going to take a short break and we will be back in at 6 00 pm to start the public input period of time um there will be five speakers at that time Mr purses okay oh okay it's it's still down oh it does okay we are back at this time we are on item 6.01 public participation concerning oh sorry we're on item 15.1 public participation concerning anything to do with education so at this time it'll be a total of up to 15 minutes will be provided for
071public comment and I have five cards each of you will have three minutes I'm going to call the first two names so the first Speaker may join us at the podium and the second speaker will be ready our first Speaker this evening is Mr Carmen rosamondo the city manager for DeBerry next will be Mrs Daisy Grimes well okay thank you chairman members of the board superintendent thank you very much for for your invite um I want to get your attention today and I'm hoping I'm getting everybody's attention today about the live local act in its current form the live local act will devastate not only to Barry Volusia County and Volusia County Schools the Affordable Care Act or live local act Senate Bill 102 is designed for a multi-family uh housing to be able to
072be built on commercial industrial or mixed-use property it allows for the the developer to use the highest density in the entire city it also allows a developer to use the highest structure allowable within one mile of his of their particular property currently in the city to Berry we just approved a commercial property with two commercial out parcels and nine industrial buildings we were looking forward to 50 to 100 million dollar tax base from this property 300 to 500 jobs it this live local Act is so lucrative to apartment Builders they're able to purchase these particular properties and and allow these developers not to build commercial property um this particular property um the built the developer is going to allow his property to expire because it's more lucrative based upon the offer that he has and
073it is going to be turned into an apartment complex and under the Affordable Care Act uh this this project is going to turn up to came house up to 759 apartments and that's just one project of many four that we think are are at risk the Affordable Care Act is not really affordable because inside of the city of DeBary under the Florida under this particular statute affordable is housing from sixteen hundred dollars a month to twenty four hundred dollars a month qualifies for affordable DeBary is the highest medium income uh City in West Volusia and the second highest in Volusia County and all of the Affordable Care Act of the affordable uh this act um allows the medium income of a particular City to be used as qualifying as affordable when forty percent of these
074apartments are considered affordable these properties are available for a 75 percent tax exemption if they're if there are if there are below 80 percent of median income there are eligible for 100 percent tax exemption so the city DeBerry is going from a 50 to 100 million dollar commercial property to maybe up to 759 apartments with zero tax dollars uh the the uh fortunately on the city of DeBary we'll have to increase our taxes simply to handle the infrastructure of 4 000 trips per day from this apartment complex and I remind you this is only one apartment complex so I ask you take a look at this there's a city to Berry multiply it by 17 times because you have 17 cities uh inside inside the city of Volusia County so please pay attention thank you
075Mr rosamondo next up is Miss Daisy Grimes followed by Mrs Cynthia Slater welcome Miss Grimes good afternoon and thank you so much to each of you our board members uh who have been elected to represent every student in the Volusia County District I am Daisy Grimes and I represent the Volusia County African-American Leadership Council which is a council of over 73 members who are presidents of 73 African African-American organizations here and Volusia County I am here to express my thoughts regarding several issues currently that have been brought to our attention that possibly will come before you this board as I understand you the board may be asked to ban certain books from our school library system because a few individuals have decided such information does not line up with their thinking or perceptions book Bandit
076is a very dangerous issue all we have to do is look back at history and we will see that Hitler began his regime with the banding of books it is a very slippery slope to do that as we are talking about mind control as a parent and grandparent I am concerned about our children's education but it is wrong for me to dictate what goes on in another parent or grandparents household even if it different from what goes on in my own to severely ban books even without a process leaves us all open to inconsistency who's to say that there are people who have different Faith than mine and we want to ban the Bible the Quran or any other religious book because they do not believe as I do for example our governor and his
077supporters tried to portray critical race Theory as something that will cause white kids to hate America slavery and lynching has not caused black kids to hate America so certainly I cannot understand his rationale regarding other kids history is history that was and is a false Narrative of his they have labeled critical race series and smartest to build a resentment to what was a minor law school class that examines civil rights laws and cases and have sold it to the general public that it was going to cause America to fall apart let me say in segregation and Jim Crow did make us fall apart critical race Theory won't cause us to fall apart but the idea of banning books what it does is scare people and folks react without truly understanding what is really going on
078I hope that you as elected officials will not fall into this madness and with a broad brush stroke and paint everything bad you have an established rating system if there is a problem review it thank you so much thank you Mr Slate um Mrs Grimes next up is Mrs Cynthia Slater followed by Dr Nikki Jenkins his Slater had to leave but I'm going to leave her message with you to review oh okay thank you very much so Dr Mickey junkins she will be followed by Dr Michelle Macklin good evening chairman Haynes members of the board and superintendent balgeman some of you know me as a long time Volusia educator but I am here this evening representing as president of the League of Women Voters of Volusia County the league believes strongly that a public school
079system is vital to the future of our country over the last few months the issue of what books to allow in our schools has been highly debated often that discussion has been heated and has created much controversy and division within our community the league supports the notion that all parents have a right to decide what materials are appropriate for their child questions regarding appropriateness for all students are best addressed by The District's book challenge process as long as that book is reviewed in its entirety and the process is fair transparent allows for representation of all perspectives and is followed in applied consistency the entire Community will be well served it's time to move on we are concerned that the ongoing focus on this issue is diverting attention from critical educated educational priorities that we can
080all agree on we all want every child to graduate with the skills and academic knowledge necessary to be successful in our complex world we all want our classrooms to be staffed by highly qualified committed Educators and we certainly want all students and faculty to feel safe from harassment and physical harm we are however falling short in some of these areas data indicate that since covid large numbers of students have experienced significant learning loss in Reading mathematics and science while you are making progress work remains recruiting and retaining teachers is becoming increasingly more difficult the ongoing negative rhetoric is demoralizing and distracting for our teachers who work tirelessly to meet the needs of their students every single day many are leaving the profession for greener pastors fewer are willing to come into a profession that seems
081under attack ask for safety we know we have a serious problem when Sheriff Chitwood feels it necessary to issue an impassioned plea to the community and parents to get a grip on student violence the school system cannot do this alone the only way to solve these challenges is for all of us to work together with our school system to bring a laser-like focus to finding Solutions and supporting those responsible for our children's education if we do not address these issues soon collectively many of our students may not be prepared to assume their roles in our society if that is the case then shame on all of us I want to thank you for allowing me to speak tonight and I also want to thank each and every one of you for the service to our
082children thank you next up is Dr Michelle Macklin welcome Dr Macklin good evening members of the diocese make it make sense I'm a teacher I'm an educator for Volusia County School our school scores increased in all areas except acceleration for algebra and geometry which were excluded yet our bam scores went down make it make sense our teachers gave their time to provide before after and Saturday tutoring to move students and they receive vam scores of a two make it make sense our Ela classes had an 11 increase despite having a substitute teacher 80 percent of the year and all they got was a rating of basic make it make sense we recognized at Southwestern middle an 11 increase in ela 45.3 increase in math four percent increase in science and a nine percent increase in
083Civics from pm1 to pm3 yet our effect size calculation resulted in a negative impact I'd like to know what standard deviation methodology was used for coins and what statistical power was used for the pre and actual calculations make it make sense administrators received vam scores of three but the instructional staff that did the work made twos make it make sense when I questioned my score I was told to send an email to an unmanned email address to which I have still four days later not gotten a response then to make matters worse we received an email from the district that basically said it is what it is not our calculations make it make sense the current bam calculations have reduced my income by a thousand thirty nine dollars to fifteen hundred and twelve dollars because
084my increase is based on my bam score while losing that amount may not mean much to you for my family it's a big deal it's a significant loss my colleagues and I work extremely hard each day including weekends to ensure that our students are learning and developing appropriately and that student proficiency increases so we should be recognized not penalized for our hard work and your van calculations paint a very derogatory and negative picture causing us the people in the field to be punished make it make sense thank you Dr Macklin at this time we are moving on on our agenda to item 17.01 Dr balgeman yes Madam chair I'll ask uh our general counsel Mr pendeley to present these board action items to you welcome Mr penley thank you madam superintendent Madam chair board members
085the following board action items 17.01 through 17.18 our request to adopt policy amendments that were approved at the August 22nd meeting for advertising those advertisements have been accomplished in all of these policies stand right for review for adoption tonight there have been no public comments received and I don't believe we have any cards for any of the policies from 1701 to 1718 so with the board's permission if we could just move those in at this time I think would be appropriate okay so it appears that um the individual I want to just double check on the cards to make sure we don't have any but in the event we don't have any speakers public input for item 17.01 through 17.18 I'd like to see if someone would like to make a motion that we vote
086on those all together instead of separately these items were workshopped then they were brought to a board meeting there was a lot of discussion there was rewriting then we voted upon the Rewritten policies for advertisement and we put them out to advertise which we met we exceeded the minimum number of days they had to advertise and they're back up tonight just to vote Yes or no so do I have a board member that would like to make a motion that we vote on item 17.01 through 1718 as a group I'm sure I do have a question on 17.21 which one uh the district advisory committee okay that is not in 17.01 through 17.18. so we're looking at those that have already been fully vetted and advertised so Madam chair may I make a motion that
