001[Music] the date is October 22nd 2024 the time is 1804 and I'd like to call the freder County Schoolboard meeting to order we have an agenda before us do I have a motion for approval Mr chair I move that we approve the consent agenda before us second the motion has been made improperly second yes I'm sorry it's the agenda not the consent agenda sorry sorry yes correct that did I say consent agenda I I did Mr chair I apologize and I move to approve the agenda before us thank you second okay so the motion has been made and properly seconded any discussion all in favor signify by saying I I any oppos that motion passes Madame Vice chair what is a pleasure of the board thank you Mr chair I move at the County School
002Board of Frederick County Virginia enter a closed session meeting for the following one to review and discuss appointments administrative appointments administrative leave declined offers dismissals leave of absence resignations staff performance information only substitutes and tutors volunteers and goals of the superintendent pursuant to Virginia code section 22- 3711 paragraph A.1 second okay we have a motion to go into close session it has been properly seconded any discussion all in favor signify by saying I I any opposed motion passes we're now in closed session and we reconvene around [Music] hours Madame Vice chair what's pleasure of the board thank you Mr chair I move that the board reconvene from closed session second we have a motion to return from closed section has session has been properly seconded any discussion all those in favor signify by saying I
003I any opposed motion passes Mr chair I moved that the best to the best of each board member's knowledge only public business matters lawfully Exempted from open meeting requirements under the freedom Virginia Freedom of Information Act were discussed in the closed session and only such public business matters as were identified in the motion by which the closed session was convened were heard heard discussed or considered by the board we have a motion to certify the closed session and has been properly second now it has been properly seconded any discussion Madame clerk would you please call the role please Dr urin hi Mr funes hi Mr Atkins hi Mr Bell hi Miss Martin hi Mrs Klein I Mrs stent I motion passes Madam Vice chair all right and that is all that I have Mr chair
004we do actually I take that back we do have a uh several motions out of closed session I move to approve the personal actions as recommended by the superintendent second okay we have a motion um to approve those items has been properly seconded is there any discussion all those in favor signify by saying and I I any opposed motion passes that's all I have Mr chair all right okay so it is 7 P or 1905 um if you would all please join me for a moment of silence thank you for that um we have um and ask everyone who is able to stand for the Pledge of Allegiance tonight we have one of our students lead us in the pledge so if I could please have Bailey Rockwell from Admiral bird Middle School come up
005front please I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with libery and justice for all thank you so much all right next is a consent agenda a cons consent agenda can't speak this evening do I have a motion to approve the consent agenda as presented Mr chair I move that we approve the consent agenda as presented second okay it has been uh motioned and properly seconded is there any discussion all those in favor signify by saying I I Mo any opposed motion passes all right we would like to pause now and read our proclamations to recognize American Education week National Education support professional day and substitute Appreciation Day Madame Vice chair thank you Mr chair Mr Atkins would
006you please read the proclamation for American Education week for us American Education week November 18th to the 22nd 20124 whereas public schools are the backbone of our democracy providing young people with the tools they need to maintain our Nations uh precious values of Freedom Civility and equality and whereas by by equipping students with both practical skills and broader intellectual abilities schools give them hope for the access to a productive future and whereas uh education employees be the teachers instructional AIDS counselors administrators substitute teachers bus drivers secretaries Librarians custodians maintenance technicians School nutrition service employees or other support staff work tirelessly to serve our children and communities with the care and professionalism and whereas schools are Community uh Lynch pin bringing together adults and children Educators and volunteers Business Leaders and elected officials in a common
007Enterprise now therefore be it proclaimed that the Frederick County School Board hereby declares the week of November 18th to the 22nd 2024 as American Education week week dated this day 22nd dated this 22nd day of October 2024 thank you Mr Atkins I'd like to turn it over to Dr Brian ersin to read the proclamation for National Education support Professionals Day the National Education support Professionals Day November 20th 2024 whereas education support professionals through at freder County public schools are key members of the team working to create an Innovative Community where carrying relation ships and authentic learning inspire all students and whereas education support professionals support student learning by keeping schools safe clean comfortable and running in good order working with teachers to help all students achieve to the best of their ability delivering students safely
008to school and back home each day preparing and serving healthy meals so students can focus and learn better assisting visitors students families and staff daily and ensuring the smooth operation of the district and Personnel budget Staffing finance and other essential support are as and whereas educational support professionals work tirelessly to serve our children and Community with care and professionalism now therefore be it proclaimed by the freder County School Board hereby declares November the 20th 2024 National Education support Professionals Day and encourages everyone to recognize the importance of Education support Professionals in our Public Schools dated this 22nd day of October 2024 thank you Dr urin and now I'd like to turn over Mr Bell to read us the National Education support Professional Day Proclamation with pleasure Madam Vice chair whereas substitute teachers are an essential
009part to the education of our children though they rarely receive the recognition or respect from the community they deserve and whereas it is inevitable that regular teachers will on occasion be absent leaving their students learning environment and education agenda disrupted and whereas maintaining the usual level of discipline and Tranquility in the classroom is crucial to every student and whereas every substitute teacher must be flexible in order to adapt to different teaching styles and planning as well as command the respect of the young people he or she may be teaching on a given day and whereas on November 22nd 2024 the substitute teachers of Frederick County Public Schools will be recognized for their valuable and meaningful contributions that substitute teachers offer to the world of education on a daily basis now therefore be it resolved that
010the Frederick County School Board does hereby extend greetings and best wishes to all observing Substitute Teacher Appreciation Day on November 22nd 2024 thank you Mr Bel Mr chair that concludes our proclamations thank you madam Vice chair we're now at the point of our meeting where we get to recognize our amazing students and staff so I will hand it over to Dr Hummer thank you very much Mr chair good evening and Welcome to our Awards of Excellence program before we proceed I would like to ask that everyone stay here through the entire program out of the respect of each individual who is being recognized once we have completed all the presentations you will have an opportunity to leave and enjoy the rest of your evening in addition when you come forward for your certificate or to
011be acknowledged as a school please take a moment and pause for a photograph with Mr sturdivan and myself and then move to the right remain at the front and we'll take a photo of the entire group being recognized so now I'd like to call Mr Sturman and I down forward and we'll get started and thanks for everybody for coming and to start off tonight's program we're going to start with the Virginia State Fair FCCLA poster design contest this October Bailey Rockwell a student from admirable Admiral Richard E bird Middle School competed in the FCCLA poster design contest at the State Fair of Virginia Bailey won the competition and received first place [Applause] congratulations and next up the Virginia State Fair skills USA competition student students from d j Howard Center recently participated in the Virginia
012State Fair skills USA competition here are the results in the category of Auto Service technology we have a first place team David mayor [Applause] along with David we have Kenny [Applause] Pearson yes can you fix my car and also in the category of Auto Service technology our fourth place team Kaden bford [Applause] and Corbin job [Applause] and the next awards are for our early childhood programs all of our preschool classrooms successfully met or exceeded Virginia's quality expectations for the Early Childhood programs for the 2023 24 school year through the Virginia quality birth to five VQ B5 program staff are focused on strengthening teaching skills and demonstrating quality in in areas proven to matter to Children's School Success and tonight we're going to recognize teams from five different schools from apple pie Ridge Elementary School the
013school met met expectations teacher Nicole Deus [Applause] teaching assistant Peggy Hughes [Applause] principal Megan [Applause] DOD and assistant principal Jennifer Duckworth [Applause] next from Evendale Elementary School met expectations teaching assistant shaa [Applause] day and principal Dr Mike Dario [Applause] next up Gainesboro Elementary School met expectations teacher Danielle Bailey teaching assistant Manda on [Applause] principal Patty [Applause] black and assistant principal Danielle stores [Applause] next up Stonewell Elementary School exceeded expectations teacher Carrie Ludwig [Applause] teaching assistant faith mne [Applause] and principal Mike weissbad Mark I apologize correction mark That's Mark weissbad just don't call him late for din [Laughter] and next up Northwestern Regional educational programs met expectations teachers Heidi [Applause] Burton Alexandra Cooper [Applause] Ellen [Applause] Dalton Randy [Applause] Dinger Lauren great house [Applause] Tina [Applause] nap Tara lalite [Applause] Susan [Applause] Madden Aaron [Applause] assistant
014program administrator J Campbell [Applause] and Dean of instruction Roy Martin [Applause] and next up we have two very prestigious Awards going to our finance department the government Finance Officers Association of the United States and Canada gfoa presented a distinguished budget presentation award to the Frederick County Public Schools Virginia for its annual budget for the fiscal year beginning J July 1 2024 in order to receive this award a governmental unit must publish a budget document that meets program criteria as a policy document as a financial plan as an operations guide and as a Communications device the gfoa award is the highest form of recognition in governmental budgeting this is the second year the division has submitted their budget document to gfoa and received this high honor congratulations and there's one more the division has also received
015the association of School business officials International asbo meritorious budget award for the past now 12 years this is the highest honor in school finance and recognizes Frederick County Public Schools for its excellence in school budget presentation and setting a high standard for transparent budget development congratulations [Applause] okay next up in our meeting we have the announcements of administrative appointments by Dr Hummer all right thank you very much Mr chair it is with great honor that we have a couple administrative appointments that we would like to announce first I would like to call up Mr Scott Lykens please come on down and join me in welcoming him as our new specialized program coordinator Mr lyans is coming from Frederick County Middle School as their assistant principal um additionally Mr lyans has served seven years of Middle
016School teaching experience in Morgan County Public Schools he holds a Bachelor of Arts in biology from the college a MERS in elementary education and a master's in educational leadership both from Edinburgh University of Pennsylvania please join me and congratulating Mr Lykens [Applause] nothing like going first so first off I'd like to thank Dr Hummer ladies and gentlemen of the board and everybody here um for this opportunity um I'm thankful to have the opportunity to continue to grow as a professional and my Professional Knowledge uh working with students that I'm passionate about and excited by the opportunity to continue to work with the scholars and families in Frederick County so thank you all very much all right next we have the new assessment reporting and program evaluations team as coordinator of reporting and program evaluations Mrs
017Danielle stores come on down please Mrs stor is coming to us from Gainesboro Elementary School as their assistant principal prior to her time as assistant principal missor served as the intervention resource teacher for three years at Gainesboro and a classroom teacher at Orchard view uh for 5 years Mrs stores holds a Bachelor of Science in elementary education and a master's of curriculum and instruction in special education both from Longwood University and a cert certification in educational Administration from James Madison University please join me again in congratulating Mrs stores congratulations I will keep this short but I did prepare some remarks because it is Bittersweet for me um I'm filled with gratit itude and excitement and a touch of sadness as I leave Gainesboro Elementary School as assistant principal um and take on this new role
