001as a fundamental right for all citizens in our country. June 19th, the community further celebrates Junth to commemorate the announcement by Union General Gordon Granger on June 19th, 1865 to recognize and celebrate the end of slavery in the United States. And finally, on June 21st, the community will be celebrating Father's Day to honor and celebrate the role of fathers and father figures in our lives, offering an opportunity to express appreciation and gratitude for their love, care, and support. Thank you, Dr. G. Uh, thank you. I very quickly have two things. Um, first of all, I would like to thank our school counselors um under the leadership of Mr. Robert aka Bobby Jameson and Annie Chs, our coordinator of guidance services for the phenomenal job they did with ensuring that our students are college ready and
002to the tune of money ready for college with over $120 million in co scholarships that are accepted. And I think that is phenomenal. And note these are merit-based scholarships. nothing to do with financial aid but merit-based so it's based on purely the work that they have done on that same note I would like to take a personal privilege to congratulate Miss Melnik who was recently appointed to the board of visitors for Longwood University and I think that appointment uh reolidifies your commitment to ensuring that students keep the spectrum going through uh K20 uh with ensuring that they are able to continue their college education. And we know we all of a sudden probably see an increase with students from Virginia Beach going to Longwood, which is known for being a producer of teachers. So, we
003know you're going to be sending a whole lot of teachers our way, Miss Melnik. So, congratulations. Congratulations. Thank you. Mr. Cummings. Yeah, thank you. Um my question is going to be directed towards Miss Lenetti to follow up on the conversation we had at two weeks ago about 618 and I was asked to follow up um just with some additional questions about to minimize instruions on instructional time and please know I'm seeking just a cl for clarification um to minimize intrusions on instructional time and impact review as required for divisionwide in initiatives or programs that are such scope that they impact or sign significantly altered utilization of instructional time and thus impact teachers deliveries of services. I looked back at our K through2 Chromebook survey and it did mention about 75 to 80% of teachers saying
004that if they didn't have Chromebooks there would be an impact but it didn't really quantify what that impact would be. And so I'm trying just to gain understanding like how does a scenario where we remove something that's core to the delivery of our educational product, you know, where there's value in some of the things that it does in in this environment. How does that not qualify for an impact study from your perspective, from a policy lens? And what would qualify as a for an impact study from a policy perspective? Is this on for administrative issues? I'm a little concerned about your agenda issues at this point. So, this would be more appropriate in the action portion of the agenda when we're talking about 618. Well, I mean, I thought we could talk about stuff about
005the agenda and reports and stuff like that. Administrative matters. Yeah, I deemed it as administrative just as it's about the future agenda. I think it's on your chair. Is that you've not put this on for issues? Does this look like you're asking for legal advice on a matter that may rem may be on agenda? I'm just not sure it fits into this section of the agenda to to have me providing legal advice on that matter that's not yet up on the agenda. Go with what she says. So that's fine. I mean, I was just hoping to get it done right now so it doesn't delay conversation. I will note there's something here in front of all of us. Um, so what you have in front of you if Mrs. Rogers asked for information that had
006been provided to the PR written information provided to the PRC about policy 618. That is the only additional written information that the PRC had. So, because I gave it to Mrs. Rogers, I made sure you all had the same copy. Would you be able to answer his questions during action B? I can try to to answer his question. That document you have on there probably is not going to answer that question. That was that's a followup from something Mrs. Rogers asked for. Right. I'm just saying since that's the section in the agenda that's that seems to be the more appropriate area to handle it. All right. All right. Thank you. We are now going to move on to the state budget update. Welcome Crystal P, chief financial officer. Good afternoon, Chairwoman Brown, Vice Chairwoman Williams,
007schoolboard members, and Dr. Robertson. This afternoon, I will provide an update on the status of the Commonwealth's budget negotiations, discuss recent developments affecting state revenues, and review the potential implications for Virginia Beach City Public Schools and our fiscal year 2027 budget. The most important point to note is that the fiscal year 2027-28 state budget has not yet been finalized. The general assembly remains in special session, which is currently in recess. is not formally adjourned yet and negotiations continue regarding revenue estimates, tax policy and spending priorities. At this point, the key question is no longer whether K through2 education will receive additional funding. Rather, the primary uncertainty is the amount of additional funding that will ultimately be available in the final budget agreement. It is also important to recognize that the state budget must be finalized
008by June 30, the end of the current fiscal year. If a budget agreement is not reached by that date, state government operations would lapse into a shutdown until a budget is enacted. While there is still time for negotiations to continue, this deadline adds some urgency to the ongoing discussions. One option being considered is a skinny budget that would fund core government services and legislation signed by Governor Spamberger that is required by law to be funded. The general assembly could resume talks after that, but if lawmakers don't, any individual member budget amendments not tied to legislation could be dead until the legislature comes back in January. A significant development occurred on June 1st when Governor Spanberger released an updated revenue forecast. The revised forecast projects approximately $1.5 billion in additional general fund revenue over the fiscal
009year 2026 2028 bienium including approximately 582.4 million in additional revenue for fiscal year 2027. This stronger revenue outlook could provide budget negotiators with additional flexibility as they work through spending priorities and seek to reach a final agreement. At the same time, caution remains warranted. While the forecast is encouraging, the current surplus is largely driven by revenue streams that can fluctuate significantly from year to year. Economic conditions remain uncertain, and policymakers are continuing to evaluate potential risk related to inflation, consumer spending, and broader economic growth. As a result, while the revised forecast may improve the prospects for reaching a budget agreement, it does not eliminate the need for a measured and prudent approach to spending decisions. From the division's perspective, we continue to be in a strong position. The fiscal year 2027 operating budget was developed
010using Governor Yncan's proposed budget recommendations. That proposal approx included approximately $19.7 million in additional state funding compared with fiscal year 2026. As long as the final state budget remains at or above Governor Yncan's proposed funding level, we anticipate remaining in a stable financial position and do not foresee the need for significant adjustments to our adopted budget. Of course, once the final state budget is approved and the Department of Education releases updated funding calculations, we will evaluate any differences and bring recommend recommendations forward as needed. The adopted fiscal year 2027 budget includes substantial investments in employee compensation. Fortunately, the differences between the House and Senate proposals related to compensation have minimal impact on our division. While some school divisions across the Commonwealth may face challenges funding salary increases or maintaining staffing levels, our current budget position