087we approve item 17.01 Point through 17.18 all those policies contained therein okay Mr persis has made a motion do I have a second I'll second that motion thank you Mrs Thompson all right it's open for discussion is there any discussion on item 17.01 through 17.18 . so I want to thank Mr pendley for answering all of our questions I know we thoroughly vetted these at a previous meeting and have had the opportunity to discuss any concerns with these policies uh in between that time and you said we received no public cards or comment on any of these I've received no questions at all but concerning any of those advertised policies sir great thank you so I uh that I want to thank you for that thank you all right I'm going to double check one
088more time is there any public input at all for item 17.01 through 17.18 okay that's one that's not in this question okay that's 21. yeah that's 21 yeah all right then we have a motion and we have a second I'm going to call for a vote all those in favor of adopting the final policies 17.01 through 17.18 please say aye any opposed it passes unanimously we are now moving on to item 17.19. this is a policy that has not yet been advertised Mr penley Madam chair board members thank you yes item 17.19 request the board's authorization to advertise proposed amendments to policy 417 leave terminal pay and holiday Provisions the board may recall we had discussion about this at the August 22nd meeting this policy is being amended to reflect a board requested change from
0899 to 12 holidays in Section 3 A1 on page 18 of the Personnel policy so there are no other changes to that we did update the effective date and revision date but the only change there was from 9 to 12 on page 18 this policy had not been previously uploaded in the correct position that was corrected and is has been included in board docs for the public facing Outlook of that and uh unless there any questions we would ask that the board consider this policy tonight for advertising only thank you I'd like to remind the board members that we've already discussed this we actually um in June added three holidays three paid holidays back in to the calendar that had previously been taken away those three paid holidays were the Fourth of July President's Day
090and Veterans Day and so the policy therefore then had to come back up for a change so that it read on page 18 instead of nine it reads 12. we did talk about this at a board meeting and it's now here for us to vote on whether or not to advertise the change so Mr cologne so I'd still want to appeal this board to add Juneteenth to the approved holidays for this policy thank you Mr cologne any other discussion all right then I'd like to call for a motion to advertise policy Madam chair I'd like to make a motion that we add Juneteenth to our holidays hey board members you've heard Mr clones yeah I I was thinking that just to get some clarification of that okay the impact in what day that it really
091would fall on I know it seems to vary from District to state to state even Mr cologne if that's good with you I mean I'm just trying to yeah okay I'm just trying to all right I'm Dr balkeman yes uh last time I think the board had requested that we do some research regarding yeah yeah yeah so um I will ask Dr Hazel who's conducted that research to come up and share with you based on what your request was all right you all asked me and I'm gonna pull this up if you'll just give me a second if you look into several aspects of Juneteenth as a holiday particularly what um what districts currently recognize Juneteenth as a holiday and what information what it would impact as far as summer school professional learning many of
092those things were hard to determine because although Juneteenth is very stable our District calendars are not always stable so depending on when the calendar committee adopts the end of the school year would matter whether it would impact Juneteenth if we know far enough in advance of course Arrangements can be made but it is very dependent upon the calendar committee um currently we have found two other districts that recognize Juneteenth as a holiday the one thing I do want to point out though is the policy itself doesn't spell out particular holidays it gives a number of paid holidays per pay type the which holidays we pay for and which days are non-work days are at we work that out each year with the payroll calendar which then gets adopted by the school board so in the
093actual policy it's just a number of paid holidays whether that's um I think it's currently it's currently nine it was going to 12. was The Proposal so even if if you designate there are 12 paid holidays then the payroll department then does an analysis looks at the holidays selects those now I know when that decision was made there was a lot of conversation I believe it was around July 4th and so that was the conversation at the amongst the board but that would impact the payroll calendar which you adopt each if that makes sense Mr cologne thanks so Madam chair I'll amend my motion to up it to 13 days instead of 12 I think Veterans Day and uh are equally as important and so I'm proposing 13. days okay so you're withdrawing your first
094emotion and you're making a new motion that we increase from nine paid holidays to 13 paid holidays correct I'll second that I just wanted can someone tell us tell us what those holidays are now I'm I've lost track of Dr Hazel do you have the list I have the list of holidays I just want to verify can you pull up I I have the list of holidays as far as what um other districts have okay and it really would come down to whether or not we do non-work days or holidays I mean either either way um so we we could go from nine holidays to 12 and added we have non-work days and we could add another non-work day well the notes that I have that were sent from Stephanie Workman and I just want
095to read this one just in case it's an option um for 12-month employees if the number of paid holidays was increased from 12 which is the current proposal 213 we the they would have the day off and be paid for it obviously another option would be to move the current paid holiday one of the two days at Thanksgiving so two days at Thanksgiving that are paid holidays for 12 month employees to Juneteenth and make the Thanksgiving day a non-work day similar to what we do during the win when we have correct that is correct yeah it's kind of confusing um non-work day in a holiday you know sounds like the same thing so it well the difference is the payment so we are paid for 255 or 250 days those are the 12 months right
096you're paid for 250 or 255 so if you subtract then the the 12 days then you're actually working 238 or 242 242 days right it the difference is what you're paid for but then you would still then we have the non-work days because there's more days in a year than the 200. and so it doesn't affect their pay in any way correct I heard someone say correct correct Mr penley Mr West okay I think I understand so I think we are observing every federal holiday except Columbus Day would that be correct that is that is correct yes okay this is what I needed yes thank you so much the paid holidays Labor Day then there are three days at Thanksgiving holiday Christmas Day the 26th the 30th of December Martin Luther King Day and Memorial
097Day and then we have non-work days which include Veterans Day other winter break days and spring break and that's for 250 day employees 255 day because we have some 12-month or 250 some that are 255 255 work spring break did you say July 4th and we have 260. that's correct did you say July 4th July 4th would be with this amended proposal would go up to the paid holidays we could do that it's just a matter of how you want with this is the proposed this is as the policy is so if when we increase that we would then have 12 paid holidays to work with so we could look at those those days and either make them non-work days or make them paid holidays I am so then would it be the calendar committee
098who decided which 13 days or would we have it written down these are the days that are the 13 days so the formal calendar committee that works off of your policy not this policy but the calendar policy it meets to discuss the student's school year and they make or make a recommendation on that there is a separate group that works on payroll and work calendars which they wait until they get the calendar committee and then they develop the payroll schedules thank you so I have something I'd like to but they're all board adopted so what we're talking about right now is only 12-month employees whether they work 250 255 or the small handful that are 260. okay so they've had nine paid holidays correct we're looking at raising it to 12. now the question has
099arisen 13. so I'd like to talk about some Equity here and the equity being we're not talking about anyone that's a nine month employee we're not talking about 10 month employees which are all of our instructional staff nor are we talking about some of the 11 month which also tend to be instructional or assistant principles so we're still going to make them work the number of days that they have had to work hold on with the few holidays that they get so we are setting out a specific group and giving them more paid holidays so my thought on this is I think we need to find some equal ground here on this so that we are looking at what we're already doing for nine month employees 10 month employees and 11 month employees make it
100comparable to 12-month employees and I'm open to there being you know whatever number is Equitable on the holiday and the others being non-work so that they can have the day off okay um whichever days it is because that's been the biggest piece I will tell you and it really hit home with President's Day when we had employees coming in and not having Presidents Day off but their children were off and then they were having to find child care for their children so my I I hear what um both are saying but we're basically then Bringing Down the number of days these individuals have to work but we're paying them for them and I can't agree to that so we have a motion and we have a second we have a motion to change this to
101read there will be 13 paid holidays for 12 month employees Mr cologne made the motion Mr persis is seconded are we ready to call for a vote I I have a question um so since we're looking at the policy right here and and you've brought up the equity with the other employees can we do anything and I'm sorry Mr penley for this but can we do anything with the number two and the number three in order to make that more Equitable for everyone and do it all now well I think that that the answer to that question is a little bit more complicated probably then we would have to do the same kind of research because the holidays don't that we're discussing specifically July 4th Juneteenth don't fall within their contracted work here so it
102it would May what it would mean currently the paid holidays that they have include Labor Day Thanksgiving Christmas Day Martin Luther King Day Memorial Day so it it really just balances out um because it doesn't there it those holidays don't fall within and the tricky part is to align the work calendar with the student calendar with other government calendars as well and I and what I think is is everybody wants to do the right thing for everyone to be honest with you and I think you know we heard people come speak about the importance of having that day off and we're trying to find a way to give that to them I think is what we're trying to do and and so the way are you we could do it is to make is to
103have non-work days I mean we can we can make it so that it is not a work day um whether it's a paid holiday or it's a non-work day I mean we can definitely arrange the exchange would mean that they're going to be working Veterans Day no those would be non-work days the problem right now is Veterans Day has been a non-work day so to speak but then we've made the 12-month employees work the next four days 10 hours and that's what we were trying to get away from now Thanksgiving right now if you could easily switch a Thanksgiving holiday day and make it a non-work day because see for Christmas it's only Christmas it's the Christmas Day and New Year's Eve and one one other one other day the day after that are paid
104okay the rest of the time they're off for Christmas are non-work days and quite frankly the one that we just had because Christmas day was on a Sunday so the paid day was on the Friday so I mean it's it's pretty fluid every year depending on how the calendar Falls but what we're saying is that if you moved because there are two paid days actually three paid days at Thanksgiving one of those would become a non-work day you still wouldn't report to work that day but the paid holiday would shift we're kind of voting on the number not necessarily when they'd be celebrated because let them figure that part out is that what we're saying to them okay you would still have the opportunity to vote on that because these calendars come before you as
105a chance as every year to vote on it's not this policy comes when the policy is revised and that spells out a certain number you vote every year on what days are paid holidays what days are non-work days so just to um so for instance this June coming June of 24. would it be a holiday well you're going to have to vote on the calendar again because if you're revising the policy we'll have to change this okay because remember we voted out more than a year ahead of the cattle calendar will come before us it will need to if you change the policy which is yes we've already voted on the current calendar but it would have to come back up to be to be reloading okay so I'm always in my motion I think