018um this school has been more than just a place to work it's been a second home for me and I've witnessed firsthand the incredible dedication of our teachers staff students and families um their support and encouragement and unwavering commitment to our school Community has been instrumental to my growth and development as a leader um I'd Al like to express my gratitude to um our principal Patricia black um she's been more than just a mentor to me she's been a friend and a confidant and a Guiding Light and her unwavering support has shaped me into the educator that I am today as I transition to this new role I am filled with excitement for the challenges and rewards that lie ahead and I'm eager to contribute to the continued success of Frederick County Public Schools and
019to make a positive impact on our students educational opportunities thank you again for your support and for the opportunity and I look forward to serving this community in this new capacity thank you all right next is Mrs Jennifer malown please come on down she is the newly established senior director of Elementary leadership having served as the principal Greenwood Mill Elementary School since 2014 Mrs mown also brings with her two years of assistant principal experience and 14 years of Elementary teaching experience Mrs malown holds a bachelor's degree in elementary education from St Mary's College and a master's degree in administration supervision from George Mason University please join me again in congratulating Mrs malown welcome thank you members of the board Dr Hummer Miss n Mr Goodwin thank you so much for this opportunity to serve as
020the senior director of Elementary leadership I truly am excited about the opportunities that lie ahead and using the leadership in this division to continue to grow our communities to help support our students after all that's why we're here thank you all right next up is Dr Dr Julie Myers please come on down she will be assuming the new role of senior director of secondary leadership Miss Dr Myers Dr Myers recently served in the role as director of secondary instruction since 2014 here in Frederick County Dr Miles Dr Myers was a high school math teacher for eight years prior to becoming an assistant principal for 5 years and then a principal for eight years so a lot of experience Dr Myers previously served as director ctor of curriculum and instruction in Chesterfield County Public Schools as
021well as holding several Adjunct professor positions with Virginia Tech Eastern menite University and James Madison University Dr Myers holds a bachelor in arts and in Fine Arts communication and speech from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro a master's of Art and teaching and learning with a concentration in secondary mathematics from Hollands University and education specialist certification and a doctorate of philosophy both in educational leadership and policy studies from Virginia Tech so please join me in congratulating Dr Myers thank you thank you so much uh Mr sturdavant chairman of the board members of the board and Dr Hummer it's truly an honor to be able to serve in this new role I have loved serving Frederick County schools and our students for the past 10 years so the opportunity to combine my past experience as
022a principal with my background and instructional leadership it's it's a great combination and a gift to me to be able to move into this new role so that I can serve and support and work alongside some exceptionally talented Middle and High School principles and their assistant principles in schools so thank you very much all right next I would like to call up Mrs Jerry Swagger come on down please is the new director of curriculum and instruction after 17 years as FCPS is director of Elementary educational instructional Services Mrs Jerry Swagger assumes the newly established role of director of curriculum and instruction additionally Mrs Swagger was a third and fourth grade teacher at Stonewall Elementary for nine years followed by seven years as an elementary instructional supervisor Miss Swagger has a Bachelor of Science in elementary
023education from slicky Slippery Rock University and a master's in educational leadership from San andoa University please join me congratulating Mrs Jerry Swagger thank you Dr Hummer and I appreciate no Slippery Rock jokes from the sports fans um thank you members of the board I look forward to the continued work with Miss Knight and our fabulous instructional team on behalf of the students and staff of Frederick County Public Schools all right last but not least let's call down Mrs Julia vetero please come on down she is assuming the new role of supervisor of Elementary special instructional Services Federal previously held the positions of private placement specialist and esy coordinator for FCPS spent six years as a special education teacher and served as a therapeutic day treatment counselor for family preser preservation services in Winchester she holds
024a Bachelor of Arts and psychology from brinar college a certification in special education General curriculum K12 from UVA wise and an Old Dominion University and Masters in administration supervision from the University of Virginia please join me and congratulating Julia thank you Dr Hummer and members of the board I would just like to and miss Mr Goodwin and our whole Community here um I would like to thank you all so very much for this opportunity I'm a graduate of uh shando high school and I'm a resident of Fredrick County and I am really honored to be able to continue to serve in this capacity for some of our most vulnerable students so thank you again for the [Applause] opportunity and Mr chair that's all I have for administrative appointments thank you Dr hmer Mr chair I'd
025like to make a motion Mr Atkins uh as everybody's leaving I'd like to make a motion to I take a five minute recess bathroom breaks second have motions been properly seconded any discussion I'm glad she seconded that I was going to drowned all those in favor signify by saying I I any oppose we will recess for five minutes [Music] next up is citizen comments Frederick County School Board is please oh I'm so sorry I'm getting ahead of myself um we have a motion to reconvene Mr chair I'd like to make a motion to reconvene second all right it's been motion to reconvene properly seconded any discussion all those in favor signify by saying I I any opposed all right next up is Citizens comments uh the Fredick County School Board is pleased to receive public
026comments at each monthly meeting from me from members of the public which include residents of Frederick County Virginia including residents of Winchester City Virginia FCPS students parents and legal guardians of FCPS students FCPS employees and businesses located within f County Virginia individuals speaking to the board will be allotted 3 minutes those individuals representing groups organizations will be allotted five minutes with one representative per group upon recognition by the chair a speaker should approach the podium to speak to the school board speakers are expected to show appropriate courtesy to the school board and the school board is committed to showing respect and courtesy to all citizens comments that are not protected under the First Amendment of the US Constitution will not be tolerated this includes comments that are vulgar obscene threatening and comments that are intended
027to incite violence or other breaches of the piece members of the audience are not permitted to interrupt the speaker or me or or meeting by asking questions or making comments violation of the guidelines will result in the chair ruling the speaker out of order continued violation will result in the removal from the premises the chair has a discretion concerning public participation at Schoolboard meetings school board meeting are tape recorded for the purpose of clarification and the development of official minutes this evening first speaker is Christy Scarboro hello board members Christy scarber of Stonewall District well I'm happy to see that the buffet Bandit recovered from his panic attack and made it to this meeting oh where do I even begin every time I think Frederick County Public Schools couldn't possibly get any worse you idiots
028turn around and shock the out of me Frederick County Middle School recently had Flex classes and that Flex class was titled lgbtq plus kindness it is worth noting no curriculum exists for for Flex classes which makes this issue even more concerning secret discussions were had with students about lgbtq nonsense and there's absolutely zero record of it groomers after the news of the Pervert Flex class broke to the public Prince putt decided it would be a good idea to take away all of the flex classes from students not just the extremely controversial and highly gay and Flex class I mean why wouldn't he he like many of you don't give a damn about these students unless it's to brainwash and instill your woke ideology on them but guess what there's more if parents thought that was
029bad wait until they hear about the politically and racially driven quiz that was given to students at Frederick County Middle School by Mr dent in general how much do white people benefit from advantages in society that black people do not have a great deal a fair amount not too much not at all here's another one do you think greater social acceptance of people who are transgender that is people who identify as a gender that is different a different sex that they were assigned at Birth is very good for society somewhat good for society neither good nor bad for society somewhat bad for society or very bad for society plot twist transgenders just like that second grade teacher that FCPS hired at apple pie they should all be locked into mental facilities where they are force-fed
030anticho medication so my question for you retards is what the are you doing about it are you going to fire principal putt putt shouldn't be a principal nor should he be demoted he needs to be fired now I would expect nothing but support from lip Daryl Bell for principal putt there it is and his perversion to force feed wokeness to students at his school as a matter of fact I wouldn't be surprised to learn Bells wearing women's underwear right now so I will leave it at that oh before I go Diana sent any nudes to men that weren't your husband recently or was that just a few years back thank you Joseph brand good evening it's Joseph BR from Stonewall District I would read you the policy regarding nepotism but it is merely redundant as
031it repeats a portion of the applicable Virginia state code section 22- 3119 is where the policy is based on which makes two Provisions that must be met in order for the hiring of a person related to a board member to be legal the first is that the board member must certify that he had no involvement with the hiring decision the second is that the superintendent certifies to the remaining members in writing that the employment is based on Merit and fitness and competitive rating of the qualifications of the individual and that no member of the board had any involvement in the hiring Decision One information has been shared here by some of the board members is that verbal notification was provided and and some have stated that no notification was provided I have submitted a foil
032request to obtain all of the records necessary to actually substantiate any fact in this situation to shed light on whether Dr Hummer and the school board has acted within the legal bounds of the law of Virginia the state code is not trivial it does not require proof of any quidd pro quo and does not provide recour and does provide recourse if this law is violated and is a Class one misdemeanor with civil penalties applied if this is substantiated and prosecuted as Citizens and taxpayers we rightfully demand that all the official actions are done in keeping with state law and any reported violation to be investigated we expect official actions to be above reproach not allowing even for a hint of impropriety we expect the best of you I also wish to address this recent Applause
033that was celebrated with our schools and their accreditations however when I reviewed the so scores for our County I was sorely disappointed to see that the ball is or the bar is so low in Reading we have a pass rate of 64 writing a 74 history a 60 math 62 and science is a 62 if we were to compare this to our school scoring system we would have effectively a D C and D minus in the remaining three categories of these scores only writing was an improvement upon the last years I would ask you board members to challenge Dr Hummer to improve the test scor if he wishes to have a favorable job rating in this District I have emailed each of you regarding my concerns for this and my general response was we need
034money for our fourth high school and we need to pay our teachers better throwing more money at a bad situation does not provide different results as I have had conversations with students teachers and listen to other parents in this community I believe we have core fundamental issues that need addressed and do not require spending any additional money or building additional schools and watching the October 7th Personnel committee meeting I was alarmed to see that there was 101 resignations of Staff in their first year of employment and 61 into 2 to threee category this must be due to a poor working environment I'm over time may I continue for the year 2023 and 24 that shows that 50% of resonations were the newest teachers in our school system in the exit interview process only 11% stated
035this was for salary reasons while combined 40% stated no reason at all or dissatisfaction with their job or for personal reasons this implies a very negative work environment for our teachers and I wish we would have better support for them and what they are trying to achieve in our schools for our children if we want to be a competitive County for hiring teachers we need to understand that we are doing wrong here and cause half of our new hires to flee the first chance that they get teach teachers do not enter this field to be paid handsomely but to make an impact in children's lives and teach them the information that they need to be successful in life this cannot be done in an environment with poor discipline where the students who are disruptive are
036not properly disciplined and instead all of a school is punished as is the case with several schools locking their bathrooms between Class periods and restricting access to an online reservation system I have read the background on PBIS and the the policy that been implemented here in FCPS I would encourage the board to investigate how well this is actually working for us and the effect on classroom discipline by using these policies that only reward positive behavior and do not impact negative behavior I would suggest that life without negative consequences will cause more harm in the long run of their life we are teaching the kids to respond with correct behavior only when there is an incentive for them to do so how will this translate to their future employment and incentives for work how will they