011allows us to remain competitive in both recruitment and retention. At this time, we do not anticipate significant staffing impacts resulting from the ongoing budget negotiations. Another area worth highlighting is retirement costs. There has been recent discussion among region 2 school divisions regarding whether the absence of an adopted state budget could affect the implementation of the new VRS employer contribution rates. Our fiscal year 2027 budget was developed using the lower VRS employer contribution rates approved by the VRS board of trustees. This approach is consistent with the assumptions used by many school divisions across region 2. Based on the information currently available, we do not anticipate any material impact on our budget related to retirement rate assumptions. Staff will continue monitoring developments at the state level and will evaluate any changes should additional guidance be issued. Budget
012discussions also continue regarding legislation that would allow localities to seek voter approval for up to a 1% sales tax dedicated to school construction projects. Our understanding is that the Senate version of this legislation did not advance out of committee. However, discussions regarding this concept appear to have continued as part of the broader budget negotiations. A similar measure passed the House, although its current status remains unclear. While this proposal is not reflected in the division's current financial plan and has no impact on the fiscal year 2027 operating budget at this time, it remains an issue worth monitoring. If the general assembly ultimately grants this authority and local v voters subsequently approve such a referendum, it could create a significant future funding source for school facility improvements and capital investments. Again, staff will continue monitoring budget negotiations
013and legislative developments and will keep the board informed as additional information becomes available. Looking beyond Richmond, we continue to monitor broader federal and economic conditions. Potential reductions in federal funding that were previously discussed appear to have moderated and are not currently viewed as a major concern for the division. However, inflation remains an important area to watch. Increase in fuel cost, utilities, technology expenditures, contracted services, and other operating expenses could create budget pressures during fiscal year 2027. Additionally, although the states revised revenue forecast is positive, economic uncertainty remains, the stronger forecast provides greater flexibility for budget negotiations. But state leaders are appropriately balancing that optimism with caution given the volatility of some revenue sources and the potential for changing economic conditions. Looking ahead, the House is currently scheduled to reconvene on June 18th and the Senate
014on June 22nd. Budget staff will continually closely monitor negotiations and developments coming from the general assembly. We remain cautiously optimistic that lawmakers will reach a budget agreement before the beginning of the new fiscal year and avoid a government shutdown once the Virginia Department of Education releases updated funding calculations through the state calc tool. Staff will review those estimates and assess any impacts on the division. Should additional budget adjustments or recommendations become necessary, those will be brought forward to the school board for consideration. And that concludes the presentation. I'd be happy to answer any questions the board may have. Okay. I don't see any questions, but I do hope that they can get a budget soon that'll help us be able to plan better. All right. We are now on to the AI simulation and we
015welcome Dr. Ryan Goldberg, director, office of instructional techn. Good afternoon, Chairwoman Brown, Vice Chair Williams, Dr. Robertson, and school board members. My name is Ryan Goldberg, and I serve as our division's director of instructional technology for the Department of Teaching and Learning. Joining me this afternoon are also my instructional technology coordinators. I want to begin by acknowledging your concern that was discussed at the last a AI update through workshop. Some expressed that AI might lead to a reduction in critical thinking. We also share your conviction that no technology should ever serve as a shortcut for a student's own cognitive struggle. In BBCPS, we view AI not as a trend to follow, but simply as one tool in our toolbox to engage students and accomplish our mission of future readiness. In today's workshop session, we will
016highlight two recent high school experiences with AI integration with a highle overview and a video. We will also review current guard rails and security features. And then we're going to end our workshop today with an AI simulation involving each of you. This timeline reflects the schoolboard's ongoing engagement with AI and VBCPS. This work has been deliberate and phased, built across multiple teams over three years. In July 2023, we introduced the AI landscape and education in the workforce, established guiding principles, and launched phase one with a focus on exploration and targeted experimentation. In July 2024, we reviewed phase 1 outcomes and began examining instructional applications. In July 2025, we presented the high school rollout plan, including guardrails for student usage and digital literacy policy. This school year, we've continued that conversation through two workshop updates, one
017in November and one in April. The November was focused on teacher professional learning, usage guidelines, and parent outreach. The April was sharing of usage data, stakeholder feedback, and our proposed 2026 2027 rollout plan. Now that we've reviewed the past learning, we will provide you with a quick overview of the two lessons that you're going to see in an upcoming high school AI video. The first instructional experience took place at Tallwood High School in a world history 1 classroom. The process began with traditional classroom learning, research, and creation. Students selected their topics, gathered information on written planning sheets, and developed a complete original slideshow or document before ever interacting with AI. Only once their drafts were finalized did the instructional technology specialist guide students in using Gemini to provide targeted feedback. Students uploaded their project instructions,
018including the grading rubric along with their completed work, into the AI, then utilized a specific prompt to generate feedback based on the rubric criteria without allowing AI to rewrite it for them. To encourage critical thinking, students were required to review the AI's suggestions and reprompt the tool if they found the feedback unclear or if they disagreed with it. Then they synthesized this information by paraphrasing the strengths, weaknesses, and actionable steps onto a worksheet provided by their teacher that was organized by the rubric's criteria. Finally, students returned to their original products to implement the revisions, ensuring that the final improvements were the result of their own informed decision-making. The other instructional experience The other instructional experience featured in the video occurred at First Colonial High School. In this 5-day mini mock trial unit, students analyze a
019hypothetical negligence case involving two professional hockey players involved in an on ice altercation. Students collaboratively develop criteria for effective trial advocacy using Gemini to refine courtroom performance skills and participate in a live mini mock trial experience. This slide shares the various ways students engage with Gemini. Before using Gemini for each of these activities, it's important to note that the students collaborated and created original work prioritizing the human skills. We're now excited to share with you the video demonstrating AI use in high schools. Today we are going to be teaching you a little bit about how to use Gemini on your projects and not to do your projects but to get feedback on them. It says do not rewrite my work and then provide feedback in the following format. Students are to select a Renaissance figure
020and developed into a product on Google Slides. I'm using this information as a guide to make her final product. From there, we then decided, okay, now we can pull out the Gemini and give the feedback. They downloaded their instructions. They downloaded their project, uploaded it into Gemini. And through that, they were able to find feedback from their rubric and they were to write out their feedback based on their understanding of what Gemini said. I definitely wanted to provide a resource for my students to have in my class that um provided efficient feedback, but still maintained the integrity of their original thought. She'd been a little apprehensive about using Gemini and wanted a little bit of support, but knew that this would be a good opportunity for her students where they had developed their project drafts.