106we'll address it on the calendar side of it so I think it's important that our that not only our students our community again Juneteenth is a new holiday and I think it's important that you know students are not required to go to school and they can participate in the events going on in the community as those are growing again it's a newer holiday and I think that's important so thank you yeah and I would just to piggyback on on that uh I think it'd be important to know when the community is celebrating that day that's the day we would want to have you know be off you know as we do with uh Veterans Day is always November 11th until it's on a Saturday right and then we have the Friday off and if it's
107on a Sunday they have the Monday off so we just want to make sure we're in sync since this is brand new yeah like the Fourth of July changes every year too I think we do the same thing yeah so I think what we need to clarify is for many years there were 12 paid holidays for the 12-month employees and then we reached a point where a decision was made and I I don't even know if you were on the board yet it may have been right when you got on the board Mr persis but the rest of us weren't here and the and those days were taken away but the biggest problem with those days being taken away they were taken away and the people didn't come in but then they had to work
108for 10 hour days so they were still working the time they just had the day off they didn't have a choice you know it's like you stay home for the Fourth of July but you're going to come in for four days now and put in 10 hours and so what we were trying to do was correct what had been undone and bring that piece back but I do feel strongly that if we just keep adding to these days we're not being Equitable with our other employees so the question here now is are we going to move forward to advertise this with 12 paid holidays for the 12-month employees and will advertise it and then 30 days from now or the next board meeting that's after 30 days from now we will bring it back up
109and as always it will go to the calendar committee to make the decisions on what will be the holidays and what will be the non-work days well I will gladly make the motion to approve this at 12 days and I certainly hope that our intent is to include Juneteenth as one of the holidays thank you thank you Mr cologne do I have a second oh second thank you Mrs Burnett any further discussion okay then I'll call for the vote all those in favor of approving to advertise policy 417 leave terminal pay and holiday Provisions at this time please say aye aye any opposed okay it passes unanimously we are now moving on to item 17.20 which is authorization to advertise proposed amendments to policy 803 public gifts to the schools thank you madam chair Mr
110pendley thank you madam superintendent Madam chair board members item 17.20 request the board's authorization to advertise proposed amendments to policy 803 public gifts to the schools there was one textual change to from bequest to requests the remainder of the policy revisions update the legal Authority and laws implemented to reflect current Florida Statutes other than that there are no changes to this revision Dr Bachman do you have a recommendation yes ma'am chair I recommend the authority be granted to advertise the proposed amendments to school board policy 803 public gifts to school all right board members you've heard the superintendent's recommendation do I have someone that will make a motion to authorize to advertise propose amendment changes to policy 803 move to approve advertise or authorization for policy 803. thank you Mrs Burnett do I have a
111second I second that motion thank you Mrs Thompson any discussion okay hearing none I'll call for the vote all those in favor please say aye aye any opposed okay it passes unanimously we are now on to item 17.21 authorization to advertise proposed amendments to policy 804. Dr balkabin thank you madam chair Mr pendley thank you Dr balguban Madam chair board members item 17.21 request authorization to advertise proposed amendments to policy 834 District school advisory committee as we discuss briefly at the August 22nd meeting this policy revision comes about as a result of statutorily statutory language changes concerning the district advisory Council and the school advisory councils the previous policy was very limited in the language there contained authorization for a district advisory Council which under statute is optional the school advisory councils were not directly
112addressed per your policy so what this amendment attempts to do is to break out the distinctions between the district advisory Council and the school advisory Council you'll see those changes reflected there but this policy is to bring our treatment for the district advisory Council and the school advisory councils into alignment with current Florida statute okay at this time do we have we have public input Miss Jennifer maranacio so Ford thank you for having me Jennifer marinasio Vice chair for doc I know that this has all been communicated to you through many emails and thank you for your responses Dr balgubin and one from Dr from Mr penley just to touch on the way it is written as you know I don't want to belabor the point but as it is written it says that elected
113teacher from each school has to serve aside from the mandatory nature of that language which cannot be imposed on teachers to participate in a voluntary activity unless they are then paid and it's outside their hours um that is a misrepresentation of the actual statute which I have also given you I have here in my hand as well um that language of saying that teachers are to be part of a DAC is part of the language for um the creation of a district advisory Council when in a very small District a SAC at each school is not possible it has no relevance to the section B of uh the statute one 101001.452 section B which creates the the optional District advisory councils so that part really should have no part in this policy it is not
114enforceable and is not relevant by Statute going on to the next part um that is on the proposed thing as as a proposed policy as I've also shared with you that's a misrepresentation of the language as well um I do want to stress that it isn't about not wanting specific language I did share with you another proposed policy that has all of our current requirements through our bylaws that we follow for our district advisory Council which includes a much greater requirement than simply having someone from each School advisory Council on our district advisory Council we do in fact reflect the and and that should definitely be in the policy the geographic educational ethnic social and economic characteristics because every single one of our school advisory councils follows all of those requirements by legislature we have
115tremendous School advisory councils they do their reporting they do their due diligence and making sure that they are representative with community members and teachers and students at the high school level and Middle School level and um parents at the right proportions so that we know when we follow by Statute the second option for how a district advisory Council may be created which is accounts uh The District School Board May establish a district advisory Council representative of the district um and it says uncompose of teacher students parents and other citizens or a district advisory Council that may be comprised of Representatives of each and school advisory Council that is the option that we follow and therefore because we take from our wonderful School advisory councils we do represent all of those um various forms in addition
116our school advisory Council doesn't just rely on that to make sure that we represent all voices in our community we also require that we also have one representative appointed by each School member School Board member so please take care to actually read the statute when considering what the policy should be thank you Mr marinosio Mr penley do you have anything else you'd like to add it's entirely the board's pleasure as to how you want to structure your District advisory Council um happy to amend it as you see fit my thought is maybe we need to Workshop this policy once we have the laws in front of us and we can all have time to review because I know there's been some emails back and forth even over the weekend on this but I am open
117to the superintendent's recommendation I'm sure Mr Clem I do have a question for Mr Wolf I know I forwarded this to you because we're getting into a laws in State Statute and I asked for some clarity so um is it and I am open to workshopping this I don't think there's any time constraint to this but uh based on your opinion Mr Wolf is the current policy consistent with State Statute or um maybe we need to look at it further what are your thoughts I do think that the uh amend policy as written does comply with the statute and I think as Mr penley has pointed out it does meet the minimum requirements of the statute uh you're certainly allowed to make more stringent requirements than this then the statute requires which this would do
118if approved but I do think it is consistent with the statute Miss Thompson so my big concern after going to DAC meetings and Sac meetings is a lot of our DAC Representatives our parents or community members from the schools and I am concerned legally how we can require teachers to be the right Representatives because a lot of times now be honest they don't want to spend that extra hour extra two hours at a DAC meeting I get it they're very busy so I don't mind workshopping this I think we should fine tune instead of just you know trying to piece together something now but that's just where I stand Mr persis yeah I'm I'm in favor of of that too I want to thank uh Miss marinacio for uh for coming forward and thank you
119for your service uh you've been on the deck for many many years and I know you know it probably as well as anyone I just remember as a principal on my my sack we always had to have more uh parents than teachers at least by one right and and you weren't uh it wasn't dictated how how many had to be on the sack but you just had to have more more parents than teachers so so I agree that uh Madam chair if you want to just take this off for it for now and put it on our Workshop maybe in October I mean I don't think it would it would take very long figure this out Miss Burnett thank you um I I support pulling this and workshopping it um I know that Miss marinostio
120has been on the DAC committee for many years and I think we owe it to her to kind of give her um some input on that being that it is um she's very she's very passionate about it and um and so I think that we owe it to all of our DAC representatives to make sure that we're doing the right thing and and reviewing it appropriately yeah yeah all right Dr balkaman thank you madam chair I will Echo the same our doc committee is above and beyond the statutory requirement of our Sac which are school-based but question for you we do have a workshop that's coming up Celeste helped me it's October the 10th would you like it for October 10th because we're developing that okay so what I was going to say is I
121I don't know if you've already filled October 10th if you have filled October 10th because I I think you had then maybe we can move it to like the November or the December like there's not a need this is not one of these policies that were being held to a date and I'd rather not right like I don't want to cram it in with something with we already have a full agenda for so if we could just possibly look at um you know bringing it back sometime between now and December um because there are some holidays in there where we just have a chance to Workshop it because then that will give us a chance to all review all of the correspondence that's gone back and forth and have open discussion about it if that's
122okay we already have two items for the October 10th I know one of the item will probably generate a lot of discussion so perhaps the next Workshop after that Celeste so you've heard the recommendation basically of the superintendent that and what we've made that we pull this item tonight and we add it to a workshop at a later date where we have a chance to talk about it before it's brought up to be advertised I'm sure I'd like to make a motion that we table this to a date not to exceed the end of the year all right thank you thank you so Mr cologne has made the motion in Mr persis has seconded it um I'm going to call for the vote unless there's more to Scott Mr clone is there anything else you