037reach and understand right and wrong Behavior and the importance of living with principle Proverbs 12 starts with this whoever loves discipline loves knowledge but he who hates reproof is stupid I would contend that we have hit Peak stupid with the high schools having to hold it or high schoolers having to hold it until it hurts while they wait for their place in line thank you Gail ferer Ferrera okay thank you good evening I'm Gail Ferrera from Shaunie District thank you Mr Hummer and the board for letting me speak miles for being my representative and uh tonight just want to speak about uh the School Staffing that was kind of alluded to a little earlier here by this gentleman um that I read a Winchester Star article written by Molly Williams on August 12th that stated
038there are 77 vacant teaching positions in Frederick County 33 of which are in special education Katie freakley Director of Human Resources for the Frederick County Public School said our neighbors are getting really competitive in this area because it is very much a critical shortage position we just not seen the talent pools are as strong as maybe they once were in the field of Education overall this is quite sad so I asked myself why are the talent pools dwindling is it the pay is it the benefit I don't think so I believe the answer is discipline or the lack thereof teachers and administration are afraid of disciplining students because for every incident documentation must be submitted to the state if a school generates too many of these incident reports funding from the state can be withheld
039therefore incidents are not written and submitted and teachers must endure being disrespected spit on curse that Etc so is there any wonder why that Taff that teacher Staffing in public schools is a nationwide problem instead of being dinged for discipline incidents schools should be dinged for failing test scores as this gentleman just explained about the S sols it must be Merit based not identity based and and indoctrination must be erased from the Department of Education teachers should not be afraid of reporting discipline invi events School discipline is needed in order to provide a safe environment for learning if the school budget passes our taxes will go up on top of the already higher taxes from home equity appreciation so my question is how are you going to find additional staff to fill these new P
040positions for these new expanded schools if you can't feel existing vacancies now it doesn't make sense so the high school will be built and expansions made but they will be empty since staff will be non-existent discipline must be brought back to the classroom so teachers are respected and students can feel safe and they can learn what they're supposed to learn thank you very much Robert gallilee Robert Galilee Back Creek District um I had prepared some things but um instead I want to address the uh survey that went out concerning uh white privilege and another thing uh with that was I was watching a school board meeting maybe a month ago six weeks ago and somebody stood up here and they said something about uh Mr Atkins and a private message that he had with somebody
041um and they were saying that they read that message aloud and that they uh black or African-American what you know whatever it is that we're supposed to say um that their their child was uh deeply just appalled and Ed crying and said uh don't say that mommy don't say that word um and so when that happened um I I went to my son who's 11 and um and I said are you are you black and he said no and I said well are are you white he said well well no I said well what what are you and he said why I I guess I'm kind of tan and so my point here is that what this school does okay with these policies Dei or this little survey is they are telling black students you
042are not equal it is telling black students everybody hates you you never have a chance you're going to fail in life because of how you were born that's what these policies are doing it is overtly racist it's disgusting it's ter terrible Any teacher involved in that needs to be fired because that's what they are doing so thank you [Applause] board Jay Richardson you'll have to go back that way anyway all right thank you um wanted to talk to you about the displays and flags policy I agree educational spaces should contain minimal distractions I agree that employees uh employees should not use the classroom to remote or advocate for their personal beliefs however I think your proposed policy seems to be a little too vague and does not take a strict enough stance on this issue
043as it reads nothing in this policy should be interpreted to preclude decor and displays related to school sponsored activities clubs athletic events special events and celebrations so it seems that all has to happen is for the school to sponsor some kind of event or club that revolves around a personal Viewpoint or ideology and then displays of this nature would be allowed now this flag policy really confuses me it seems like you're trying to make it seem like you're taking a hard stance on this issue um however it says the flags that are allowed are the American flag which honestly really ought to be the only one um maybe the Virginia flag I notice that's that's all you got here in this building here um flags of any US states or territories flags of any local
044government County Frederick County Virginia why do the local governments in Frederick County need flags flag of the city of Winchester flags of the Armed Forces flags of the public school again why why does public school need a flag and official flags of countries recognized by the us or directly related to the curriculum are you kidding me so FCPS employees should display no Flags except for every flag in existence seriously Ukraine is recognized by the US and I don't support it being displayed in schools Afghanistan is recognized by the us but I don't want to display their flag if the students are learning about the Civil War can they hang a Confederate flag if the uh you'll get me wrong I don't want to censor the history books just happen to believe that you should display
045the American flag and you really shouldn't give any other flag a place alongside it thank you Christian Lapsley good evening board my name is chrisan Lapsley and I'm a senior at trando high school and Mountain Vista Governor School in a world of constant negativity I'm here to shed some light on something positive happening in Frederick County in a partnership with the Shanda classmate Gabriel aach and a friend from James Wood jeem Solomon we created Christian service clubs at our respective high schools the purposes of these clubs are to help community members through service projects in the name of Jesus some accomplishments the shando and jameswood clubs have done so far are making cards for children in the hospital and those in nursing homes collecting over 300 stuffed animals for the Middletown Police Department to use
046in calls involving children making dog toys for the local SPCA and working with the Knights of Columbus to help them prepare over 2,000 meals I thank the board especially Miss Klein and Dr Hummer for their support and advice and I thank you both for making our voices heard and helping us navigate these new processes if anyone would like to help support us the clubs are partnering with the ice cre with the ice cream shop through which is off of Pleasant Valley behind Chick-fil-A this Sunday from 12:00 p.m. to 4 p.m. to raise funds to provide Thanksgiving meals to those in need I encourage you all to go to Mu through get a treat and to remember to mention the Christian service Club when ordering thank you for your time and God bless Chris Davy Chris
047Davey B Creek District so as we talked about this lgbtq plus Flex class um I am the one that uh was made aware of this first out of everybody um not because the school likes to give out information about this but because my son actually will bring home information talk to me unlike some kids so if he wouldn't have done this nobody would have known about this because as we have been made aware there's no uh information about this class it's a private class that was going on um you know whatever they want to call it of uh just students you know doing this class is is a bunch of bull crap is what it is you know it shouldn't have anything to do with the schools now I do appreciate Dr Hummer you know
048taking quick uh you know advancement on this issue that we had and reaching back out to me to have a discussion so thank you for that um but we have a spineless principal at the school that I tried to message twice before about the issue first time he liked to uh email back with this Camala word salad of just explaining what uh you know Flex class is which great you know I already knew what it was I really don't give a crap what it is this just needs gone lgbtq plus anything doesn't need to be in the schools at all so that needs to be left up to to the parents to teach their kids not your the school system be teaching the kids so the second time I reached out to him because it
049happened the second week um so I reached out to him again again he uh responds oh well this is something that's you know going to keep happening basically I can give you guys the emails if you want I have them all saved so um but nothing being done like I said tried to reach out to the principal first no action at all you know so that's when I go farther and after that second email interaction he never responded and wouldn't wouldn't respond to me until the third week when again they have this uh class off offer you know and it was every Thursday is what it is if you guys want to know um but um this class was offered again so I told my son after the second one I said hey look I
050said if it happens again looks like we're going to the school board first thing he says when he gets in vehicle hey I guess you're going to the school board so perfect thank you so here we are talking about this and uh you know like I said he got rid of it but he did it the wrong way instead of getting rid of the perverted class that shouldn't have been there in the first place he got rid of all of them so instead of just getting rid of the one because he wanted to stand up and actually do the right thing he just punishes every kid gets rid of everything so again like was stated we need to just get rid of this guy he has no reason to be in charge of anything with
051the schools if this is how he's going to be so thank you [Applause] do stlm uh good evening board my name is DoD style Meer uh you know I originally came here to speak about the 11 19p public comet um I'm kind of disturbed about when you put policy changes in there and you do use the word should or shall I do understand the difference between those two words there's a lot of people that don't there's a lot of people who get intimidated uh by what they see written and they have no idea of how much recourse they have there's a lot of people that would come up here and talk to you about certain issues or they would reach out to other people to talk about issues but they're afraid that their kids are
052going to get retaliated against in schools so I just would like for you guys to think about that I really think that policy has enough rules as it is and it just needs to stay the same don't need to do anything to it that's just my theory um there's a lot of other issues that need need addressing um I think that there's been some good points made this evening by some folks uh another another Point certainly is that there's a discipline problem in the schools and that is indeed why you have a a teacher shortage and it's a vicious cycle and so then you come to the county for more money for more raises for the teachers for more incentives to get them in here and they still won't stay so perhaps maybe we just
053need to go ahead and and do some addressing of the discipline problems and maybe that would help to address some of the shortage issues as well thank [Applause] you Rachel Ratliff good evening my name is Rachel Ratliff and I'm speaking as a proud resident employee and graduate of frederck County and freder County Public Schools I'm also a member of the frederck County Education Association speaking as an individual I'm speaking on two points this evening one is sharing positive happenings at my school Indian Hollow Elementary School second is some thoughts and seeking more clarification on the employee code of conduct that is being discussed and voted on I believe at the November board meeting I'm currently the title one math specialist at Indian Hollow Elementary School I've been there the past two years I'd like to
054share with everyone some great things that have happened at my school already this year we have collected almost 300 300 pounds of plastic for the TR recycling challenge in just over a month our school year goal is 2,000 lb there are about 44th and fifth grade fifth graders enrolled in tutoring taking place before and after school fifth grade students lead our daily morning announcements with the help of our wonderful librarian we have a very active kindness team consisting of fourth and fifth graders led by one of our guidance counselors we recently had our second annual Title One donuts with grown-ups event last week where we served about 44 dozen donuts to over 300 total people over the course of two days students are earning Hawk awards for character traits that include respect and friendship teachers
055are working across grade levels as buddy classrooms to promote community and connection in our school we have a staff that is always willing to lend a helping hand to pursue our school's goals and vision there are great things happening in our school in our school not and excuse me there are great things happening in our schools not just my own and we need to recognize these more often the second topic I'd like to speak about this evening is on the employee code of conduct a question I have about this policy were any teachers or other FCPS employees asked for input into this policy I believe this was drafted with good intentions but is lacking some clarity and is subjective in some areas in the section of professionalism what is considered moral and ethical behavior in