021They needed to get actionable feedback and in a class size like that, it's very difficult for her to get around to each student individually. Technology is a great tool, but you really need a teacher. And these teachers are still really focused on the kids learning and doing the work. And that Gemini is just an assistant. I think it helped clarify information and give my feedback more efficiently. It helped me look at areas I didn't think of having to implement it in my different lessons so that they saw that you can still have critical thinking and analysis of your own but still use it as a support and not as your mind. So, as I've always said, you guys are the eye. You're the intelligence that created this, right? And then Gemini helps refine your thoughts.
022AI is the assistant to the intelligence. So whenever they're creating, they create first and then allow uh Gemini to to make that idea better or reinforce that idea. So it almost kind of like it sits itself, right? Cuz that's that's another one of the rules. If you're going to use it, acknowledge that you used it. Right? So we ran the questions. We've got the evidence. Are we ready for trial? So these gloves were a weapon. Correct. Um I could say they're like a weapon. In this particular assignment, Gemini helped me so much in giving me an idea of what to use for my evidence. It also helped me refine my questions. They told me what the other council might like object to. Instead of being too vague, they help me be more specific in what
023I wanted to ask. And it helped me really illustrate the story. Teachers, the way I've seen them use AI is they're having the students do the lift first. They're introducing material, getting kids talking about it, doing activities with it, having them do labs and projects and things. But then the AI helps them make meaning out of some of those things. I think my biggest win was the day Gemini got it wrong cuz we were creating leading questions. We learned that Gemini can't do leading questions. They didn't know what that was. For the students, it was the first time they saw that Gemini can be wrong. And at that point, like they became much more critical thinkers with AI. I feel a lot more comfortable with it than I did at the beginning of year. I'd
024also say I know how to prompt it a little bit better because our classrooms are a safe environment. That's what we do is we teach. When we're all learning together what works and what doesn't work and discussing it, that's the best opportunity for the kids to learn this information. I'd like to take a moment to reflect on the video. You heard teachers emphasizing that students must do the lift first. We have recommended that AI be introduced after the students have researched, done activities or created their own original drafts. This is the human first approach. We also saw how AI acts as the assistant to refine thoughts, catch blind spots and push the project further. The emphasis of using AI was on refinement, not on the actual creation. Students are explicitly being taught how to effectively
025prompt in Gemini and then analyze the output in order to maintain academic integrity when asking for the feedback. This video highlights that Virginia Beach City Public School views schools views AI as a collaborative tool rather than a shortcut for finding answers. This successful AI integration is the direct result of intentional strategic groundwork. It represents the culmination of years of dedicated learning within department of teaching and learning paired with robust professional development across many levels. We've established a comprehensive implementation plan with clear guidelines and guard rails. By prioritizing targeted professional learning, we have successfully strengthened our tier one instruction and enhanced students critical thinking skills. We'll now transition to discussing some of our technology securities. Securely filter is our foundation and first layer in internet protection. In simple terms, it is our 247 digital safety net.
026No matter where a student is at school or at home, if they are on a district device, they are being filtered. This system doesn't just block bad websites. The Department of Teaching and Learning and Department of Technology work closely with securely to only allow educational sites while also blocking inappropriate material. It also serves as an alert system, flagging safety risks like self harm and violence in real time, allowing the appropriate parties to intervene before a crisis occurs. Safety is a shared responsibility that happens both in the classroom and can extend to the home. Securely classroom empowers our teachers with a live dashboard to monitor screens and lock students into specific sites, ensuring every minute of instructional time counts while on their devices. You will see this in action later today during your simulation. When students
027leave our schools, the Securely Home app hands the keys to parents, allowing them also to continue to monitor and set digital restrictions on their devices as they please. Together, these tools create a seamless safety net for every student. We'll now transition to discussing AI filtering and controls for every student. All unapproved AI websites are automatically blocked. For example, you're all familiar with chat GBT. ChatGBT is blocked for all students as it is not approved. We don't want students stumbling onto tools that haven't been vetted for privacy or age appropriateness. However, we do acknowledge that our high school students need to learn how to use these tools for the future. That's where securely classroom comes in. It gives our high school teachers the power to unlock specific approved tools like Gemini or Notebook LM only when
028it makes sense for their particular lesson. If a teacher is doing a collaborative project around the Chesig Bay and wants to use AI throughout different parts of the process, they can allow Gemini in their access plan. If they don't need it, the block can stay in place. It puts the teacher in the driver's seat of using the technology. Before we begin our AI simulation and our work in Gemini, I want to take a moment to review a few terms that you might hear the teacher use during the lesson. These are shared with you to simply provide awareness. Our high school students were provided an AI introduction lesson and an overview of student technology responsibilities. As you have heard several times this year, our teachers were provided three professional learning sessions that also covered these topics.
029You also have a copy in your folder of the AI student the student usage document which is on the screen. You'll be receiving the folder. I'm going to pause and give you a moment to read the slide. All right, we're going to pause for a moment and have my team come up and get you guys paired up with your folders and your computer. So, we're going to pause for a quick moment as we get set up. Oh, excuse me. You want me to give this to three small All right, we are now about ready to begin our simulation. Okay, one minute. I'm getting to one minute. Okay. All right. Are we ready to begin? Okay. So, we're going to begin our AI simulation where I'm going to you're going to step into the role of
030high school students and you're going to experience an AI integrated lesson firsthand. I will walk you through all of it. Using the laptops that you are provided, you're going to engage in a guided learning activity. In the interest of time, I'm going to lead the session. I'll be your teacher and Mr. Callahan in the back is going to monitor progress via securely. You're also going to have co instructional technology coordinators behind you who will be offering technical support if you need anything. We would ask that you hold all questions to me until the end. Okay. All right. All right. So, the activity today, it could serve as a lesson in an oceanography course. In a typical oceanography classroom, it's in a unit on the Chesapeake Bay. In a typical sequence, the students would first gain
031foundational knowledge around the bay's ecosystem through traditional instruction. So, we're working under the assumption that the students, you guys have some background knowledge on the Ches Bay at this point in time. The specific performance task would serve as the unit's capstone, providing students the opportunity to investigate and address contemporary that threats to the bay's health. Y'all ready to begin? Okay. All right, students. Let's get ready for our lesson. You're seated next to your partner based on your colored folders. We're going to work on a performance task on the Chesig Bay. In your folder, you're going to see your assignment overview. Go ahead and take that out now. We are focusing on part one of our project where we will use Gemini to help us narrow down our research project topic. Keep in mind if you
032look at your computers right now, your computers are locked because you don't need access to your computers. I'll give you a moment to read the challenge in the context which is on the board and also on your handout. All right, we're going to start with our first step. So, with your partner, you're going to turn and relying on prior knowledge, take a moment to brainstorm three current threats to the Chesapeake Bay. Record these on section one of your notecatcher. You have about 2 minutes. Just a reminder, make sure you're writing your three on your note catcher. So you have them. Okay, we're going to move on to the next part. Hopefully you have your thoughts in your three brainstorm. Does anyone want to share out one of their brainstorms? Fertilizer runoff. uh coastal infringement like