123wanted to discuss okay then at this time I'll call for the vote all those in favor of tabling this and we will Workshop it between now and the end of the year please say aye aye any opposed it passes unanimously we are now moving on to item 17.22 authorization to advertise the proposed amendments to policy 805 political activities in or on school property and at school sponsored events thank you madam chair Dr Hazel can you please join Mr Bentley Madam chair if I may proceed thank you board members item 17.22 request authorization to advertised proposed amendments to policy 805 political activities on interon school property and at school sponsored events the intent of the policy is to restrict uh political advertising and political participation on campuses particularly by staff members you'll notice that change in
124while on duty during work hours and then we included changes in the general Provisions to prohibit display of partisan political posters and advertisements on campus the advertising provisions there that you see on page two other than that this updates the legal Authority and laws implemented section of our policy which had not been revised since 1990. thank you Mr penley for the um those listening at home and anyone in the audience that's not been involved in our policy update we are updating we took on the challenge to update policies that some were as much as 50 years old and so as Mr penley said this one had not been updated since 1990 and our goal is to get all of the policies updated so that we are current Mr cologne and so is there any provision
125in here seeing that our schools are used as polling places that would exempt the placing of political posters during elections provided they are using our buildings there is in the general provision language concerning temporary use in accordance with our regular facilities so that there are Provisions for temporarily placing things that do not what the law talks about is displayed the imprimatur of the school board endorsing a particular partisan physician or candidate that sort of thing but during obviously during polling times a temporary placement of political science is appropriate so I'm going to ask again so this means if if the supervisor of elections is using a school as a polling place these restrictions would not apply to candidates on the day of the election during the polling period yes great thank you Ms Burnett thank
126you and I know we asked I asked this before but I just want to clarify it again this time and that is that we have a number of Law and government programs that sometimes will sponsor different debate type activities between candidates as part of a project or something that they do within their educational program Academy and that will still be permitted correct yes it would okay that's part of the curriculum thank you I'd like to remind everyone we actually talked about this when we were doing the other policies and it was pulled um with the change made that you're talking about Mr clone um so that the temporary piece could be in there and then the other parts that are in red those were the parts that we already had said we had no issue
127with it was just um working on just the additional changes so Dr balkapin thank you madam chair and I know I asked Dr Hazel to join Mr pendley on this particular 805 and that's because Dr hazelhaus has already engaged in conversations with the supervisor of elections so um so I recommend that the authority be granted to advertise the proposal amendments the school board policy 805 political activities in or on school property in our own School Board property and at school sponsored events thank you you've heard the recommendation of the superintendent do I have someone that would like to make a motion to approve to auth to authorize advertising the proposed amendments to policy eight zero five move approval to average to authorize and to advertise proposed amendments to policy 805. thank you Mr persis drive
128a second I'll second thank you Mrs Burnett any further discussion okay then hearing that I'll call for the vote all those in favor of approving to author authorizing to advertise the proposed amendments to policy 805 please say I I any opposed it passes unanimously thank you okay at this time we are going to take a um no we'll be back in here at 7 20 and at 7 20 we will start on item 18.01 which is public participation that gives us enough time to collect the rest of the cards and be prepared for that part so we'll be back at 7 20. um we are back at this time but we have received an emergency alert that came through two minutes ago from the National Weather Service there is a tornado warning in this area
129until 8 pm it is stating that we should take shelter now in a basement or an interior room on the lowest floor of a sturdy building and if we're outdoors in a mobile home or in a vehicle move to the closest substantial shelter and protect yourself from flying debris to Captain Smith [Laughter] good answer that is priceless [Laughter] so we're good let's keep going okay we've read the warning what I will say is if it gets loud and anyone hears anything I don't know my recommendation is going to be please know when to exit out that door we will exit everyone out the double doors here or the door here at the front and we're going to go down there is a basement level in this building and that's where we will go to okay
130so in the event anything happens I don't want anyone to go out the back door I want you to come to the front door and we will do it in a calm manner or this store and we're going to go down to the basement level all right so all of you now know what we're under and let's hope that the tornado just moves on all right at this time we are on item 18.01 public participation Dr balgaman would you please ask Mr penley to come forward Mr pendley can you please join us we've asked Mr penley to come forward to review the current law because most of the cards which I'm holding 37 at this time that have been filled out are about books and we want him to review what the new law says
131about books thank you madam chair board members pursuant to Florida statute 1006-28 subsection A2 each School District School Board must adopt a policy regarding an objection by a parent or resident of the county to the use of specific material which clearly describes a process to handle all objections and provides for resolution the board has done so in its adoption of policy 320 last let me go to the bottom um May 9th of this year so that policy is current and up to date [Music] the objection of there's some language here about the objection form um but the process must provide that the parent or resident the opportunity to proper evidence to the district school board that a an instructional material does not meet the criteria of section 100631 subsection 2 or section 1006-40 subsection 3D
132if it was selected for use in a course or otherwise made available to students in the school district but with sub not subject to the public notice review comment and hearing procedures under Section 1006 283 2B 8 9 and 11. any material used pursuant to subsection B any material used in the classroom made available in a school or classroom Library are included on a reading list contains content which one is pornographic or prohibited under Section 847.012 which is also included in policy 320 as a footnote those definitions are there subsection Sub sub subsection 2 depicts or describes sexual conduct as defined in 847.0119 unless such material is used for a course required by other sections irrelevant here are identified by the State Board of Education rule subsection 3 is not suited to student needs and
133their ability to comprehend the material presented or a subsection 4 is inappropriate for the grade level and age group for which the material is used statute further reads any material that is subject to an objection on the basis of sub subparagraph B1 or Sub sub paragraph B2 must be removed within five school days of receipt of the objection and remain unavailable to students of that school until the objection is resolved parents shall have the right to read passages from any material that is subject to an objection if the school board denies the parent the right to read passages due to content that meets the requirements under sub subparagraph B1 the school district shall discontinue the use of the material if the school board finds that any material meets the requirements under sub-sub paragraph a or
134that any other material contains prohibited content under sub subparagraph B1 the school district shall discontinue use of the material foreign if the school board finds that any other material contains prohibited content under Sub sub paragraph B2 through 4 the school district shall discontinue use of this material for any grade level or any age group which such use is inappropriate or unsuitable thank you Mr pentley for those of you that did not start the evening off with us I just want to remind you that each speaker will have a total of three minutes to speak please respect the time clock which you will be able to view no signs placards or other visual forms of communication are authorized except as a part of an individual speaker's presentation so speakers shall not engage in personal attacks abusive
135language or other conduct which interferes with the meeting I as the chair have the right to terminate any speaker's privilege to address the board if this rule is violated members of the audience should be courteous to all speakers and shall refrain from making audible comments or applauding during the meeting if you wish to show whether you are happy or unhappy with something you can do a thumbs up or thumbs down or you can do jazz hands so at this time I have a question for the attorney for and for Council so thank you well where did he go you heard the warning gotcha so so based on the state statute 1069 it says that an objection form as prescribed by the school board rule do we do we have an objection form available for parents
136to object to content we did how many current objected books do we have in the school district right now that we have objection forms for I believe zero let me confirm is that confirmed so we currently have zero books that are objected is that what I'm hearing so with that being said board I'm going to read to you line by line here it says any material that is subject to an objection on the basis of sub paragraph sub paragraph must be removed within five days of receipt of the objection and remain unavailable for students parents parents so this only applies to parents shall have the right to read passages from any material that is subject to an objection how many objections do we have right now zero zero if the school board denies a parent
137to write to read passages due to content that meets the requirements under sub paragraph sub paragraph the school district should discontinue the use of this material uh Mr Wolf I have a question so um and we had already spoken about this are you is it your opinion as you're guiding us as our school board attorney that this is only Rel related to books that are objected in that formal process that's how I read that sucks so uh no I've been very from a moral ethical standpoint a lot of people know where I stand on a lot of this but we've got to follow our process and if it means that this gets challenged which I anticipate after I say this the challenges are going to roll in that's okay that's why it was written that
138way the legislature wrote it this way if they don't agree with what the board agrees with then it goes to an arbitrator and somebody else tells us I just wish we would follow our process and personally and again I I thank my dear friend Mr gimbert who brought this to my attention and as I read it we have no objections right now the 18 books that were objected to have not been re objected to the next level and I believe that's what this is related to and so I I just wanted to um say that out loud not that I agree with the content I think I've been very very vocal and but we've got to follow our process and that's just my thought process thank you this is Burnett so I have a question
139thank you so I appreciate everybody who's come out tonight to support their side of the story um and and I think each of us all want what's best for kids and sometimes that idea is not always the same but our goal is the same and that's what's best for our kids and students so my question is if for some reason someone comes up to read a book tonight or a passage from a book and we have zero on objection if we tell them to stop it doesn't mean they're going to get removed anyway because they haven't been objected to is that correct that's my reading of the law yes so so I'm I I have my opinions on these things as well and I know what I want ethically in our students hands I also
140want to follow the law so the law does state that sexual context books will be removed from our libraries pornographic as defined in section 847.012 or depicts or describes sexual conduct as defined in 847.00119 which are both cited in your policy 320. okay thank you so Mr penley I'm going to read Florida statute starting with section 18. sexually oriented material means any book article magazine publication or written matter of any kind or any drawing etching painting photograph Motion Picture film or sound recording that depicts sexual activity actual or simulated involving human beings or human beings and animals that exhibits uncovered human genitalias or the public or the pubic region in a lewd or lascivious manner or that exhibits human male genitals in a discernably turgid State even if completely and opaquely covered simulated means the