056my opinion these can be interpreted differently in a section titled accountability again this is subjective one person may view their actions as being accountable while another may not in the section titled collaboration and teamwork it states that employees are required to receive feedback constructively and respectfully what is that supposed to look like is it appropriate to tell EMP polies how to dress outside of work or change them or charge them leave pay or days to change their clothes this appears to be an overreach of authority the section called helps help keep students safe is entirely too short this is a teacher's priority every day and should be treated as such what are the expectations for employees during an emergency what about student safety in and outside the classroom during the school day in the failure
057to adhere section this is also too vague teachers do their best every day but should not be worried about their daily actions being interpreted in such a way that may result in disciplinary action are there levers to the disciplinary action like a warning probation leave etc for this policy to promote professionalism and the best out of FCPS employees it needs to be more specific so employees know what is expected of them and what may happen if the expectations are not met very similar to our classroom teachers share expectations with students I appreciate your time and consideration this evening thank you [Applause] James Moulder James Moulder Back Creek District these will be going out to all the Back Creek uh voters first of all chairman I'd like to know two months ago when I walked into
058the room why did you call me your boy it was on videotape secondly these videotapes there's nothing in you uh YouTube policy saying that language is the reason why they're taken down thirdly y'all want to censor us when we get up here and talk you don't want us to use cuss wordss Mr Bale I believe you don't want us to but through your phone last month you said so so if you want to take me out call me so take me call me SOB but you didn't say so you cussed that's how you ex that's how you make it that express yourself so if you can express yourself up there we can't express ourselves down here that's bullcrap also Mr chair going back to the hiring of your daughter first uh you told everyone that
059you let Dr Hummer and Tara halow if I pronounced it correctly about your daughter applying for the job secondly you come out and you said you let the school board members know two of you publicly said you were aware two of you publicly said that you were not aware two of you wouldve never heard out of uh and then you said that you signed a piece of paper stating that you had nothing to do with your daughter being hired but you voted for her that is doing something to have her hired you voted for you broke policy time to step down time to get off this board you don't do anything about the woke agenda that you promised there's still books out there with uh talking about people having sex in the uh in the
060book uh sixth graders reading books about kids uh uh in college having professors trying to screw them but they didn't say the screw word they said the f word and then you go look the book up online it's supposed to be for ninth grade above sixth graders reading it it shouldn't be in ninth grade it shouldn't be anywhere in our school when I went to school we we might have the dword in a book every now and again but not the f word not sexual explicit word this is this right here is on some of the doors in the Middle School rainbow flag safe place isn't our whole school supposed to be safe for all the kids and again hitting on the LBGTQ uh club or whatever they want to call it that broke School
061Board policy you need to hold your superintendent responsible for his employees if he don't start disciplin them it's time to get rid of the superintendent also and it need and on everything not not just LBGTQ on anything the hiring practices whatever is going on the discipline no kids are disciplined thank you [Applause] yeah play Perry clay Perry Back Creek District I thought I was going to get a break from this when we had five conservatives or at least that ran on a conservative platform on this board and here I am back again because I'm seeing things happen in our schools that I don't approve of um I'm not going to shout I'm not going to call you names I'm not going to cuss I'm going to try to be professional about this I don't think
062it's going to make a difference dud this going to ignore me but I'm going to at least try to be professional uh I'm just angry and upset angry and upset um you guys ran on a conservative platform you talked about the Spooks you talked about the transgender policies you talked about all these things you got voted for based on those things and then they're not happening um at least with the liberal leaders darl Brian we know where you stand we know what you're going to do I mean I Hester was you know I liked Hester because at least I knew what Hester was going to do I get confused with you guys sometimes um before I get into my points about transparency and transgender I want to say that lady right there she won her
063Schoolboard seat over Dr John lman the interim superintendent here and the current superintendent out at Clark County far more qualified on paper but she ran on a platform of ending wokeness and supporting parents rights and that's why she's in that seat today thank you Linda um transparency you know I thought you guys were going to structure things going forward just like they do at the supervisor's office where we speak and then you guys respond so we know you actually heard us not just ignore us and go about your day but that hasn't happened yet now we're down to one meeting a month we used to do two now we're just doing one a month how mean how are we going to communicate as Citizens about what's going on in these schools if we only get
064one meeting a month I mean it's just I don't get that um did you cut your pay in half I don't think you did but whatever um comments are no longer allowed on Facebook post um we're not giving Advanced Communications out to parents about locking bathrooms and some of the other putting urinals at the AER girls locker room now that's been removed but again reactive versus Pro proactive um I I just don't get it and just like the gentleman before me said there's books out there that shouldn't be out there and now we on to the transgender topic we've got surveys as been mentioned middle schools about transgender we got opportunities for kids to learn about uh lgbtq and how to be kind to them and our Flex periods again these are getting canceled bus
065161 had a pride flag a parent had a notify you know and the flag got removed but all these are reactive you know I want to stand up here and say thank you but I can't say thank you if you're being reactive and you're not being proactive about this stuff and now we have a transgender teacher at Apple p as I understand he had a fifth grade class but was moved down to a second grade class where they believe in Santa Claus cuz I guess the fifth graders are too hard for him if he can't do the job that he needs to be removed from the school it's as simple as that we're here to teach these kids so what I want to ask you guys especially Dr Hummer can we send out a message
066to all teachers and School Employees to just stop this stuff rather than wait till a parent finds out about it and then deal with it let's just send out a message make it very clear about not indoctrinating our children in our schools uh I know I'm out of time but I do want to say that I believe wholeheartedly that teachers do deserve more pay I think Unfortunately they get used as pawns I think where the less pay and the less positions need to be in this building here they're paid too much and there's too many of them we need to send more money out to our teachers ala berdick MH um she signed up twice so that's everyone who signed up is there anyone who wished to speak that did not sign you need me
067members of the board my name is Brian Nur resident of the opin district um actually I heard a really good idea ear just now that made me change my mind a little bit but we should probably send out emails telling Stu uh teacher or parents that their teachers are gay or trans or anything why don't we start doing it when they're black too why don't we start doing it when we have uncomfortable topics in school like black history month or the Civil War the Civil Rights uh era you see where that falls you see where that goes I think that the flag policy is a solution in is a solution for a problem that doesn't actually exist we're count to some of the worst of our community when we should be supporting the least of
068our community doesn't the Bible say something about that but if you want to go with that let's go with that let's take everything personal out of the teachers rooms I'd like every member of this board to look at their left hand what do you see there do you see wedding ring get rid of them we do not need to know that our teachers are married married female teachers don't need to change their last names why should we know that that is happening pictures do you see where this goes start supporting the kids stop protecting the bullies we just got out of suici we just got out of bullying prevention month we're just entering Suicide Prevention month a university of uh British Columbia study showed that when you incorporate the discipline with um lgbtq um education
069you actually see a reduction in bullying and suicide ideation you see a rise in test scores because the students are willing and able to come back to school because they don't feel like they're going to be hunted down by the bullies unfortunately this board is being allowed to be run by the bullies and Dr Hummer I'm really disappointed I really really really expected that the school would draw a line I go to Lowden County Prince William County Fairfax County every weekend I went to Charles J colan High School Manasses a beautiful high school a Taj Mahal you might call it did I see PR Flags in there couple of rooms here and there did it hurt the students absolutely not the students felt included and they felt accepted students are now reporting on their teachers
070a reposter was removed from a school a classroom in um milbrook because a student complained to their parent the parent went to the administrator the administrator was afraid of the parent and pulled it rather than saying what it really was which was a statement of inclusion you have a teach you have a parent in this room who has bullied a teacher out of and bullied a principal into changing their kids class over what a tiny flag really are we that sensitive these days if you're going to actually go up there and say you're here for the kids then start doing it anyone else okay next up is a superintendent report by Dr Hummer all right thank you Mr chair appreciate that so I have a couple announcements before I give my annual report to you
071all so first and foremost I want to congratulate all of our students and staff for all of the recognitions that were honored earlier this evening our staff and students are working hard and accomplishing some really really great things and I'm so proud of all of them and looking forward to next month's recipients I also want to thank the school board our delegates Dolores oats and Bill Wy and Senator Mr Timmy French and our amazing school team for their time at our legislative Summit two weeks ago it was very successful we had some really great Rich conversations in regards to how we're supporting our students and School Division and I'm confident that this is going to start something good to make some needed changes at the state level looking forward to continued discussions of these matters
072as well as future collaboration with our elected officials greatly appreciate their support and yours so thank you for that I also want to take this time to give a major Accolade to our media and Communications team if you don't already know communication and transparency is very very important to me and I'm about getting ahead of sharing the great things that are happening here in Frederick County sharing out information that needs to be shared as well as the areas that we also need to improve our me media and Communications Department put together a fantastic video showing the different aspects of the space issues at our high schools with interviews videos from inside our schools to include our operations in real time if you haven't seen it yet please take the time to watch it and hope
073for a favorable outcome tomorrow at the Board of Supervisors meeting so with that I'm now going to step down and go over the annual report very quickly all right just give me a minute all right so the annual report this annual report is to review information and accomplishments that we have accomplished last year this is a required annual report C per state code that I'm required to provide you all every year we typically do this in October we have a report that we put together every year and this is in more in-depth and detail on our website you can actually go on there and click on that now so that is posted our media and Communications teams put that together so this is just a brief summary and overview of this annual plan and then
074of course any questions that you have so I heard a quote today that good educational leaders are what's called merchants of Hope and we are merchants of Hope for our students all 14,500 plus of them as we continue to grow we're about providing opportunities for our students we're about investing in our students to do the great things that we know that they're able to do and we raise the bar for each and every one of them because we expect Excellence from all of them and if we are to expect Excellence from them we want to make sure that we provide them with the staff that they need and provide our staff with the resources so that they can be excellent as well so this is just a graph showing the total staff that we had
075last year we had 1558 instructional staff and 479 support staff we have about 2500 staff so we have other staff that support our schools such as counselors social workers and other staff and of course we have our administrators as well and all of these staff work together for the best interest of our students because of all the accomplishments and we always like to highlight a lot of the great things that are happen happening right here in Frederick County with all of our students so a series of them that I would like to share with you this evening we have students that are getting first place at Regional fairs we also had a group of students that took it upon themselves at Greenwood Mill to do a project project based learning project to add adaptive equipment