033how they're building right now across the Chesapeake Bay Bridge Tunnel and Okay, so we have coastal infringement with some of the building and the construction along the tunnel. Pollution. Pollution. All right. Good. Yes. Commercial fishing. Commercial fishing. Okay. So, we're going to hold those ideas. I'm going to let you know that right now we're going to be start using Gemini. Okay. Before we get into it, I want to go over a couple things with you. I'm going to review my expectations for you with using AI. You'll note that on your notecatcher and then also on the slide. I've identified this lesson as a level one. A level one is a guided lesson with step-by-step directions from me on using Gemini. You're only allowed to use Gemini as directed and you must be clearly able to
034explain to me how you used it. All right. So, if you look on the screen, I've provided you with a prompt to use for Gemini. Go ahead and read the prompt. The prompt's on the screen. The promp's up here. Yes. Okay. All right. So, I'm going to take a moment and give you a couple more directions. Now that you've read the prompt, I want you to note that in red, we've said where you're going to input your topic. So, when you take a moment to type your prompt into Gemini, make sure you delete that part out and input the three or four ideas or whatever that you brainstorm into that section. We are going to unlock your screen now and we will note that you have a second tab up there where you can choose
035to copy and paste the prompt into Gemini or if you would like to type it yourself, you may do that as well. You may start that process. getting ready to be arrested. I think some of you are moving along. So, I'm going to give the next step in the directions just so as you're moving forward, as you click the arrow and if you've inputed your prompt, then you're going to take some time to read through the generated output. So, you'll receive an output from Gemini. The goal is for you to talk as a team to determine which of those outputs in there sparks your interest. From there, you'll record your interest and your thoughts onto number three of your note catcher. Christmas. Never heard Yep. So, I'll go over the directions one more time for
036after you've prompted. So, once you've put the prompt in, you're going to click the arrow and then you're going to read through the output, which is what Gemini gave you. Read through that and look at what sparks your interest in comparison to what you originally brainstormed and write that down on number three. Take about one more minute to finalize your thoughts because we do have an opportunity to reprompt. So, make sure you're getting your notes down on your note catcher. All right, I'll take a thumbs up if we are ready to go to the next portion. Mr. Cummings, you ready? All right, here we go. All right, so now that you've read the now that you've read the output from Gemini, we're going to take the opportunity to talk about reprompting. So oftent times we're
037going to reprompt to ask for an additional output from Gemini. So if you look here, we're going to reprompt to ask for three more known threats to the health of the Ches Bay. The prompt is on the screen and also on your notecatcher. Please provide three more threats to consider. You can copy and paste it directly into Gemini or you may type it in. Just for our groups who are moving ahead, I'm going to take one moment. After you've reprompted, you're going to go ahead and analyze the outputs all together. All right? So, you're going to consider all the outputs and think about what you would like to research the most. What interests you the most? What would you like to research as a partner the most moving forward? You can ask I'm going to
038pull you back one more time, students, and just remind you that once you have your nar once you've narrowed down your research topic, we want you to critically decide what you're going to research moving forward and jot down that on your note catcher and also think about why you selected that topic. So, that's going to go on number five. Just What's he doing? That's what I was going to say. Uh-huh. Do we need to block his screen? All right. I'm going to ask you take 30 more seconds to finish your thoughts. I am going to ask you to share out. We will be sharing out what you thought. So, just keep that in mind. Yeah. All right, boys and girls. Now that you have boys and girls, can you tell I was an elementary teacher?
039All right. Okay, students. All right. So, we are going to go ahead and block Gemini at this point in time for some reflections. So, I hope you have written down all of your thoughts. Um, what I want to take a moment is to ask you a couple reflection questions. So, we'll probably have two or three people share kind of a twofold question. share out what did you select as your research topic and then how did using Gemini help you to get to that selection. So how did what did you select and how did using Gemini help you get to that point? Would anyone like to share? Turn yours on too. Yeah, we'll share. We'll share. You want us to share? Please. We chose um microlastics and the um ingest the the way the oysters ingest
040the microlastics and and the threat. And so we got there by uh we inputed litter. And so that was one of our things that came up in the first prompt. And it was very interesting the stuff that came up when we reprompted, but we felt like microlastics and the threat um was probably a broad enough topic for a research paper where we would be able to find a lot of resources. Got into a lot of chemistry in the second in the second part. So good. So it appears that it took your original brainstorm and then took it a couple steps further to give you some more information. Great. Someone else care to share? Yeah, Mr. Cummings. Yes, we had fun. Um, we landed on the research topic of pharmaceutically medicated fish. And so when people
041throw away medicines like antibiotics, anti-depressants, anything or you know, controlled substances, it goes to the water, impacts fish, and grow, you know, they evolve into new things that will take over us. So, and then we had it draft. We tried to cheat and have it write a five-page paper. And I'm happy to report school board that the Gemini would not write our five-page paper. So, but very interestingly, it redirected. It wrote more like an outline and basically said if you kind of discuss this, it'll take about a page. If you discuss this, it'll take about a page. It was actually interesting. Yeah. Yeah. So, was that your I'm assuming that wasn't your original your original interest, right? Did you It took you there, Mr. Cummings, Mr. Co Pepper. took you to that point from that
042wasn't your original That's correct. Yeah. Okay. We went from our our first three were erosion, over fishing, and pollution. And then from that, it drew us into shoreline management. And then from shoreline management, we got in Matt actually purposely asked, "Give me the three most outrageous uh derivatives of this." And that's where we got medicated fish. Great. That's what he wrote. Yeah. Miss Wally, we did a whole study on that on drop off day. We did a whole study, not we but a group on on exactly what you're talking about. Well, drop off date leads to the next thing. Tell tell them the last thing you did. Well, there is a different angle that it's altering animal behavior. For example, researchers researchers have found that the male smallmouth bass in the Pam Pamic River Pomacic
043River major tributary of the bay are developing female characteristics and growing eggs inside their organs. A phenomenon called interex fish largely driven by chemical and hormonal pollution in the water. So, we learned all types of things. Yeah. So, I think you can see Oh, sorry. Yes. Oh, one one last thing. You wouldn't write a five-page paper, but the last thing Matt did was say, "Write me a schoolboard policy on on on this on medicated fish." And it wrote a policy about how to properly dispose of drugs. I didn't write anything. I will say that Mr. Callahan was behind you monitoring that the entire time. All right. So, getting back to kind of um culminating our simulation, I appreciate you guys working with us. And guys, if you want to step down, grab their computers, that
044would be great. And then we'll close out. So, there are a couple things that I want to draw your attention to from the simulation and just bring back to the points. Um, today you were able to collaborate with a partner and you were thinking critically around somewhat of an unfamiliar topic. So, as you see, you all were able to brainstorm a couple things, but using Gemini, it led you to think more critically about that piece and your brainstorm. This new learning was done in about 20 minutes. It seemed long, but it was about 20 minutes. Um, this type of learning demonstrates the power of using AI to strengthen tier one instruction and also provide students with agency over their own learning. So each of you took it in kind of a different direction. At least