141explicit depiction of conduct described in subject section 16 which creates the appearance of such conduct and which exhibits any uncovered portion of the breast genitals or buttocks specific sexual activities includes the following sexual activities and the following anatomical areas human genitalias in the state of sexual stimulation or arousal acts of human masturbation sexual intercourse sodomy all kinds of things the fondling of erotic touching of human genitalias or the pubic region the buttocks or the female breasts less than completely an opaquely covered human genitalias or the public region buttocks female breast below and above human male genitalia is also again in a turgid State even if they're completely or opaquely covered and if you go up to 16 it says sexual conduct means actual or simulated sexual intercourse deviate sexual intercourse sexual bestiality masturbation or any
142type of abuse actual lewd actual physical contact clothes or unclothed and if such a person is a female the breast with the intent to arouse or gratify the sexual desire of either party so I go back to this we have a law we have a statute it clearly defines and what we have seen or heard already in this boardroom that there are books that have made their way into our schools that go against what I have just read and we I'm just going to say I'm going to say what I've said every time when this was first brought to my attention and this was not kind of me I laughed at someone and said there is no way there are any sexually explicit books that are sexually explicit defining sex with who or what rape
143you know incest beastiality I said it doesn't exist in Volusia County schools libraries however I have been proven wrong because people have laid books in front of me and I'm not the only board member and I've been proven wrong there are drawings there are photographs there are depictions of this there are it's described in ways with words that I would never use as I've stated before I am now a grandmother I have three grandchildren my grandson is six years old one-third of his childhood has already passed he only has two-thirds left I personally think he needs to have that opportunity to be a child and any of these topics should be introduced by his family not in a school library where he has unfettered access to sexual materials showing sex acts and describing it explicitly
144where his parents do not have the ability to go in and help make those selections I have no problem with any of these books truthfully being in a public library because as a parent myself I took my children got them their first library card I took them to the library I reviewed the materials that they were going to take home I remember telling my daughter in high school when she pulled one book and handed it to me nope that's not appropriate yet you've got to wait put it back on the shelf and select another book so parents have the right to choose but when it comes to school libraries parents don't have the right to come in and help their children select the books the books are there and they have unfettered access and the
145law says we will not have these materials we bring children in at the age of three we keep them to the age of 21. those are our special needs students but none of them are an adult until legally the age of 18. someone recently said if you took one of these books and you made it into a movie and put it in the theater our children wouldn't be allowed to go in and see it because of the rating on it so as I've said I mean we could spend some time and go back and see who brought these books into Volusia County Libraries but I'm not interested in who brought them in here I'm interested in ensuring they no longer come in and I'm interested in removing those that are there because this is not
146what children should see children should learn this topic at home and parents should decide how they're going to describe it to them at the appropriate age that they feel it's appropriate for their child and none of this matches a standard that we are to teach that will prepare our kids academically to go out and be productive citizens so at this time Mr persis you may speak thank you madam chair I I'm confused okay I I thought I had this figured out before I sat down and now I'm like totally confused so um because I'm I'm thinking we're all following every school districts following Florida law right so how come Indian River County or Seminole County um they went they went through all this and they didn't um Seminole County they didn't pull any books I
147mean if it's the same book to see this is what I don't I don't understand if it if it was that black and white uh then it you know they would just be okay it's it's simple you know this is the book this is the title it's not it's not appropriate for this age in it it's state it's Statewide I mean if it's a Florida law Florida law is applicable and all 67 districts that correct you are so it it there's got to be more more to it than than that uh and so what I'm trying to figure out is the pornography standard that we have in in the state the Miller test I believe it's it's referred to that's right isn't that the one that says that you have to look at the at
148the total content of the book the literary value and it's not just picking out a paragraph from a book and then saying because of that paragraph It's pornography as cited in your policy 320. and as is stated in Florida law at section 847.001 12. the definition of obscenity means the status of material which a the average person applying contemporary Community standards would find taken as a whole appeals to the purion interest B depicts or describes any patently offensive ways sexual conduct as specifically defined here in and C taken as a whole lacks serious literary artistic political or scientific value a mother's breastfeeding of her baby is not under any circumstances quote obscene end quote so that is this standard that the Lost cites for obscenity and each Community has its own Community standards that can
149be applied to that definition so that is my explanation for why you would see variances between what is a community standard in one part of the state being different from another so Mr Penn let me ask you then so there is a difference between the obscenity standard as you just read there and what one might and what Miss Haynes just read as far as being sexually explicit we also cite the same definition in our policy and it is that is the correct reading of state statute but if you just answer my answer my question there on it I'm just struggling with something could be sexually explicit and not meet the obscenity standard so if we go to 847 so the stat the state statute 1006 28 A2 sites four grounds that I read before pornographic
150or prohibited under 847.012 or depicts or describes sexual conduct as defined in 847.00119 unless such material is for a course required by section 100346 100342 1003 42 2N or identified by State Board of Education rule so there that's two of the grounds the third ground is not suited to student needs and their ability to comprehend material so it doesn't have to be pornographic or describe sexual conduct if it's not suited to student needs or for inappropriate for the grade level and age group for which the material is used so those are the foregrounds for a challenge depending on which one of those grounds a challenge is made determines whether it is something that has to be taken off the shelves within the five days if a challenge is made under subsection one or subsection two
151that is pornographic or describing sexual conduct it has to come off within five days until the process of review is is completed okay and we have I've said Mr cologne asked the question um do we have any of those do not currently okay we do not my understanding that we do not have any current material library or media materials that are subject to a current challenge all right well I'm I'm open and I I support our our process I support the process that we've always had I I see what this new state state law is is trying to to achieve here but once again I respect the right of any parent that does not want their child to read a certain book I mean that's what we've always said here we never Force library books
152on anyone's child at the same time I would not want another parent to be able to tell me what my child cannot read so I think it's incumbent on on this board if we say we're for parental rights but for all parental rights and I believe the state puts us in a very difficult position here and Madam chair I I believe that is that your intent to have the people come come forward at this time and we'll go from there I mean is that what you're continuing to do I didn't know whether you were trying to stop the process or anything okay so Miss Thompson thank you and Dr Hazel you may have the answers to these questions so I don't know currently the books so let's say for example there's zero that are being
153objected to right this second hypothetically tomorrow morning parents out here went and objected to the books that have already been challenged what would the next step be we would follow our procedures under Section policy 320 to convene a School level review and that's constituted by the principal in the media center specialist in our coordinator for Media Services gotten that title wrong but Ms rabinsky would assist in formulating the review team those individuals are specified in the statute that process completes there's an appeal to the district level review team conduct that review that review goes to the superintendent and ultimately to the board unless a parent wanted to challenge it before a special Magistrate and currently I've seen a list our high schools mostly throughout the county 28 copies of one some have one copy of
154one it's kind of scattered currently right this second do we have all those books on the shelves and who is held responsible right now in Volusia County Schools for the books in the library Dr Hazel please join uh GC her policy and statute those responsible for the books that are in media centers or the media specialist and the principal who work together to make those selections and review the content so hypothetically if you had a principal who had books that had been challenged in their library and were continuing to cause issues within the community or the parents and it's up to the principal could the principal pull the book off the shelves and say I don't want to deal with this I'm just going to pull the book as it is my responsibility principles and
155media Specialists are responsible for reviewing all materials in their media centers and ensuring that they are in compliance we've had several trainings with them on the issue for doing that now if a book is challenged at the first level which Mr penley was talking about in 320 where there is a conference with the person who is making the to who is initiating the challenge that decision can be made then yes so yeah again as I read earlier under the current iteration of section 100628 any material that is subject to an injection on the basis of I'm going to skip reading all the Sub Sub sub paragraphs I'm getting tongue-tied uh if it's pornographic under section one or if it describes sexual conduct under section two it must be removed within five school days of receipt
156of the objection and remain unavailable to students of that school until the objection is resolved that is black letter I'm reading the statute So based on Florida State Statute 847 if there is a book that is pornographic in nature and some of these are violently pornographic and it is challenged the principle within five days will pull that book off of the Shelf correct state statute yet and it will stay off the shelf until it is goes through the whole process all over again correct remain unavailable to students of that school until the objection is resolved so even if people read books tonight and they there are zero we've established there's zero objections tonight so if they're read tonight nothing by law can be done however if they were to go tomorrow and challenge them technically
157could start going through this process and be pulled off the shelf within five days correct it's pornographic or describe sexual conduct thank you so much for that clarification both of you know I have another question don't go anywhere so if if for some reason a book was challenged tomorrow morning it has five days to be pulled but is there any way that we could put a process or is there a way that electronically we can make it where that book is not checked out immediately so even though they have five days to remove it can it be automatically um electronically indicated not to check out I don't I don't know about an electronic flag in the system I'm a system would allow for that I mean it would just be a matter of us informing