076to the playground so all students can have access to to playground and to have that time during recess so that was a great accomplishment for those students and I was very proud of them we also had a student who received the US presidential scholar which is very rare and Olivia Jud we're very proud of her for accepting that honor last year and then of course we're adding on numerous opportunities for our students we added on the pharmaceutical Tech program down with with Mr Thompson who's doing a fantastic job there and we continue to work at providing students with what we're calling high demand experiences so that they are able to apply those skills in high demand jobs so once they graduate they can either go to enrollment into a college or university they can enlist
077in the military or they can be employed right out of high school and we have a lot of those accomplishments that I'm going to share with you here in a second so a couple things that I wanted to draw your attention to I'm not sure if you're aware of this but we serve of we served over 1.3 million lunches so who knew that we were going to serve more lunches than the Golden Corral we also traveled more than 2.4 million miles on our buses 2.4 million so thanks to our nutritional staff thanks to our bus drivers and our AIDS those are the heroes that keep our School Division running smoothly and we greatly appreciate all the hard work that they do for our students next is our dual enrollment courses so we have students that
078are taking dual enrollment classes we had over 6,000 credit hours that our students were able to obtain so they were able to get a head start on going towards a particular career or pathway and they were actually saving money so if they actually wanted to go to a fouryear university some of them were graduating with Associates degrees so these are the opportunities that were providing our students again being merchants of Hope for our students so we can provide them the skills and strategies they need to be accomplish individuals once they graduate high school we also had an expansion of our CTE programs and as you can see we had over 2,000 credentials obtained and those were credentials that were students were able to obtain to actually get one step closer to potentially getting a career
079right when they graduate high school or to get a good idea of what direction they wanted to go in I also want to draw your attention to the 93.5% graduation rate Which is higher than the state average I told you when I first started I'm not stopping till that's 100% we have work to do but we are above the state average which we are very proud of I also want to take some time to really highlight our assets which is our people and when we invest in our people and when we invest in our students we get really great things so I want to highlight these two individuals we have Colby cook as well as Deputy Chase Smallwood who is over at AER and these individuals were actually students of ours and when you talk
080to them if you haven't spoken to them I highly encourage you to do that because they talk about their experience here in Frederick County and how we've provided them with opportunities to now be able to come back and give back to the community and I'm very proud of each of them they're always a joy to talk to and I highly recommend you to do that but this is what we need to invest in and this is what we need to focus on as our kids because that is our why that is why we are here so we want to make sure that we continue to do that lastly I do want to focus on the areas that we need to improve and we have addressed those areas of improvement with you and I am dedicated
081and committed to making those necessary changes that we need to do in order to move the needle for our kids we are working on Pro establishing additional Frameworks we're working on developing our new strategic plan which we're very excited about we've worked on a reorganization there are a lot of things that we are doing doing to move the needle for our students and our team is dedicated and committed to our students to make sure that we are making those necessary changes and we have work to do we have work to do our so scores are not where I would like them to be our performance is not where I would like it to be but we have good staff we have good structures in place and we are moving in the right direction and I'm
082very proud of that and I'm also very proud to see the direction that we are going to go in because I want to make sure that we're encouraging the collaboration and encouraging the conversations that we've been having to move our move our School Division where I know it can go and I'm very very excited about that in in regards to our next steps that's all I have for you want to open up for any questions and then of course this is a required annual report you can see the full report online or if you want a copy we can print that out for you thank you Dr hmer yes sir questions you you know where to find me if you have any questions thanks okay thank you un unfinished business next we have unfinished business
083to include the second reading of policy 11 19p public participation at meetings and the newly drafted policy 213 P Decor display and flags so Mr chair before I hand it off to Mrs Jordan or to you all if you have any questions um there wasn't there was one minor change to this which has been posted on board docs of course and you guys are aware of this change I just want to draw your attention to it and it was to include aspect of of students in regards to uh the the protections um under furpa law with them um but besides that there was no other changes or adjustments to this particular policy is there anything else that we wanted to add to that Mrs Jordan no I believe that's it this is the second reading
084of this bylaw so the board is free to take action on this item tonight if it so CH desires to I canar Mr chair I move that we that the board approve 11 19p as published second we have a motion to approve and it has been seconded is there any discussion Mr chairman Mr at at the um last meeting when we had the first reading of this policy um still uh adamantly against this um I think anytime we give up a little bit of our rights no matter what they are um that we're not going to get those back so if we allow this policy to go through with more stricter laws and what's already there then it's just another way for a government body this board to restrict your freedoms and I'm not going
085to vote for it um you know I wrote a couple things down um it's not the speech that makes makes people smile or feel good that needs to be protected it's a distasteful speech the speech that no one wants to say for fear of being canceled or social backlash but speech that needs to be heard we're not going to hear from Mr Davey Mr Perry the folks over here tonight Mr Branch I believe um with everything that we are doing wrong here in the schools and we're not hearing that you know if if we limit that you know people can say we we can go you guys can reach us by email you can reach us by phone you can do this do that but this is public Discord this is what the whole Constitution
086was built around was coming up to a Podium and speaking publicly I know I've got some folks over here that that spoke out against me a couple times up here in the front um over here to the right a couple times as well and that's fine I'm fine with that come up I'm a public official chew me out tear tear me to Pieces that's okay but that's your freedom of speech you cannot like me I don't care I really don't I'm not going to lose sleep over it um but this is one thing that we have to protect is our freedoms um four of us up here have taken a note to the Constitution of the United States you know and pledge our lives on that I I don't think you know it's ah we
087like the Constitution but ah you know might want to change this or that um volter said I disapprove of what you say but I will defend to the death your right to say it now I don't like volter he's a communist but it's my right to say it um you know but it it does still ring true um so with that I want to say that I'm against this and I will be voting no Mr chair if I may Mr um Mr Atkins I wholeheartedly agree with you and I want to make sure we're looking at the correct at the same version so the first version I 100% agree with you I was not in favor of it at all period because it did say that you had to express courtesy to us well you
088know what we we ran and if you want to sit here and cuss at us and say vulgarities that is your that is your right that is absolutely your right that was the first version so the version I'm looking at and Miss Jordan please confirm if you would to make sure that the most current version with the exception that Dr Hummer mentioned is up on board docks in fact could we maybe even put it up on the board on the screens because I I feel and Mr Atkins I'm right I'm one of those that raised my hand took this the oath to protect and defend the United States of America and the Constitution I get it 100% I am just having I'm struggling here to see in this current policy where it restricts any speech
089whatsoever um there is a part if anything I I know earlier in our tenure we enabled individuals to sign up online um and then also not only did we add the online signing to make it more accessible to people to speak their minds but we also removed the time limit aside from the 3 minutes and the 5 minutes to make it unlimited speaking so we can be here until 5: in the morning if we wanted to but I'm having trouble and I'm looking at this on my laptop so if I'm not making eye contact that's why I'm having a hard time seeing exactly where the current state of this policy after all of the input that all of us gave into this is restricting speech because I see a lot of should but I don't
090see shs we took all of that out because that was in the previous bylaws that was there last previous administration previous board but I'm having a hard time seeing it if I am Miss missing something please tell me cuz we took out the shs and the should we took out the shs and the will and changed it to May and should um and after comparing this policy with other other conservative schools across the the Commonwealth this is actually more open and more allows more people to say more things I maybe I'm missing something got to pull back up okay and Madam Vice chair I did just check the the current copy is on board docs and the public should be able to access okay hopefully our wonderful media guys can get it Mr chair if
091I may okay Caitlyn Miss Jordan sorry is it on board docs where it shows that uh the changes are in red are the changes in red on board docs as well yeah it is the red L version okay yes sir so basically then just for those of you at home and here in the audience um any addition or change to the original is uh listed in red I believe there's one addition that wasn't there before um which is about signs posters placards banners or like objects are not permitted into the school board meeting and regardless of whether they're positive or negative um it's my opinion that they don't add anything to the meeting um and in point of fact they can only detract from the meeting um but as far as folks getting to stand
092up and speak I think you saw tonight that people can come up here and talk and pretty much say what they want um including about my undergarments so um I I don't think that we've prevented anyone from being able to speak so um I I don't understand I guess um Mr where you're coming from with your distaste for this particular policy Mr chairman yes sir uh at risk of of being an echo I just want to add a couple of pieces into the the conversation the reason that I um supported and um was very much in favor um along with Mrs Klein of um not moving forward with the first version was because of how vague um and how potentially restrictive it was um anything in my opinion which I said at the time anything
093that has a chilling effect on free speech is an absolute noo U for for me the reason I've the reason this newest draft I think is is much more palatable and it puts us in line with other professional school um School boards and and school divisions is this and this is probably the Civics teacher in me that that Mr Bell and I have talked about before that show up to the house of delegates and Richmond or the Senate show up in DC to the House of Representatives or the Senate um they have rules of decorum every elected legislative body um in this country has rules of decorum um and I don't think that we ought to be any different that being said I would Echo what was said a moment ago about um if you
094wanted an example of where the boundaries are I think you heard them tonight they're there barely are any please just don't threaten people don't cause a scene other than that you you could make a fool of yourself you like you're welcome to do that Mr chair Mr henkins to answer uh the question that I was asked um well there's two parts um and I know it's not restricting all the way but why even have it in here at all if if we're opening it up um complaints regarding employees we just had some employees that you know people feel need to be complained about you know why why do we even have that in here if if it doesn't mean anything it's a should um all these shoulds you know are coming in here and and
095it's it's nice to have that but why why change it in the first place then and then yes it does restrict freedom of speech because of the signs and posters that uh Mr Bell brought up if somebody wants to have a sign sign her poster up that's fine I would just kindly ask you to step to the back there's folks here right now with flags in here um that's their right for speech and I'm glad they do that that's a citizen out there that has their own Flags there people out here with hats and and other things um where does that restriction uh or where does that um stop you know um so you look at signs posters and everything else that's covered in that what if somebody wanted to hold a a poster up
096in the back um is that not limiting their speech maybe they're a little stage shy and don't want to come up here but they want to stay in the back not block the view of anybody else anything like that why can't we have those and that was one of my points that you and I discussed before um I I don't think somebody should be glory hopping from seat to seat or interfering with somebody else's view um with that but yeah why not have that why not have that sign so to your point Mr reckons the complaints about employees and it's a should you're right it's more expeditious if and it's my understanding too this will be hyperlink because there was some concerns from the public too about finding this policy so 119 is a policy