045the two that we heard of, right? It went in a somewhat of a different direction. Without the use of AI, this assignment would have looked very different. Students would have spent much more time going into our research databases and analyzing and doing all those pieces and it would have not been able to been done in 20 minutes. Narrowing down their topics would have taken a significant amount of time. So that is one of the benefits of using AI with our high school students to strengthen and leverage that tool to support our tier one instruction. So in closing during this workshop you've seen AI purposely integrated in the video at Tallwood and First Colonial High School and then also in the simulation you just experienced. Despite the differences, all three lessons share a common foundation. Teachers
046practice selective and intentional use integrating AI for specific objectives during only a brief portion of the class period. Each lesson also follow that human in the loop philosophy which I explained earlier. Students begin working independently. Then they engage in the AI midway through to refine their thinking. And then they apply their own critical thinking to refine and enhance the project. Throughout the goal was for the AI to enhance not replace critical and creative thinking with students remaining the primary architects of the work using Gemini as that springboard as you just saw for deeper learning. These three elements form the foundation of all of the AI professional learning that we provided to our teachers this year. Thank you for allowing us to join you this afternoon for a brief update in the AI simulation. We thank
047you for your attention and we're ready to answer any questions you may have. Miss Rogers, thank you um so much. I really appreciate this presentation. I know um how much my own high schooler lovehates the whole you can't use your computer right now. Now you can. She has told me all the time, I hate it when they turn off the computer on me. So I thought that that was pretty clever that you showed us how that happens. Um my only cons question slash concern is um just looking back on our power users. I know that the students said that they um the student should be learning how to prompt better. So if you look at our power users and it's a very small number but it's still it's still there. How are we then um
048ensuring that we are teaching those students who are power users how to appropriately ask the questions because we should see a decline in those users and so um I guess that's my question is like what are we doing to support those students while they are on the edge um I I like that was my biggest concern was the power users um and if I recall I had the same concern when We heard the term power users. That's not our term. That's how the data is is reported back to us because the term power users to me uh indicates someone who's a master in the use of and that's not what it is. Right. I saw it as a number of queries and that's what it said was right. And so if they're asking if they're
049asking I believe the number I don't remember the beginning number but I saw the end was like 999 plus and so that's where I am saying if we have like it was 2% of that I want to say it was 5.99 but I can't remember the beginning number off the top of my head but where we want to see that those students being appropriately um taught how to ask the questions so they don't need to ask that many queries. Does that make am I making sense? Well, I think you Yes, you are making sense and I think to Dr. Robertson's point trying to get away from the language of power user would be because it's it's a term that we maybe should not have used, right? But so in talking about it, it was 2%.
050Yes. And I don't have the exact parameters up in front of me right now, but I think it's twofold, right? Like in this exact simulation that you just saw, you guys prompted once and then you reprompted one more time. Our high school students, some of them who are really prepared in using Gemini and in using AI and who are using ChatBT on their cell phones at home and all the time, they're prompting a significant amount. So in this exact assignment, they could have reprompted 15 times to get the right prompt that they want. me myself alone, like when I'm working on a presentation or a document to prepare, I I'm prompting a significant amount of times. Um, and so I think when you're thinking about it, yes, of course, we do want to train our
051high school students of the power of effective prompting, which is what we are doing, and we start with that with our professional learning for our teachers, but I think you have to consider that it isn't always necessarily wrong that they're prompting that much. They could be redefining their output to get what they want, to get the correct product, right? And I and and I like and I understand that. I think like I I said before, my biggest concern is students using it um because they're bored. I mean, let's be frank. And I have a kid who would do that in my own household that would be like, I'm bored. Here's the AI tool. I'm just going to ask it a bunch of questions because that's more fun than listening to what the teacher's doing. So
052again, I realize that they are only given a small amount of time to do it. I guess that would be my concern is how do we then look at that data and say well who's using it effectively and who's using it ineffectively and so that would be what my question be and I don't know if we have an answer right now well it's a great question who are the power users in this group Matt right there and and they provided a real interesting dialogue didn't but you also heard Kahan standing behind them saying they're walking the edge right so you have to have somebody like the teacher who's on looking at that saying that in but they came to a fascinating conclusion that I don't think would have happened after two prompts right you know
053so I think we have to be real careful to tie a number to what the impact truly is where in their instance they got highly engaged in what they went to and as they shared out we were all like well say more and I think that's that your point we have to be careful look at that number saying it's inappropriate versus trusting the adult who can monitor it through that usage I think is the important lesson I learned from watching these two gifted students in the in the front room. But I also think to your point, Mr. Delaney, is that we had several teachers, teacher assistants up here, and that's not the reality in the classroom. You have one teacher to 25 30 high schoolers. So that's where my concern is is that where h
054what can we do and again there might not be an answer today and that's okay but what can we do to ensure that they th those higher prompts are appropriate if the teacher isn't able to get to those students because you know you've got these two walking the edge and maybe some down here that are well over the edge. What can we do then to put in guard rails for those students that are high prompting? And that would be my question. And again, if there's not an answer today, I'm okay with that. But that's where my brain is going. I do want to share something with the board. So to answer your question a little bit, we do, and I think I shared this at the November update, but I might not have. There is
055access to Google Vault through DOT. And so we have had similar concerns to you when we first started in November around probably the December December time frame, right? We're analyzing the number of prompts that students are doing. And there were a couple high school students that had an exuberant number of prompts very early on. And that was prior to the work that they've been doing all semester long learning about Gemini, right? And so we are able through Google Vault through DOT to pull students prompts and review it on a case- by case basis. Okay. So if there is a concern um like it's we work with DOT with Mr. Den's team and we pull those students prompts and we can review it. So is that work though difficult to do? Like if I'm a educator,
056so we have 12 high schools full of teachers. Is that something that I then have to go through central offices to have that done or is that something a teacher can do? So right now it's done through Google vault but if you remember we did share that we are releasing the securely chat feature which will come next year next year in the fall to teachers. Well they will be able to monitor what their students are putting into the chat. Okay. So right now I'll be honest with you we have had no teachers request the the chat history. um if they did request it, we I'm sure we would make it available for them. But we have looked at several students just to keep an eye on it and we haven't seen any concerns, but I
057do think the security chat feed feature will be a new security feature that will be nice in the fall to answer your question. Right. Just because if I'm I I know for myself, if I'm an educator and I'm concerned about my student, I'm not going to you guys downtown to say help me with my student. I want to be able to take care of it in my own classroom. So that's where, you know, if we have those things available, that's that's a good thing. Um before we go to the next speaker, um Mr. Kellen, yours went dark on my thing. You hadn't put in a request to speak, had you? I have. You have? I have. Okay. So, were you after Miss Melnik? I don't know. It doesn't matter. Okay. We'll do Miss Melnik then.