158the school or the person making the challenge and forming the school that the challenge is on this basis and then we would remove and we could get an immediate answer to what school it was in and how many copies that they that we can provide immediately yes we know we our district card catalog allows us to look up any title any author and know exactly where the books are if they're currently checked out so I mean hopefully there's not many of these books and honestly it wouldn't take more than that same day to repul those books if you had your school-based team do that correct well correct I mean all the media Specialists have access to their okay okay thank you just want to share just want to add to something that you asked Dr
159Hazel so if there's a challenge a book that is being challenged going back to your question at a particular school as soon as the principal receives notification Desiree rabinski whose instructional materials coordinated for instructional materials she will notify Dr Hazel Dr Hazel adds that to a a list that we have and that is sent to All principals to let them know that this book is being challenged at XYZ School the challenge process was initiated on this date so everyone receives notification in our school about the initiation of the challenge and in my thinking that shouldn't take five days for that to happen well as soon as we I think the provision is there is that they have up to five okay and that is the Safeguard okay it's not that it takes five days it's
160up to five days I mean if someone's not there or there's weekends but as soon as we there is a initiation that that's begun then Dr hazeln Dr rubinsky works on that to notify everyone else so I have a question Dr Baldwin since we're sitting here tonight and everybody wants to keep talking about if there's any challenge books I mean there have been challenge books there were books that were going to be moved to our level and then the challenge was withdrawn so my question is while we're sitting here tonight because the first few cards I have are not books okay can we get copies of the the challenge process form printed and have them available tonight for anyone that's reading that wants to challenge the book so they don't even have to go find
161the form print the form take it to their school can we get them printed for them yes chair we can all right then Mr penley we're going to go ahead and start with public comment in the first part of my public comment is not doing with the books so up first is Mr Robert is it rice okay followed by Miss Elizabeth Albert good evening I quote for instructional Personnel who teach one or more courses assessed by Statewide standardized assessments under Florida statute 1008.33 the band scores provided by the safe will be used for this evaluations in accordance with the applicable rules as a retired military member of the United States Air Force I understand the importance for getting evaluated in rules being in place the above what I've read comes directly from the Visa manager
162or manual that was adapted by this school board on July 25th 2023 which was after the 2022-2023 school year I bring up this fact due to these there was a statement made by the Florida Department of Education which I quote due to the transition from FSA to the best bam will not be calculated for the 2022-2023 school year since the state did not issue a vam score were not calculated Volusia County used their own method to create our bam scores for this school year I find this convenient since most of the raises are based on the summative scores of our educators how can Educators who get an IPS score of four magically drop because of a vamp score of two I wonder if we can reconsidered level cut scores that will probably help from teachers
163walking away from the profession is this fair and Equitable towards employees also for ese teachers our scores are always going to be lower because we have some of the lowest scores on it also the school board has made promises or made us saying in the past promises made Promises Kept is this for all promises or just some the ese teachers have more and more paperwork than ever and are expected to complete this every day did they change the number of hours in the day since I've been in school I don't think so last year we had data days which allowed us the opportunity to do this paperwork but due to costs they got rid of it this is causing more and more Educators to leave the profession and when they do the blame is put
164on the school-based administrators it's remember it comes from the top down as I leave tonight I would like to thank my fellow Educators my admin team and any other admin in this District going through the same issue thank you thank you Mr rice next up is Mrs Elizabeth Albert followed by um okay Miss Elizabeth Albert then I'm going to make a statement when to read on behalf of another and then my own do you know which one that is um concerns from the classroom does it say reading for another I yes okay so you're reading on behalf of Judy Tracy yes okay just need to make concerns from the class right okay thank you all right good evening Madam chair uh members of the board superintendent Dr bagelman I am reading on behalf of a
165member good afternoon to our school board members my name is Judy K Tracy I'm a third grade teacher at Deltona Lakes Elementary I love love love my job my students my colleagues my administrators and our entire dle family we all work hard to give 110 to our jobs I am a 31 year veteran however I feel compelled to reach out to you and advocate for my students I am not complaining I repeat I am not complaining however our County leaders are not setting up our students for success I feel compelled to let you know what they are doing under the guise of what is best for our students first all third level Empirical research research States the importance of taking the time to teach our students rules procedures and expectations for 10 to 20 consecutive
166days this time is used to build rapport with our students and with each other in multiple ways we were robbed this year when a unilateral decision was made to skip the three weeks of rules and procedures and only give us one week I say shame on them for allowing this to happen Volusia County went against third level Empirical research and made the classroom teacher's job much more challenging than it needs to be next the county made a financial decision to not administer the i-Ready diagnostic placement test at the beginning of the year this is needed to level the kids and set them up on their individual learning paths what happened to the county doing what is right for our kids in addition the county is using the Staffing of students in the Ese and Pre-K
167programs against the teachers at our schools ese self-contained units are staffed at a much lower teacher-to-student ratio they also have Paris which are greatly needed to support the Learning and Development of these students however VCS is facing a teacher shortage issue and they are trying to improve it in an unsatisfactory way we wonder who wants to become a teacher nowadays when we are treated this way and our salaries don't grow with the times the county has decided what they would ignore best practice 18 students in primary and 22 and intermediate the county is saying we are using an average of all students to all teachers for example if we have six if we have six classroom teachers and four ESC teachers in third with third graders on their list we're going to divide the students
168by 10 teachers instead of six so the numbers look lower how is that fair this is compounded by the fact that our school houses a very large ese population other schools have less so how does this seem fair or in the best practice for our students we also have a pre-k program once again not all schools have this unit either are we being penalized for housing these units in our school I understand that the law is softened on the Hardline class sizes however it does not make it right just because we can doesn't mean we should when is VCS going to stand up for our kids and do what's right not what is easy or financially benefit beneficial this is why we can't retain our teachers or recruit quality new teachers we are all suffering
169more than ever and not improving the situation and to wrap up this is what she says they are okay so talking again about fighting against the voucher system to keep kids in our Public Schools Volusia County Schools is working against this Movement by increasing our class sizes they are the numbers to displace teachers in one area to shore up the teacher shortages and others Judy K Tracy Deltona Lakes thank you all right at this time I believe all the other cards I have are on books so we're moving into the book section when you come forward if you are going to read a passage from a book I need you to identify the title and the author of the book that you were reading and at the same time if possible tell us if it's
170a it's it's currently available in a Volusia County School library next I'd like to know if you are a parent or a Community member of Volusia County if you're not will you please State the county that you are here from so we're going to start and please remember there will be no calling out at people while they are speaking first up will be Laurel Robinson followed by Mrs Kai I don't want to is it Panero okay so Laurel Robinson you are first hello I'm Laurel Robinson I won't be reading any excerpts but I live in Volusia County you've hired and heard a lot of thoughtful and articulate citizens tell you once again why the vicious schemes for the wholesale removal of books from public schools is harmful to students harmful to Educators and democracy itself
171I joined my voice with theirs but I do think that time has come to think about why this assault is happening now the issue of parental rights is a red herring parental rights have always existed long before the current book Banning activity the policies were in place and the policies worked but why has this become such a volatile political activity I suggest that there's a very long game in place engineered by those whose interest is not so much as what's on the Shelf now but how and with what those books will be replaced what will those Replacements books look like who will decide the content of those books and who will participate in the multi-billion dollar book industry that is just waiting in the wings to write purchase and have all our school board all
172our school boards spend a lot of money in replacing the books that will be gone from our shelves who are these people who decides it's my fervent hope that the decision as to what is goes into our school remains on a local level but I do direct your attention to an article printed in the Orlando Sentinel this past Sunday there are new actors involved that are waiting on a state level and I caution you to be very aware of what's coming behind this Activity thank you thank you the next speaker you're here following Mrs Panera will be Miss Cuthbert welcome thank you speech I wrote at home I've forgotten left at home so bear with me my name is Kai Pinero I live in Ormond Beach part of Volusia County Schools my grandson went through
173every Volusia County School there is and these are strictly my thoughts and opinions everybody has their own I believe in equality for every aspect of a person's life children of people children need to be exposed to different cultures laws and religions um as to be well-rounded and equipped to deal with reality in the world we live in our current world is violent filled with strange people and a lot of rules why make it harder for our next generation you simply don't want your child to read a book go tell the principal go to your school open house and look at the media shelves look what your child is checking out look at when they bring it home you don't like it tell them they'll take it back they'll tell your kid can't read it they
174do what the parent wants in the school's here never had a problem in any Volusia County School my child has been in I know there have been challenges as they grow up in their teen years and no this Volusia County administrators that I've met have all been 100 percent a book is a safe environment to have a child can learn about different things it can teach a child how dangerous a back alley can be or how strange people can be it gives them safeguards in a safe place I don't want my child running out of back alley because I didn't know something bad could happen yes it is a parent's responsibility but if they can help get extra training and reading I'm all for it um you have to be respectful and teach that it's
175okay to disagree we are all Unique Individuals we had taken our grandson in fourth grade to see the news journals Jesus Christ Superstar we got mobbed how can you bring your child to see such a violent thing like it's based on the Bible it's Easter you can't get any more violent than the Bible I mean really people come on you know it's got a lot of reading material in it and yep everybody reads the Bible everybody reads it to their children so I don't see what the problem is make yourself be involved in your school make yourself to known to your principles and your administrators you won't have a problem thank you thank you Miss Panera Miss Linda Cuthbert followed by Miss Anna Hannon good evening Madam chair board members Dr balgebin District staff I'm