097that's within the policy section on our on our website and then the reference policy here it's my understanding that will be hyperlink so if you want to click on it it goes directly to that policy is that correct you mean 124 in correct do that okay okay so that would that would put it directly in other words someone could click on that hyperlink that's highlighting FCPS policy 124p and then it would go directly to that policy and then it outlines the complaint process which I sounds it sounds like it takes a long time it does not it's more efficient to try to do it this way first than stand up here and disparage a teacher because then it actually gets addressed quicker so again it's a should now to that point if it's not resolved
098in a timely fashion and you're not happy about it you need to email us you need to call us and then if that doesn't work then stand up there and absolutely hold us accountable for not following our own policies by all means now the Signs and Banners I completely agree I think if we could if people would be would be collegial enough to stand in the back I have no problem with it the problem arises when we block cameras and block people in The gallery's View and they can't see so I would be I would be amenable to that amendment to this bylaw but I also I want want to ensure that the policy stays right here as far as the complaints regarding employees because it's a more expeditious process and then it's recorded as
099well not only on YouTube but it is officially documented and can be foed and all of the official things that someone would need should they should legal action take place and should the school need FCPS need as a company as a third of a billion dollar company to exit someone stage left if they do have enough valid complaints from teachers and from from anyone from any constituent about a teacher oh I I agree that we definitely need a paper trail when it comes to disciplinary procedures and stuff um with any of our staff however tonight I wouldn't have heard about um a Mr dent and this quiz and until I I heard about it here at the uh Podium tonight tonight um I'm sorry but most people out here don't know how to access our
100policies nor have the time to go chase them down to do 124p um if they have a complaint most of the time they just reach out to us right or or they'll they'll go out and they'll come to a meeting and they'll have they'll they'll address it right there um I I understand having 24p I understand there's a process to it but I don't want to hold people to that when they can come up here and address their grievances like is as stated in the Constitution of the United States we're not holding them to it it's just a should and when it comes to disciplining someone or asking someone to find other employment it is very helpful to have as much written documentation as possible and this starts the paper trail my suggestion strategy wise
101to folks is start the paper trail and then if if you're not satisfied with the expeditious nature at which it's going through which I hope that it would then definitely come up here that's why it's a should and not a shall I remove that the shall from this because it and and I appreciate that I appreciate that um I just if it if it doesn't have teeth why does it need to be in the policy I understand like reference it this in the policy this is where you could go to document as per our guidelines on 124p I think it's going to have some teeth uh Mr chair if I may um the change that there you were referring to complaints regarding FCPS employees should be submitted um for all intents and purposes number one
102it is a reference but it's a reference to a policy that exists and the policy outlines the essentially the process of your complaining against a particular employee this has been in place um and hasn't isn't part of the question of 11 19p 11 19p is simply just referencing that as a uh place for you to make those complaints now FCPS employees should be it should be submitted and you know that would be up to the chairman and or other board members as to whether or not it's gaveled down um as far as making those complaints so I think it kind of serves as a compromise between uh those who believe that this policy is limiting their freedom of speech and those that understand that it isn't um so I I'm still not unclear as to
103what the issue is with this particular policy but I think you hit the nail on the head with that word compromise I don't think we compromise with our rights and limiting the signs right here as it says in 11 19p um that that definitely takes away from the First Amendment I also think you know not only this but through 11 19p we've also lost something else that that hasn't been brought up except for by by one of uh our constituents that came up here to speak earlier the online comments have been taken away on on Facebook or whatever um I understand it hurts some people's feelings um but when I'm scrolling through trying to read the temperature of the county and seeing what people feel about a certain topic it it really does help to
104be able to look through that um but instead the board didn't vote on this this was a administrative action where we've not uh allow comments anymore we've taken that away um so by saying that oh well we're just putting this out here and and we're going to uh we're making everything real easy for you folks but but we've also taken away their ability to communicate with us on social media and now we're taking away their ability to communicate using a sign or a placard um what if you have somebody who who's deaf or you know MW and they want to have a sign up in the bag would we disparage against them um was that an ADA thing I don't know I'm I'm just asking here because I I think everybody out here would like
105to you know say what's on their mind in any means possible you know it sounds like to me that uh we we just need to ex this thing and leave it as it was exactly it was doing okay and I think what we just really want to say to the public is please try your best to um keep your presence as a a mature adult while you're up here and and say what you mean what's on your mind and what's from your heart uh but if you do otherwise then that's up to you Mr chairman point of inquiry is there a uh is there a motion on the table right now with respect to either um calling the question or or tabling the policy no motion has been made yes there is motion in a
106second I apologize those discussion so there needs to be a vote discussion this is a there's a motion to vote on approving or or not approving 11 19p as it's written Mr chair if I may mam Vice chair so Mr Akins you bring up you actually bring up a great point about being able to communicate if someone can't speak verbally valid I I did not think about that you're right how would the board feel if we kept if we kept the same verbiage that we see here and we required those individuals to stand in the back where they won't block the cameras they won't block anyone's view in the gallery and then a person with that type of disability could have a sign have a have written on the sign what they need to say
107Mr chair if I may I want I want to be very clear on this if we have any individual with a disability that is attending our board meetings that they need to reach out to us and let us know we will accommodate accordingly so if you all vote on this this evening as it stands and it passes and an individual needs an accommodation to communicate in some form or fashion we have to accommodate that regardless of what our policy says so Mr Atkins you bring up a really good point but I just want to be very very clear that we have to accommodate adults with disabilities that attend our meetings Dr Homer um I have a question for you do is it anybody out there deaf no you wouldn't be able to hear me but
108um I guess the the question I have is if this gentleman that walked in just now was deaf and needed a sign language interpreter is there an interpreter in this room right now I mean it's an up it's a public meeting we don't have an interpreter here furthermore we don't have anybody in here who can well I'm sure we probably have somebody in here who can who's bilingual um but say we have somebody in here speaking Canton they have a Cantonese speaking child who walks in we don't have somebody coming in here to translate that um I mean I think we're getting a little off to topic with that but I'll tell you what I would be willing to do on this keep the language um ask the folks to stand in the back with
109the signs but reinstate our ability to speak on social media uh Mr chair point of order I don't believe 11 19p has anything to do with the uh Facebook page of our school does it not as it stands nor would it why is that not public discourse social media is public discourse I get slammed in public newspapers for my social media post I mean it was an administrative thing Mr chair if I could just just a a detail whatever you all decide you is up to you all how you decide I just want to provide a very uh a piece of clarification um that that our social media posts were not designed for that level of of communication and our our bi our um terms of service was very clear on that and and there
110was there was comments that were made on those social media posts that had nothing to do with people's um ability to share their opinions on certain things there were things on there that had nothing to do with anything um and those are front-facing for for our community and for our students and that was the reason that those were taken out it's a feature that when you post something you can click to say will you do you want to allow comments or not so that and it was a management issue because of the volume that we were receiving that had nothing to do with that specific post so for example if there was a post about trunk or treat and then there was inappropriate language using that had nothing to do with anything we had to
111monitor that to notify that individual that this language and first this language was not appropriate for a School site and secondly that this has nothing to do with a trunk or treat and our terms of service was very clear on that so it was as I've shared with each of you it was a management and administrative oversight that complicated matter so that is the reason that it was asked to be taken down I think I think that goes back to miss clein's point a few uh meetings back what is what is considered inappropriate you know she brought up uh FFA or yeah FF or FAA guidelines um and then uh versus um uh FCC guidelines um you know and what's offensive to that gentleman might not be offensive to that gentleman what's offensive to her
112might not be offensive to him um so who would be the one to put their thumb and and their finger on the pulse of what's appropriate who's that Arbiter I mean because that's the person who would be limiting your speech um so if somebody wants to go out there and rattle off something about Miss Klein or myself or or uh Mr Sturman that and or Daryl and his and his uh his clothes um from earlier that's fine I mean do do I do I do yeah he's comfortable do I think Daryl's a bad guy because of that no I chalk it up to just another angry troll on social media you know and what are we supposed to do shelter those kids or do we as parents explain that to the kids that hey this
113just a dumb comment this is a dumb comment on social media and guess what that makes the parents become teachers and they have teachable moments in the house they we have those kitchen conversations um back with them again I think this is something that we need to have back if it's something that's getting out of control don't monitor it it's not something we should monitor unless there's a threat made upon the school or the children or the staff sorry Mr sh EXC oh wait excuse me I need to go fire off some text excuse me um Mr Atkins I hear what you're saying 100% um just as as a point of order for the meeting MH that those the the social media comments aren't part of this policy however I do think that it is
114worth a deep dive on this board to really Fetter out what Facebook's policy is now why do I care about that I I wish I didn't have to care about that okay I wish I didn't however if they do have a vulgar if they do have like in my world FAA NTSB and FCC I I don't know if Facebook fits under FCC guidelines and as a public entity if we have to scrub essentially the comments and our posts for words that are not comminate with FCC or whatever the guidelines may be of Facebook and we have the potential to lose the ability to post and inform our community of what our schools are doing then that's a problem too to have everything taken away from us by the people who run Facebook I don't agree
115with I'm I don't agree with it I'm just saying that's that's a possibility and I think it's something that we do need to look at but for the purpose of tonight's meeting it's not part of 11 19p but I hear you well i' I'd rather rather it be Facebook take it away than us take it away I don't want to be responsible for stepping on somebody's voice um and no that's part of my horse trade on this um we can add this in there into this policy we can do it right now with a with a motion um we can do it with an amendment um it can be added back in there or added in there for social media or we can just say cool and we put social media back up we can
116do that as as simple and easy as tomorrow so so at this point what I would like to do that we have a motion on the table that's been properly seconded MH I would like to amend the main motion to adjust the language in paragraph item five five to allow the signs posters placards banners and Etc as long as they are in the back of the meeting now miss Jordan helped me with the language on that but permit the signs posters placards Etc as written in in subo five but they have to stay in the back of the meeting where they're not blocking people's View and they're not blocking the cameras so if I may pursuant to our special Rules of Order since it a mission's been made there's been a second if the person
117who seconded your motion to adopt the um the policy as presented agrees you can make a motion to amend your motion to accept the proposed amendments to um policy 119 P presented as presented with the following edit to paragraph number five okay to read signs posters placard spanners or like objects will only be permitted into the school board meeting if they are held at the back of the room and if that language is agreeable um agreeable to you you could say so moved okay so moved but the person who seconded you have to agree is that me I I honestly can't remember who agreed I'm sorry I don't agree so at that point we would need to take to take a vote on the motion that was made to accept 119 PP as presented and