058Then we'll do you. So, I liked the onoff feature and it it stopped us a couple times like, "Okay, we're writing. We're going to have permission in a minute to go further." But what I liked, not a super user like these two, we wondered right off the bat if we even knew enough to do anything about the Chesapeake Bay. We knew a little um but we it really helped us um choose a topic. Even when we redirected um we went back up and picked something that was very interesting. And I'll tell you now, I'm thinking about it. Um, and I'm thinking about something right now that I didn't think about an I wasn't even thinking about it an hour ago. Like, I'm a big fish eater, but now I'm wondering, and I always try to
059choose the wild caught fish, and now I'm wondering if maybe I should be buying farm-raised fish because of microplastics. And so, I don't know the answer to that, and I might have to to research that, but I'm thinking differently now. And I think and we know things about the Chesapeake Bay now that we didn't that we didn't know. Um you want to talk about CO2 now? We know a little bit about that, you know, and that happened in just a few minutes. But the high school Kim, as I think about myself in the early 80s, would probably still be sitting here trying to think about what should I write about? I don't know. Like that's where I would be and I'd be so far behind and probably feeling worse about myself. like I I'm not
060smart enough to do any of this. And so this was really incredible. Um and I think parents need to know that the teacher controls and I loved that feature. You're listening to me now. This is off. You're not putting in 15 prompts. I don't know how you guys did that, but it's off and you're listening and you have my attention. Back to your partner. Go. And I that this was fantastic. Thank you, Mr. Ken. And then Mr. C. I hope my question is not inappropriate relative to this exercise. But the question that bubbles to the surface is since AI is a runaway train moving at a speed faster than our ability to keep up with it. And B, since most of the students are far more advanced when it comes to technology than most of
061the adults who teach them, do we have a sense yet of the known unknowns that still surround this whole exercise or is that just I don't know where to go with that so move on to the next question. And I get that. But that's what comes to my mind and that is do we know even what the unknowns are that we still need to wrestle with and try to tame. I mean I think you're right. AI is moving. We've talked about it before. AI is moving faster and more rapidly than we can you know stay on top of. But we do have we've talked about it in our strenuous application approval process. My team we demo applications all the time. We were in a demo this morning for an up andcoming AI platform that is
062very interesting. Um, we give feedback to up and cominging platforms. Lots of platforms want to work with Virginia Beach. They reach out to us as we're a large division. So, we give feedback to those platforms. We try to make improvements and suggestions. Um, but no, we don't know what the unknown is and what's going to be coming next year. And, you know, even a platform similar to Notebook LM, which we just turned on for our high school students, that platform has changed tremendously over the course of a year. And looking back, we think about should we have turned that on earlier, right? Like those even the ones that we're using Gemini every day. You can ask my team every day something new pops up and we don't even know it's coming and then we're working
063through those pieces, right? So I think it's just trying to stay on top of it, but then also empowering our educators to use those tools and to try them and to share those resources and to share things that they think are powerful with us so that we can put it through the approval process and see if it's safe for our students to use. It seems as though you're confronted with a need to keep running as fast as you can to keep up while at the same time putting the brakes on, not to do anything too fast before you fully truly understand how it can be applied. Yeah, it's a push and pull for sure. I mentioned this last time and I'll mention it again. You're in my prayers, Mr. Cummings. Yeah. Thank you so much
064for an exciting and engaging activity that I think gives us visibility into what goes on in the classroom. Um it's very exciting and I enjoyed it. Uh I don't have a direct question. I was just going to share some quick comments with the board and let you folks know I sent an email as well. Um I when looking through this topic I was googling securely and artificial intelligence some of the work that they've done and so they actually just completed a study where they went through December 1st 2025 to through February 20th 2026 and looked at over 2.2 million AI conversations on schools issued devices and they evaluated them and and their claims. Now granted this is a vendor saying that they're their claims and so it's not an external you know person but I
065think that they would have integrity reasons to report accurate numbers but approximately 78% of student AI conversations were deemed educationally appropriate under district administration administrator set policies of the remaining 22% at least one content deflection was triggered meaning the AI blocked or redirected the prompts as inappropriate that represented about 2.7 27 million um deflections and about 2% of AI prompts showed signs of self harm, violence or bullying. So I just thought that was interesting to see you know what is data across a thousand some divisions. How is it being evaluated? Um, now I do have some concerns because I'm like, well, Securely is using this data on sponsored content for marketing a product. And so I think there's I mean they say they did everything within the realms of their contractual agreements and whatnot, but
066I think that is kind of an interesting um concern that I might have there. But I think seeing the impact of AI and how it's utilized at scale um you know it's an interesting article. I hope folks could take time to read through it and, you know, maybe insert it to Gemini and ask for more information. Great. Thank you. And I know that we'll be exploring this topic more at the retreat. So, I'm going to hold all of my thoughts for that because I want to make sure that we get to the next presentation here. So, we are going to welcome Nicole Livis, chief communications and community engagement officer, and Dr. Admin Alexander, director, office of family and community engagement for a face update. Good afternoon, school board members, Dr. Robertson, chairwoman Brown, and vice
067chair Williams. I'm Nicole Livis, chief communications and community engagement officer, and I'm joined by the director of the office of family and community engagement, Dr. Adman Alexander, who is here to share an update on the Office of Family and Community Engagement, also known as FACE. The face team has been busy this year working to further the division's mission of partnering with the entire community to empower every student and also connecting our programs to the division's strategic priorities. All right. Thank you, Miss Livis. Uh, good afternoon, school board members, Dr. Robertson, Chairwoman Brown, and vice uh, Chair Williams. Everything Oh, wait a second. There we go. Awesome. Everything we do in FACE ties back to conference of 2030, specifically goal for partner with families and the community to support students. Our work is about cultivating partnerships
068among families, schools, and the community that support students and was also an area of focus on this year's strategic action agenda. Our mission is straightforward. Provide access to information and resources families need for academic success and improve the social well-being of families and students. We define family engagement as a dynamic, inclusive partnership between families, schools, and community partners. It's not just about getting parents in the building. It's about meaningful two-way engagement. Our work is organized around five pillars. Professional development, welcoming all families, volunteering, language access, and outreach. I'll walk you through each of these. Open up. Our first pillar is professional development. We use a roadmap for strong family engagement that gives schools a structured pathway. Four phases that build on each other. Phase one is building awareness where we introduce family engagement concepts and