176a bullish County resident a mother of a Volusia County teacher and a grandparent still of the senior New Smyrna High um as a 26-year career at high school English teacher I had to select lots of novels and plays for my juniors in American lit which now that american-led curriculum has become very controversial from The Scarlet Letter to The Crucible The Great Gatsby Adventures of Huckleberry Finn Streetcar Named Desire and Death of a Salesman and I particularly always selected these novels that were on the state list but also why I wanted to teach it not the book itself but the purpose because any good English teacher will tell you there are three reasons why writer writes person reads or someone listens to a speech it has to do with the audience who's receiving the information the
177subject to the material and also who the author is the speaker because the speaker always has something to say and when I taught The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn many of my students objected to the n-word and of course it was very historically correct at that time it was written in the 1880s and it was set in the 1830s all historically correct Mark Twain wanted to make sure that Huckleberry Finn who fit in the very violent culture of the 1830s he made fun of and ridiculed Jim the slave but by the end of the book because he experienced slavery child abuse racial Injustice feuding murder poverty lack of organizational Educational Systems theft and controversy he changed because he found that Jim his one-time Target of bullying was a human being a family who was lost and
178sold off and because of all this he rejected civilization and light it out for the territory my students learned what they didn't like and what they did like what they found was precious but it was a series of Adventures a series of supporting details we I never taught the n-word I never taught any individual Adventure it was all of those details taken not out of context but put together in a total book a total message a total purpose so my students can learn and choose for themselves what they liked what they didn't like how they wanted to model their lives and what they didn't want to model their lives after if a boy like hook who had no formal education can decide what he wants in his life I'm sure our students can too thank
179you Mrs Cuthbert next up is Anna Hannan followed by Steve friend following Steve friend will be Patricia Stevenson good evening I have here the report to the state that I emailed you a couple of weeks ago I emailed my opinion about it and I expressed that I was very disappointed that out of 89 that were objected to Volusia County only had two removals that was the worst in the state it is very embarrassing so therefore we still have 87 that are objected to left you have our list okay the law it didn't expire those 87 did not get reviewed under the current HB 1069 law I read the law objected to was not specified that it had to be via a form I read HB 1069 and I looked for this specifically so therefore the
180book that I'm going to comment on please consider it now on record that I am objecting to it and that book is called you too author Janet garthler it is in DeLand High School and Spruce Creek High School this book contains inexplicit sexual activities including sexual assault and molestation sexual nudity alternate gender ideologies profanity drug and alcohol use and controversial racial and gender commentary it is a minor restricted it starts out with pedophilia and rape with page 17. I think this is exactly why the neighbor told me it's our secret if you tell anybody then they'll want to play articulate game it won't be special anymore I was five I wanted to be special I didn't tell anybody that this man lay me down on the back of his work van took my pants down
181and touched me there but that's not the reason I didn't tell I didn't tell because at age five I had no idea this was wrong page 19. I asked him if he could make a doll bed out of the box and he said sure but first I want to play with you okay play with me sure I'm not not it happily but it's a secret he said you can't tell anybody or they'll want to play too secret oh boy he picked me up set me on the floor of the van pushed me back and took off my pants they were shorts actually he had a cigarette clamped in the corner of his mouth and as he put his hand between my legs and rubbed does that tickle does that feel good he asked he gave
182me a little pat on the leg he put my clothes back where they belonged and lifted me up remember you can't tell anybody this is our secret I remember will you please stop and please fill out an objection form Mr Steve friend followed by Patricia Stevenson and then Donna brosmeyer good evening I'm Steve Fran resident parent I work for the FBI during that time I investigated child sexual abuse material I'm here to uh call out one particular novel that's in in the libraries in multiple schools uh I'm not against I'm not favor Banning books I'm not in favor of getting rid of To Kill a Mockingbird or Huck Finn I think the literary value should outweigh the uh the pornographic material and I'm pretty familiar with that so I'm going to proffer that Slaughterhouse Five
183is violative of the law it's uh by Kurt Vonnegut it's available at University High School Deltona High School Mainland Pine Ridge Spruce Creek rated not for minors book contains explicit violence including animal cruelty inexplicit sexual activities including bestiality sexual nudity profanity inflammatory religious commentary page 59 he had a dirty picture of a woman attempting sexual intercourse with Shetland pony page 111 their penises were shriveled and their balls were retracted page 150 and 151 bility was on top of Valencia making love to her while Billy was making love to her Billy made a noise like a small Rusty hinge he had just emptied his seminal vesicles into Valencia and contributed his share of the Green Beret page 159 man said the porter you sure had a hard on can we stop could you please stop and
184fill out an objection miss Patricia Stevenson followed by Donna brosmeyer followed by Jude Spiegel if I pronounced it correctly evening school board and superintendent I'm not going to be reading any excerpts I'm here my name is Patricia Stevenson and I'm here to oppose any immediate removal or ban on books when I was younger it was often said that we shouldn't judge a book by its cover nowadays it seems more pertinent to say that you shouldn't judge a book by an excerpt but that is the goal of this out of town special interest group tonight I really appreciate that you took the time to review your policies because I had looked those up they want to ban books based on a few out of context readings and these books they've all said so far are for
185high schoolers what high schooler doesn't already have access to sexual material online on TV or even just in their discussions with peers these books do have the potential to provide value for the students to explore these ideas everybody's concerned about sexual trafficking child prostitution these types of issues could be discussed in a book and still be age appropriate so I disagree with the state statute there in some counties this group has succeeded in getting books that they've read aloud immediately banned and removed in fact on September 21st 2023 the Orlando Sentinel reported that Florida is leading the nation in book bands accounting for over 40 percent of book bans nationally that is not something that we should be proud of what I am somewhat proud of is your policy to have a procedure and a
186process to review these books I wish it wasn't taking the books away immediately um but from what I understand as published in the West Volusia beacon on July 13th through the 19th Edition last year 18 books were challenged and they all went through the committee process they were all returned to the schools and it was determined they could stay in the libraries with a parental opt-in policy for permission to read these books I appreciate you being ahead of the curve on this and having this policy however I think considering the minority of parents that have these objections perhaps it would be better for us to have an opt out policy instead I hope you will stay strong against any immediate book bands and perhaps continue to share the procedure with parents through your social media
187outlines so that we don't have to waste our time or your time reading these excerpts that clearly make everybody uncomfortable these books are meant to be read in private and not in such a public forum I'll leave you with this quote Banning books gives us silence when we need speech it closes our ears when we need to listen and it makes us blind when we need sight thank you for your time and attention thank you Mrs Stevenson Astana brosmeyer is up followed by Jude Spiegel followed by Debbie Parker good evening I'm not here to read either and some of what I have to say has been touched on a recent headline read shuttered adult bookstores cite Fierce competition from school libraries that that headline was satire from The Babylon bee we wish it was funny
188given the list of obscene books that we know are in the libraries of Volusia County Schools it isn't Florida statute defines obscenity it defines the limitations of sharing obscenity in particular with regard to juveniles who are also clearly defined as those under age 18. in other words the age of K-12 students Florida Statutes impose criminal penalties against those who share obscene materials with minors this is not about Free Speech because obscene speech is not protected if it's true that to read obscene passages in this setting will violate federal regulations that warning alone should tell this board and this Administration excuse me that those books do not belong in a K-12 Library the concept of age appropriate is not new it exists at all levels of Our Lives legal contracts drinking driving the justice system and
189even the education system which is why we have elementary middle and high schools they are age appropriate that is the only objective with regard to specific library books Volusia County restricts the location of adult bookstores Florida statute defines them it defines in that context what is harmful to minors it defines what is obscene it provides penalties for those who violate these statutes as a school district we do in 1964 Justice Potter Stewart famously tried to Define obscenity but concluded with I know it when I see it we do too all of our books should be reviewed in the context of these definitions it's not the job of public schools to facilitate the sexualizing of our students K-12 libraries should not fit the definition of adult bookstores but right now they do this district has inexplicably
190slow walked the removal of these books from our libraries we are well past time for this board to comply with its own updated policies and act on it it's time to stand up we must no longer be bullied into silence or cowed by the threat of legal action the State Board of Education has given us a preliminary list of books in our libraries that fit these definitions we shouldn't need to wait for them to demand their removal and the public shouldn't need to come here and demand their removal we have both the authority and the obligation to do so if content is inappropriate to be read aloud here in front of adults then cut the mic and remove the book That's the Law leave the smut to the adult bookstores and stop providing it to
191our kids thank you thank you Jude Spiegel followed by Debbie Parker followed by Suzanne Southard welcome I am Jude Spiegel I'm here with my husband as a parent and a 23 23 year resident of Volusia County in fact I went to Timbercrest Elementary School Galaxy Middle School Deltona High School Mrs Stevenson was a teacher of mine actually in 2006. uh so uh what's going on here is pretty relevant to me and my family I have a five-year-old and uh who started school this year and my youngest start school next year um first I want to start out by saying a quick hi just earlier I just want to point out that um we honored a representative who left quickly before I could remind him of our last encounter in the capital where he called me
192names but it was nice to see him honored here I guess as a parent of a child in Volusia Schools I'd like to think that my voice matters I'd like to think that my child's family matters if we went by views expressed by certain hate groups then my family is something perverse which deserves to be hidden our family is comprised of two fathers and two children growing up a family like that never seemed possible book Banning does nothing to destroy information it only keeps it from those who may need it most like little kids who just started Canada kindergarten who deserve to see their family in their books or middle schoolers whom they think they are alone and what they are going through high schoolers who need affirmation that their existence and what they've been