118then um go from there okay Mr chairman um I'm Mo to call the question on uh 119 p uh and close debate I'm sorry I couldn't hear you uh I move to call a question on 119 p uh and close debate I second well we still have a motion that we have to deal with first call I think Dr Ken what you what you're referring to is calling the question yep okay has ever do we have deal with the motion at hand or can yeah the motion at hand being Miss Klein's original motion of 119 P yes yes that has to be dealt with first before anything well I believe uh Dr kin's motion is to call is to call the previous question which is to bring that in initial motion back to the table
119for the board to v as a superseding motion that's correct and when would we do that right right now we have to vote on that and vote on the original motion 119 P being presented being adopted as presented correct which is behind you on the screen and uploaded to board docs so there would be no changes to 119 p in this if this vote is approved and if it's not approved then we can go back to the amendment motion if it's not approved then the presented draft fails yep and are 11 19p Remains the Same okay thank you okay so then we have to vote Madam clerk Dr erskin I Mr funes I I'm sorry I Mr Atkins no Mr Bell oh I'm sorry I I'm sorry I misunderstood okay I will start over okay
120okay all right Dr erskin I Mr funis no Mr Atkins no Mr Bell I miss Martin no Mrs Klein yes Mr sturdivan no motion fails now we so now as I understand 11 19p is just the way it was it that is correct and so no changes have been made correct as of right now as of right now so as someone who voted yes for it can I bring it back to the table with an amendment no because it would have to be somebody who was on the who voted no because they won the vote okay all right um I'll bring it up uh Mr chair I I move to uh amend policy 119 P um with the language in um item five uh saying signs posters placards banners or like objects will be permitted
121into the school uh school board meeting but as long but as long as long as they are kept in the back and not obstructing anybody's view of the meeting moving around I would hope if they're in the back it doesn't matter um with the caveat that if this passes that we bring back social media comments on our FCPS I don't think we can I don't think we can do um we can can we can I do that I don't believe that's a proper that's a proper motion because what you're making a motion to do is amend our public our one 19p which is specifically for public participation at meetings yeah well then I just let it fail M Mr chair if if I I make a recommendation M Mr Atkins um so the motion on
122the table is for 11 19p you're trying to amend that and I understand what you're trying to do in regards to like a deal if if we if we approve this to give that if I can make a recommendation for Mr chair for the board to consider is can we look at reconsidering the the posts we're more than happy to do that it shouldn't be part of any sort of motion you just ask me to do that and as I've done in the past I will do that um I've asked yep so I specifically have asked you and I know that it's not a consensus and not not the the king of the board or anything like that but um if we could get a general consensus right now I'd be happy to pass this
123through with the amendment Mr chairman um just a comment on Mr Atkins proposal um in terms of a gentleman's agreement I'm absolutely willing uh to support that conversation I think it's worth having um regardless of how it turns out I think that the this group should be having that conversation and making a recommendation to to Dr Hummer uh Mr chair Mr B um I agree with Dr kin um I do believe that we can have conversation so that we can determine what the will of the board is with regards to uh the social media and the ability to make comments I think that's a great idea um and that way we can determine if it's in the best interest of our schools and in the best interest of our constituents based on how all of
124us um feel about it and certainly those of you that are there out there and watching please uh reach out to us and give us your thoughts and ideas and opinions on how you feel about reinstating the Facebook posts um that's this is how a democracy works or I should say a republic works so um I'm I'm consens sounds like we have a consensus well that's of us I've got a not here yes there would you guys be good with bringing social media post back yeah well having the conversation not bringing them back but having the conversation about bringing them back okay to be clear I'd like to put put a timeline on it sure uh can we do it before the next meeting yeah yes yes so Miss Jordan can I can I table
125this till the next meeting uh do you mean proposed amendments to 119 P proposed amendments to 119 P yes all right um Mr chair I moved to table uh the proposed amendments to 119 P until our next full board meeting motion has been made is there a second second motion has been made and properly seconded any discussion all those in favor signify by saying I I I any opposed I opposed motion passes right the next item up is the 213 P correct correct okay so Mr chair 2 13p is before you uh we've discussed that through personnel and we've also had conversations about this with staff so it is before you this evening as a recommendation for adoption by you all Mr chair Mr Atkins I move um that we accept um the changes to
126or I moveed that we accept policy uh 2133p so this is just our first point of order this is just our first reading not a bylaw oh that's good point good point thank you second okay there's motion made to accept and has been seconded is there any discussion Mr share Mr a I understand uh this is kind of a contentious topic right you know some people think you know we should have these uh ideologies in classrooms and some people you know think we shouldn't look we're here to teach kids right that's it you know if you want to have ideological conversations at home God bless you you know you do that do that on your own time that's awesome you know I I applaud you for doing that I app you for interacting with your
127children like that and teaching them one way or the other you know that's that's your call you're their parent but to bring that into a classroom I don't care if some everybody keeps talking about well we shouldn't be bringing the Bible in the classroom we shouldn't bring um gay rights into the classroom or transgender this in the classroom you're right we shouldn't bring any of it into the classroom um we're here to teach you public education our test scores are low so let's get all this other stuff out of the classroom and teach what matters right I the customer out here is the parent right they pay the taxes the product that they want at the end of the day is an educated child right the factory is FCPS we have workers in this Factory
128right and they have to adhere to a standard right to pump out educated children right so if we have stuff in there guming up the system that's not reading writing math or has nothing to do with it it doesn't need to be there right it's like putting the wrong oil in your car right does that make sense um you know so I think let's get back to the basics let's teach Reading Writing math arithmetic all the sciences and everything else you know if you want to teach ideology at home hey cool if you if there's a club after school hey good for you you know we just had a a gentleman over here at shando has a Christian Club if there wants to be an lgd lgbtq Club after school hey awesome do it after
129school it's not part of the curriculum um but that that should be like a Parents Choice so um I'm good with going forward with this uh 2133p thank you so we have a motion and it's been properly seconded so we can vote so we just just knock it out Adam clerk Dr ersin we can teach it all part of the curriculum no Mr funis yes Mr Atkins yes Mr Bell no m Martin yes Mrs kleene yes Mrs stent yes motion passes motion passes oh sorry that concludes the unfinished business now we have new business up next is uh first is the Personnel committee meeting Mr funes the meeting of the Personnel Committee of the fur County School Board was held on October 7th 2024 the meeting was called to order at 4:35 p.m. and a
130copy of the meeting minutes has been provided to each board member during the meeting Miss Campbell gave a staffing update for professional vacancies and a breakdown of all vacancies he shared the Staffing update for fy2 and support vacancies and professional vacancies filled as of 20124 and the years of experience of new hires M wrinkler reviewed the celebrations of recruitment effort and gave a staffing update regard guarding retirees years of service from turnovers for all staff from 24 years of service for classified staff in particular as well as the top reasons for leavings of classified staff in general and for year zero and one in particular for 2023 24 m wrinklers then reviewed the years of service from turnovers of Administrators in the same time frame and their top reasons for leaving and discuss the years
131of service from turnover for teachers and professional staff as well as their top reasons for leaving in general and for year zero and one in particular she also gave a substitute to update shared Recruitment and Retention efforts and discuss the focus on special education and recruiting plans M ever Johnson's reviewed the 2024 FCPS benefit open Roman season the FCPS Valley Health Family Care Center openhouse and two new Benefit Service Partnerships Miss freckly shared that a Ser survey will be sent out to all FCPS employees regarding St priorities to help build the budget next year she also gave an update on the core and displayed an employee code of conduct M Jordan shared the timeline of the proposed policy with the coure and displays an employee Co code of conduct the meaning Jour at 5:20 p.m.
132additional details regarding the information covered at the committee meeting are included in the minutes provided to the board members are there any questions from board members about information shared at the Personnel committee meeting held on October 7th can you read it again thanks a lot I moved the board approved the minutes for the personal committee meeting held on October 7th 2024 second motion to approve thank you has been made and properly seconded any discussion all those in favor signify by saying I I any oppos next up is the finance committee report thank you Mr chair a meeting of the finance committee of the Frederick County School Board was held on October 7th 20124 the meeting was called to order at 5:30 p.m. and a copy of the minutes has been provided to each board member
133during the meeting Mrs Anderson discussed the contract award for fresh produce to USA produce and seafood Incorporated in the amount of 150 million $339,000 190 it's a lot of produce and seafood and to PK J pjk Food Service LLC DBA doing business as Keeny produce and Gourmet in the amount of 14,44 189 she also explained the vpsa education educational technology funds and the functions of the finance team including the cycles of responsibilities and the attributes of a strong Finance team Mrs Reed reviewed what fund accounting is the basics of fund accounting how Financial fund funds are managed and how fund accounting Works she discussed the fund accounting Erp system in the chart of accounts and the financial information provided to the county Mrs Anderson reviewed budget development and financial forecasting which included Virginia code salaries
134and benefits the budget development and accounting for staff next Mrs Anderson shared the budget development for non-personal personnel items budget transfers and amendments standards of quality for funding and the local Composite Index she reviewed the budget development in regards to state revenue and County revenue why localities fund above the required local effort as well as revenue and accounts receivable in Grants management she also shared information on major School construction financing and financial reports and keep performance indicator examples this included budget Publications produced by finance and financial statements of activity compared to budget Mrs Anderson also reviewed the kpi key performance indicator and the required local effort for operations in the cost per pupil comparison as well as FCPS is historical cost per pupil by source of funds Mrs Reed and Mrs Anderson reported on audit
135risk management and fiduciary activities the meeting adjourned at 6:30 p.m. additional details regarding the information covered at the board at the committee meeting are included in the minutes provided to board members are there any questions from board members about information shared at the finance committee meeting held on October 7th all right seeing no questions I do have a statement just a call to action I highly encourage anyone to come and sit in on my finance committee meetings because they are full of great information um it's been quite an education for me I feel fairly fluent Corporate Finance but um a government entity and a school is a whole another ball game so I applaud miss frankley or Miss freely I I applaud but uh Miss Camry and her team Mrs and Mrs Anderson as well
136for for bringing it in and being an interpreter for me so I could help equate what knowledge I have of corporate finance to to school Finance so highly recommend that you uh come to those meetings or see view them online so with that there are four action items so here we go I gotcha all right I move the board approve the contract award to USA produce and seafood Incorporated for fresh produce in the amount of $5,399 second motion has been made to approve the contract through USA produce and has been properly seconded is there any discussion all those in favor signify by saying I I any opposed it carries and Mr chair I move the board approve the contract award to p JK Food Service LLC doing business as Keeny produce and Gourmet for fresh