069create shared understanding across sta uh excuse me shared understanding across staff. Phase two is establishing foundations putting situation excuse me putting structures in place for consistent family school communication. Phase three cultivating collaboration is where we develop authentic two-way partnerships through ongoing relationship building. And phase four is deepening relationships is our goal. Integrating family voice into school decision- making, continuous improvement and uh school struct school culture. Schools are at different points along this road map and our team supports excuse me our team supports um them whatever wherever they are. Our second pillar is about making sure every family feels welcomed and supported. One tangible way we bring this to life and remove barriers is through the student supply rack. The student supply rack is now in 85 schools supporting supported by United Way funding. It gives
070students free immediate access to supplies they need, no questions asked. We're filling over 150 requests per month. Our family resources include welcoming all family posters and schools, a study skills guide for families, a family resource fair, and a family book club. We also have a face resource site which is a comprehensive guide that puts schools and community resources at families fingertips available online and via QR code. our family engagement digital resource book which provides tailored support for educators enhanced enhanced communication and volunteering features and readyto-use professional tools. This aspect of enhanced communication and volunteering brings us directly to our third pillar volunteering. Volunteering is our third pillar and the numbers speak for themselves. Through our volunteer and education program managed by Signup Genius Enterprises, we've logged over 14,000 volunteers and more than 46,000 volunteer hours
071through quarter 3. That's approximately 1.6 million in value to our schools. Volunteering education is all about welcoming families to get involved and build uh connections through school-based volunteering. As a spotlight, our coats for kids event brought out dozens of volunteers, including students and language ambassadors. We distributed over a 100 coats and books and 200 families attended. The essential work of our language ambassadors and at events like this highlights our fourth pillar, which is language access. Language access, our fourth pillar, and it's critical to making our schools truly welcoming. Our language ambassador volunteer program currently has 93 ambassadors representing 25 languages with 183 volunteer hours logged. These ambassadors bridge communication between schools and families who speak languages other than English. They support events like the human resource career fair, pre-K registration, and a variety of school-based
072activities, providing informal translation and interpretation services that remove barriers and make our schools more accessible. Our fifth pillar is outreach. How we reach families where they are. Family outreach representatives are the backbone of this work. They deliver professional learning to school staff, facilitate family school communication, organize workshops and family education, and collaborate with collaborate with community partners. Two key tools support this outreach. The family connection, which is a curated resource hub where families can learn, grow, and connect to school and community support. The Beacon is our mobile resource truck designed to strengthen the connection between home and school by bridging, excuse me, by bringing VBCPS resources directly into neighborhoods and meeting families where they are. This initiative addresses critical family needs by boosting achievement and attendance, expanding accessibility, and increasing engagement. The focus on outreach
073and meeting families where they are is driven by our commitment to mutually supportive partnerships through our collaborative group VB Care Connect, which is a network of community partners dedicated to sharing information and vital services, creating a sustainable collective impact. We demonstrate this commitment by co-leading the youth and safety working group and mobilizing community partners to address critical issues like our student meal debt. This comprehensive community support is further amplified by our broad network of partners in education whose contributions spann all eight dimensions of the wellness wheel that you see on the next slide. The extensive impact of our partners in education can be best understood by examining how their contributions align with the eight dimensions of the wellness wheel. Partners in education connects businesses and organizations directly with our schools. This year we have 1,800
074partners supported by 3,100 school connected partnerships. These partnerships generated approximately $160,400 in donated items. That's about 15,300 individual items plus $219,454 in sponsorships. Our partnerships span all eight wellness dimensions. You can see the breakdown here. Intellectual leads at about 1,700 followed by occupational and physical excuse me followed by occupational and physical. Every dimension is represent represented showing the diversity of support our community provides. The back to school caref fair is our signature community event and the numbers this year were outstanding. Bear with me. I'm going to read the numbers because we are extremely proud of them. Over 7,000 attendees. We distributed more than 3,000 backpacks filled with supplies and 3,000 pairs of headphones and and earbuds. We provided 346 vaci vaccines and 61 physicals. Over a 100 free haircuts were given, 110 community partners, and
07526 sponsors made this possible along with 80 community and student volunteers. There were 50 plus Virginia Beach school staff and eight bus drivers who transported families to and from the event. This is what partnerships look likes looks like in action. Last, the Virginia Beach Education Foundation operates under the mission of inspire innovation, give with purpose, and make a difference. This year, VBF founded, excuse me, funded 67 uh future ready grants totaling nearly $29,000 broken down across innovative learning, schoolwide, and school plus community uh categories. The beach bag program, where 100% of contributions go directly to students, distributes 1,200 bags weekly. Nearly 46,000 bags have been distributed to date. The Virginia Star, a partnership between VBEF and VBCPS, connects workforce development with family technology access and has distributed 27 refurbished laptops. And the house that students
076built involved uh 81 students across six CTE trade classes generating $150,000 in scholarship and grants plus $150,000 in donated materials and time. We're always working to expand the ways Oops. We're always working to expand the ways our community connects with schools. Families and community members can get involved through three main pathways. Volunteers in education gives individuals a direct way to contribute time in our schools. Partners in education connects businesses and organizations with schools to support students. And the Virginia Beach Education Foundation channels philanthropic investments into innovation and student success. All three of these pathways are promoted through our outreach channels, our events, and our school-based teams. If board members are ever asked how someone can get involved, these are the three doors we point people towards. Last, with family engagement isn't one program or one
077event. It is a daily work of building trust between our schools and our families they serve. Thank you, and I welcome any questions. Thank you, Miss Malnik. I just don't have enough nice things to say about the face department. You guys are amazing and and honestly, this is not a group that sits around and thinks about what they can do. You are out there. You are visible. You are an action group and we know it and the community knows it and you continue to grow and impress every year. Five Pillars, you you guys are amazing. Um, I especially appreciate the 93 ambassadors representing 25 languages. How important that is for this very diverse community and that you meet people where they are. Um, that is it it's just amazing. And any board member who has