193through is okay higher knowledge is key to growing into both empathetic and compassionate adults books being available for Access is integral to a free Society if you don't want your kids to read something then do your job and monitor what they are reading instead of policing everyone else's child what some may consider perverse or unnatural family is just family to me and mine thank you Debbie Parker followed by Suzanne Southard respected my concerns tonight are different from those described and extensively detailed before this time for public comment books are being challenged for a variety of reasons including the color of the character or author I believe that student access to all books in all history is necessary and proper education for student growth I will share with you a bit of local history please be
194prepared because unfortunately there are many negatives but I promise there there are positives too and learning from our past helps prepare us in so many ways for the future during the 1920s the Ku Klux Klan was influential in Volusia County and DeLand was the center of many rallies and marches five lynchings happened in Volusia County one of which was not far from Woodland Boulevard in 1920 the Ku Klux Klan was angered by Mary McLeod bethune's voter registration efforts but beside but despite their efforts they failed to intimidate her in 1929 the Osborne Hall and perhaps some of you are familiar with it it's on the south side of Dunlawton Avenue in Port Orange it was the state headquarters for the Ku Klux Klan February 9th the first Florida student protest against segregated public facilities occurred
195in DeLand a group of students from all black Euclid High School came quietly into the werewolf store on North Woodland Boulevard sat down at the lunch counter and requested service the counter was closed as of them sitting down after the group's fifth attempt the counter closed then it reopened sometime later with anyone could be served regardless of skin color the annual DeLand Christmas parade on December 6 1975 included members of the United clans of America that was the 27th annual DeLand Christmas parade the members were in full costumes but without masks some carried battle Flags Confederate battle Flags many in the crowd turned their backs others food on October 22nd 1998 the Jackie Robinson ballpark was added to the U.S national register of historic places Archer last year Florida gave a beautiful statue of Mary
196McLeod Bethune to the National Statuary Hall collection in Washington D.C thank you thank you Suzanne Southard followed by Chris Smith followed by Jacob Smith welcome thank you can you hear me okay I'm a little short so I'll bring this down thank you for letting me speak tonight my name is Suzanne Southard I have happily and honored me to be the director of religious education for the First Unitarian Universalist Church for more than 25 years I also spent several years working for the seventh judicial circuit for here Volusia County and three other counties here in Florida so I think I know the difference between church and state uh my son graduated high school here uh four nieces two nephews and I have one niece still going through the system most of them College all that's good
197stuff um I I heard someone say Slaughterhouse Five I I'm interested that it's only the sex that was a problem not all the violence of War which is what the book is about so all the issues seem to be about sex so as a um you know director of religious education so both of Lot's daughters became pregnant by their father on and on and on let's see where's my oh your waist is a mound of Wheat encircled by lilies your breasts are like two fawns twins of a gazelle your neck on and on and on about her physical That Song of Solomon also in the Bible so I guess I'm gonna have to go down to uh wait oh that ye may suck and be satisfied with the breasts of her constellations that ye may
198milk out Isaiah so I guess I'm gonna have to go down and fill out a form and it's really going to be hard on the IB program to have the Bible removed from any of these schools these books are high school books and I I had other stuff written down but I just have to say if someone reads a book about molestation there's going to be something in that book that says oh my God that and maybe I can talk to my teacher about it protecting your children from anything that's sexual is not protecting them one in Four Women in this country is sexually assaulted whether you protect them from books or not they're being attacked they need education they need information keeping it from them won't help I'm asking you to listen to your
199Librarians they pick books for a reason for information hey I don't want to read Machiavelli's the prince but I don't think anybody else should be prevented from reading it listen to your Educators they went to school for this do not listen to these obscure groups obsessed with sex kids in high school are 17 18 they're 18. you're willing to let them go to war with a gun but you're afraid of them reading about sex there's something wrong with that I thank you for your time Madam chair I have to say something in reference to the Bible and there are many sexual instances in this good book however the state statute specifically States the sexually graphic material in a book and if you are being aroused sexually by the Bible then you might be doing it
200wrong thank you okay um next up is Chris Smith followed by Jacob Smith followed by Rowan Fox welcome good evening superintendent chairman Haynes and school board members and staff thank you first of all I wanted to start off by thanking you for your diligent work in the challenge process this last spring that would includes more parent voices that's a good thing thank you for your thoughtful questions tonight I also wanted to share my support of continuing to use the full challenge process which is first submitting paperwork to school and then a school committee and then you know if elevating it to a district committee if needed this means a lot of parent voices in Community Voices are heard when the full process is done this school board and chair set a precedent last school year
201of allowing persons to re fully read their excerpts with a warning ahead of time and it will be this board's choice to change from that unfortunately this is a clear sign that you do not want these books fully vetted by their respective challenge committees if you choose to stop speakers so as to circumvent the full comprehensive process you are not listening to the community as seen in the latest Miami Herald article confusion abounds with the latest laws and its implementations as noted in conversations and emails back and forth with the Schoolboy lawyers although we aren't mentioned so I guess that's a good thing but there is confusion among School Board lawyers it has not been clear from the doe as to what the statute says and they're trying to figure out this carefully please go
202through this carefully and thoughtfully and thank you again clarifying I do appreciate that you are asking that these are Volusia County residents and that these are parents who are reading these excerpts additionally an additional piece of information is that in this County last year Volusia only had 13 students whose parents restricted Library access and in a public records request this year as of the first day of school only five students had requested that that same restricted access I do not know what the current number is even in nearby counties which mandate a parent choice in order words to get a document a device you have to choose what your access is going to be approximately only five percent across Statewide are asking for restricted status this clearly shows that the parents comfort with the materials
203found in their respective School libraries it is important to keep all of our students with their varied communities home lives self and their self-selected reading age-appropriate needs in mind as you move forward thank you for your time thank you next up is Jacob Smith followed by Rowan Fox followed by Martha Ashley good evening speakers I really thank you all for letting me be here today I expressed my opinion my name is Jacob Smith I am a graduate of Seabreeze high school in 2017 state champs go Breeze um I'm here today so I can try and help speak for my generation I'm actually gen Z these students are still in school right now and we have certain feelings about how we want to be educated too we want a quality education we want to decide what
204we're getting educated on what I think is silly is I learn about my father and how he had to read some books because they were banned and I think that's 30 40 years ago and I'm still having to live this reality I don't want to continue fighting the same things we were fighting from the previous generations I'm living in the new age I want to be here I want to continue to develop I want gen Z to be a generation of people that find new peace find new Justice that America has never achieved before so I think it's ridiculous that we're going back in time it feels like we're going back in time I asked that the school board continues to maintain their current vetting process you know like me being up here today is
205a great thing that I'm able to speak my opinion that you don't ever count out the people of your community and what they want to achieve out of their Public Schools I know a lot of people here uh know more about the education system I'm a resident of Volusia County I went to Volusia County Schools still young I'm still close to the kids age and they can speak better on how this needs to all happen but I know I'm just passionate about this I'm passionate about letting children in schools like I was just a short while ago and honestly I still am figure out where they are in lives biggest thing in school of all the things you learn is your own identity and if you count out some books because of your maybe religious
206beliefs or personal beliefs then you're counting out some kids chance to learn about his own identity and figure out who he is for himself or themselves so I appreciate your time thank you thank you Rowan Fox followed by Martha Ashley followed by Nancy linsmeyer welcome thank you my name is Rowan Fox I'm a lifelong almost lifelong resident of Volusia County School in New Smyrna my son also Edgewater New Smyrna so we've been in the school system here quite a while I just want to start by saying Liberty state of being free within a society from oppressive restrictions imposed by Authority on one's way of life Behavior or political views as a parents who don't want their children to read certain books have reasonable recourse for their issues well yes they do but instead they want
207to make the choice for everyone's children denying the right of Liberty to others some people would have you think that the ending books is about protecting a child's innocence a noble idea but not strictly true one look at history shows us what it's really about and it's about control ask yourselves when were the book banners the book burners and the sensors ever on the side of freedom thank you Martha Ashley followed by Nancy linsmeyer followed by Tom Billings welcome hi I'm Martha Ashley I am a retired Volusia County School teacher I also went to Volusia County Schools my entire life as a former teacher I believe that censorship has no place in our society I believe that parents have that right to determine what books their children read but they do not have the right
208to determine what other children read and that is true in our school system as well um someone said something about the entire library and parents don't have the right to go in and peruse the books there and decide about their choices within the school library I'm not sure about the mechanics of that but I would be surprised to find out that the list of books in our library our school libraries are not available to the parents should they want to know what books are available to their child so that they could go through that list of books read the books and decide which ones they want to keep their child from reading I think that's a fair way for them to do that without affecting the choices that children of other parents have in their
209school libraries all students desert deserve to see themselves in the books they read in our Public Schools and they deserve to see their families depicted in the books in our Public School Systems I do have another thought to share with you very quickly I personally am a Christian I was raised in Volusia County as I said and I attended all the schools in Volusia County I was not restricted by my parents in any way as to what books I could or couldn't read and yet somehow I managed to retain my faith I somehow read a lot of sexually explicit material somehow I managed to maintain my own personal beliefs and my moral character and I made a lot of decisions for myself because I had a lot of materials to choose from that my parents
210probably didn't agree with but I had the right to make that choice and I believe students today need the right to make that choice and I will make the comment about the the passage from Song of Solomon and a comment was made that if you read that passage and you're aroused there's something you're not doing it right I beg to differ it's a very explicit past