078not been to the face office, you should stop by. It's a buzz every day. I mean, it's just you want it is action. It is alive. It's it's it's action. And Dr. Alexander. Go Phils. Go Phils. Thank you. Go Phils and go birds. Thank you. No, Dr. Green. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you, Miss. It's not football season. It's always football season. Um Dr. Alexander. Um, I can't also thank you enough because as a reminder, the biggest thing we do is educate our students and ensure that all barriers to learning are removed so that they will be successful. And your office is an intricral part of that. Ensuring that learning can take place, students are fed, students are loved, nurtured, and have everything along with their parents that they need to be academically successful. I can speak
079firsthand to those three pillars that you have implemented because certainly your office has been a great help in helping uh schools in my district with uh establishing volunteers, new programs and and I'm a part of a group that does a big partnership um with the division as well. So, thank you. And in case my colleagues missed it, um there is a big push to help reduce the seniors who are graduating their lunch debt. So I challenge you to donate. I already have. Thank you. It's a team effort, by the way. It's a this is a team effort. I'm up here, but these ladies, cuz I work with all ladies, are phenomenal. So thank you, Dr. Alexander. And I also wanted to um just highlight some of the ways that you guys are really in the
080community and in a way that is accessible to our um families and students which is really wonderful. I've gone to the back to school caref fair for many years. Um not only as a board member but as an educator. Seeing you guys give those students haircuts that need them, giving away the backpacks, making students excited about coming to our schools is really so important. And I can't tell you how great it is to hear the kids excited to go in and be able to get everything ready so that they're ready for the first day of school. It is so heartwarming to be able to see all of the staff there ready to welcome them with open arms and get them ready to um have a great first day at school. I've also um been uh
081um donated to the beach bags program. I think it's so wonderful. I've seen the impact of the beach bags program on my students who get the beach who have gotten in the past the beach bags and how um critical that is for them to be able to understand that they won't go hungry over the weekends and that they will have something that they have access to to eat. And I think that's great. I've also think that it's great that your offices have engaged parents and ask them how can we help you be more involved and that's a conversation that I was able to have um with some of your um volunteers and staff and it's really um wonderful to see that they're interested in engaging especially our secondary parents because I feel like our elementary
082schools are full of volunteers and our secondary students really don't have as many volunteers from their parents for whatever reason and so to have those conversations to try and re-engage parents in the um volunteering at their student school at the secondary level is really great. So, thank you for all that you do and I hope to continue to engage with your offices. Thank you, Miss Falton. Thank you, Chair Brown. My how can I say thanks for all that you all do and the ladies sitting in the back every event that we have they are all they are always there to welcome us and and just to lend a hand and to guide us. Um you are the face pun intended. You are the face of Virginia Beach public schools and I do appreciate it. And
083when you do have the caref fairs I went this year it was awesome. I mean, it was buzzing. Everything was there. And every five pillows that you all mentioned here is at the caref fair. I see all of that when you're walking around and you're talking and the parents are so engaged with what you have there. Uh, I just love attending it. When I thought I had missed one, uh, I was just a little bit on time, but I was running into I slid into the convention center to make sure I got there. But I just want to say thank you for all that you're doing and I do appreciate uh your new addit your your truck. I was impressed with it when I saw it before you cut the ribbons. I was there looking
084at it all inside of the truck. You get me tour of the truck as well. But what I would ask you and maybe if you can answer it for me, maybe not now but later when you talk about the um neighborhoods and uh engagement that you're doing um how many neighbors neighborhood have you have you all visit as of today and how other neighborhoods chosen? So good question. We we haven't started yet. Um we've been working really with schools. We're that's going to be our summer push. um that's going to be on the website. The the uh locations that we're going to be going in um this they're chosen um based upon the need. Uh really we're looking at uh specific communities that we want to get into um and help academ help reinforce academics.
085The most important thing about the truck is yes, we're going to have additional community resources or community services are there, but it's a partnership between the face office DL docel to really get out there and really connect with our families so that we can so that we're all on the same page and we can move forward. So summertime is when we're really going to get into the communities. Um we're kind of finalizing that now, but it's a it's as everything I've talked about, it's a collective partnership to make sure that we're moving everything forward. Thank you for explaining that. And I and I hear you saying, you know, it's a team effort and I I'd like to commend you for that because you always put your staff there beside you and and talk about how
086you're all working together. Uh this is just a tip of the spear. I I do this program, this particular one is really engaging. I will say it again. You are the face city public schools. So keep up the good work. Thank you so much. Thank you, Miss Mr. Ken. How do you cover 25 languages? I assume that's with the help of technology, but I don't know if that's an accurate assumption, but that's a lot of languages. That's why we have people. You ask people for help and they help you. And so that's what the volunteer uh language ambassador program is about is there's a lot of people that speak multiple languages, which they become assets to the school division. So we asked them to become assets to the school division and they volunteer their time
087to do that. So a lot of them are teachers or custodians. So they work all day and then uh we have a system that's set up where if we learn about different events like schools or our face events, they then sign up to come. So it it is the work of the people and how they're invested into this community, invested into the school division, and they come out and help support. and we're just trying to find ways to make sure that we um honor them um because they, you know, they they uh they put the time, effort, and energy into it. Very impressive. Thank you, Miss Dwire. That would have been my last comment. Um all of the goals that you've achieved, what a blessing um for the community and these families. Um I just
088had a question. Uh the house that students built, is that on tour? Can anyone go see that? So, it's just being finished up. Uh I think it's going to be I'm going have to get back to you because I know well it's in the process of being built and sold. So, once it is, we just have a uh once it all together, you all will be invited to see the house and tour the house. Yes. Thank you. And thank you for everything that you do. Um I do want to just highlight and reiterate for the um the community sake the student supply rack. You mentioned 85 schools. That's every school. Correct. So that's really great. Um that that's in there. And then there's one other thing that I think that we do, but I'm not
089sure that we still do it. I think it was called My Friend's Closet. Is that something that's still going on? No, we had to make some adjustments of our friend's closet. Yeah. All right. Well, I I'll ask I'll ask more about that offline, but yes. All right. Thank you. I appreciate everything you do. And we are going to reconvene at 6 pm. This is adjourned.