137produce in the amount of $14 14,44 189 second motion has been made and properly seconded is there any discussion all those in favor signify by saying I I I any opposed motion carries I move the board approve the resolution declaring its intention to reimburse itself from the proceeds of one or more grants made by the Commonwealth of Virginia for certain expenditures made and or to be made in connection with certain Capital Improvement second motion has been made and properly seconded is there any discussion just for clarification on this one so that for everyone watching as well as the board um so this we received a grant after our budget was already allocated so we are basically reimbursing ourselves and the county from that Grant so that's what we that's what the motion on the table
138is my question um any further discussion all those in favor signify by saying I I any opposed motion carries and finally Mr chair I move the board approve the minutes from the finance committee meeting held on October 7th 2024 second motion to approve has been made and properly seconded any discussion all those in favor signify by saying I I any oppos those minutes are approved next is building buildings and grounds a meeting of the building and grounds Committee of the Frederick County Public School Board was held on October 14th 2024 the meeting was called to order at 432 p.m and a copy of the minutes has been provided to each board member during the meeting Mr Davis discussed the capital projects list highlights including support facilities West interior door replacement apple pie Ridge Elementary School
139and and Orchard View Elementary School and the bleacher replacement and track overlay at jameswood middle school he also discussed notable fund funded uh cap projects in progress the uh upcoming facility snow day prep and the capital asset planning process Mr conin gave an update on the weapons detection system program and Mr Kenny receed Mr Kenny reviewed the omnitrax request for additional for addition of a scale um Mr or Miss Chapman uh presented the recommendations for a contract award to ecns uh midatlantic LC for geot technical testing and inspection services for the estimated annual annual amount of $250,000 for a contract award to Smart building strategies LLC will be the primary and SEI and Associates LTD um as a secondary for commissioning uh services for the estimated annual amount of $250,000 and a contract award to
140uh combuster Corp for the apple pie Ridge Elementary School boiler replacement in the amount of 2 50,8 97 she also presented the recommendations for a contract award oh I'm yeah contract award to add combustion Corp for the Stonewall Elementary School boiler replacement in the amount of $384,000 63 for a contract award to JG Hopkins Inc for the shandle high school boiler replacement in the amount of 300,000 [Music] $322,700 27,100 uh the meeting adjourned at 5:13 p.m. additional details regarding the committee meeting uh are included in the minutes provided uh to board members do board board members have any questions about what was covered at the building and grounds committee meeting held on October 14th no I want to say thanks to Mr Bell for stepping in on that one uh we were a little bit
141short um for people so thanks for stepping up to the plate man I appreciate it sure um we have multiple action items coming out of here just like everybody wants to hear me talk more uh action item number one I moveed that the board approve the request from omnitrax for the INR scale and to authorize the chairman to execute all necessary documentation that has been approved by legal counil second motion has been made properly seconded is there any discussion uh a little bit about this one um it's not going to cost us anything uh the folks that use the rail system that's on our property out there want to put a um a scale in that way they don't have to make multiple trips when they're loading and unloading corn oil uh you know think
142about it saving the environment also because we're not making multiple trips I guess but yeah it's definitely going to um we be able to charge them a little bit more on rent uh so it's a win-win for everybody if I understand correctly that was for limited time correct uh till their contract's up at the end of the contract they could choose to take that scale with them because it is their scale or they can leave it um but yeah it's their scale they're just uh and they're doing all the work it's not a dime coming out of our pockets um but they're it's their scale so they can take it if they at the end of the contract if they want any further discussion all those in favor signify by saying I any oppose carries
143second I move that the board approve the contract award to ECS Mid-Atlantic L LLC for geotechnical testing and inspection services for the estimated annual amount of $50,000 second motion has been made properly seconded is there any discussion hearing none all those in favor signify by saying I I any opposed carries uh three I move that the board approve the contract award to both smart building strategies LLC as the primary and SEI and Associates LTD uh as a secondary for commissioning services for the estimated annual amount of $250,000 second motion has been made seconded any discussion all those in favor signify by saying I I any oppos motion carries all right number four I moved the board approved the contract award to combustion combustion ER Corp for a boiler replacement at apple pie Ridge Elementary School
144in the amount of $250,800 any oppos carries uh number five I move the board approve the contract award to combuster court for the for a boiler replacement at Stonewall Elementary School in the amount of $384,000 63 second motion has been made improperly seconded is there any discussion all those in favor signify by saying I I any oppos motion carries number six I move the board approve the the contract award to GJ Hopkins Inc for a boiler replacement at shando High School in the amount of $322,700 is there any discussion all those in favor signify by saying I I any oppos motion carries number seven I move the board approved the contract award to combustion air courp for a chiller replacement at as Hoover Elementary School in the amount of [Music] $527,000 second motion has been
145made and properly seconded is there any discussion all those in favor signify by saying I I any oppos motion carries last one I move the board approve the minutes from the building and grounds committee meeting held on October 14th 2024 second motion has been made and properly seconded any discussion all those in favor signify by by saying I I I any oppos motion carries next is the instruction committee report thank you Mr chairman a meeting of the instruction Committee of the Frederick County School Board was held on October 14th 2024 the meeting was called to order at 5:30 p.m. and a copy of the minutes has been provided to each board member during the meeting Dr Meyers discussed the addition of 3D art to the program of studies for the 2025 2026 School Year Mr
146Cavalier reviewed the addition of honors Virginia and United States government as well as honors Virginia US history and World Geography to the program of studies for the 2025 2026 school year Mrs post and Mr Thompson discussed the addition of cyber security network systems to the program of studies for the 2025 2026 school year Mrs post reviewed the removal of travel tourism and destination marketing and database design and management from the program of studies for the 2025 2026 school year Mrs niola discussed the four inspired 2025 goals Student Success culture strategic Partnerships and high quality staff she also reviewed the 2024 2025 School accreditation Mrs McDonald gave a special education lead overview and Dr Meyers gave an update on the grading Coalition Mr cavaliere and Mrs post discussed a grant proposal for building students data and
147Computing up Computing application skill set for careers the meeting adjourned at 7:03 p.m. additional details regarding the information covered at the committee meeting are included in the minutes provided to board members are there any questions from the board members about information shared at the instruction committee meeting held on October 14th okie dokie uh we have four action items uh the first is I move the board approve the request to add the courses of 3D art honors Virginia and United States government honors Virginia US History world geography and cyber security network systems to the program of studies for the 2025 2026 school year second motion was made to add the those uh topics of discussion and properly seconded any any discussion all those in favor signify by saying I I I any opposed motion carries number
148two I move the board approved the request to remove travel tourism and destination marketing and database design and management from the program of studies for the 2025 2026 school year second motion was made improperly seconded any discussion yeah uh Mr chairman if I may that that travel class I just it shocked me that we had it I thought everybody had Google Now um we can pick our travel destinations so uh we don't we don't need we're not training anybody to be um uh what Trav agent travel agent I thought it was an extinct word I'm glad you guys still remember but um anyway yeah so I'm glad we're getting rid of that and we're moving some uh classes in that'll benefit our students thanks any further discussion all those in favor signify by saying I
149I I any oppose carries I number three I move the board approve the student program's experiences an engagement Grant titled building students data and Computing application skill sets for careers second motion has been made and properly seconded any discussion all those in favor signify by saying I I any oppos motion carries and the last one number four I move the board approve the minutes from the instruction committee meeting held on o October 14th 2024 second second motion has been made and properly seconded any discussion all those in favor signify by saying I I I any oppos motion carries next on the agenda is board member comments Mr chair Madam Vice chair so first I want to give a shout out to to not only our students that were recognized earlier in the meeting but I
150want to give a shout out to some special students at shando high school who on Sunday had their safety trick-or treat fundraising event I took my two sons there and it was awesome it was very well organized I could tell it took a lot of work they had three separate lines for three separate versions of a haunted house and those kids were all into it so uh huge congratulations to the shando high school band boosters for what I am assuming is a very highly successful event so uh lots of care um my my sons are even more solidified in their Warrior Pride because of it and they ask to go every year so uh huge kudos to them um about the uh just to just to really kind of hammer this home our curriculum is
151key to our Student Success we put a lot of effort uh we this board of course we get to approve that curriculum but our staff puts a lot of effort into ensuring that that curriculum advances our students so the flex class time was part of that and I just highly encourage Any teacher administrator out there that if you want to deviate from the instructional curriculum that that will not go over well with this board as what is clearly demonstrated tonight by public comment by the way I want to clarify the flex time is not part of the instructional curriculum so I know that there's some discussion as to whether that will be included back in or not um still need to get more information on that but to any teachers or administrators who dare to
152deviate from from our instructional curriculum that will not be looked highly upon by this board or at least this board member and finally as I always seem to with a call to action in my board member comments I want to thank Mr Davey who's one of our parents as well as a constituent because there are only seven of us here and we have 21 facilities and over 14,000 students I know many of you in the community think that we're Clairvoyant and omnipotent and we are not I hate to disappoint we can be everywhere at once we cannot read minds we cannot see everything so thank you to Mr Davey and other concerned parents and constituents for bringing things to light bringing them to us and being our eyes and ears out there I think you
153pointed to your son so excellent uh but thank you for doing that please continue to do so and please parents please please continue to be those eyes and ears bring your concerns to us and we will get them addressed that's all I have Mr chair Mr chairman mren I just want to briefly address a couple of things uh first it would be um to to aim in and Echo what Mrs Klein said a moment ago one of the two most important um duties of any elected School Board um is to govern curriculum um and finances I mean this with every bit of respect that I can muster that final charges on this board and as was said earlier Any teacher or administrator out there in the county who thinks that they can flout the will
154of the constituents in Frederick County and get away with that unnoticed you're on notice that also won't go well with me uh the second piece I just wanted to address because I thought it was cute I've been caught a lot of things never in my life have I ever been called a liberal so that was fun um I I um my dear friend Mr Bell who I admire very much uh and I'm learning from the more I'm on this board um anytime I'm compared to you I'm okay with that I take it as a compliment um but as far as politics go um being on a school board is a nonpartisan position if we've ever spent a minute and a half in a room together you'd never use the word liberal to describe me but
155that's okay I've been called worse so uh that's all I've got to say Mr chairman um Mr chair I want to say thank you for everybody to come out you know everybody voicing their opinions um it's part of that 11 19p right where we're all allowed to come out that First Amendment right we get to go speak our minds I appreciate that we didn't uh we didn't know which is not a good excuse um so I want to apologize um on behalf of myself and and I'm pretty sure the rest of the board feels the same way about um curriculum that that was being taught so if you had a chance to look at um our instruction committee that we um had on the 14th you'll notice we had a review of um inspired 2025
156portrait of a graduate and you know there's a lot of great words in there there's a lot of great things that did come out of that um but there's a lot of stuff that wasn't started wasn't tracked there's no Matrix um please I encourage you to go back and watch that meeting um this isn't the the old days I know it takes a while and government moves slow um but I know that Inspire 2025 is running now we've got Dr Hummer Miss Knight who are leading the charge on setting forth our new path um and I know in a short time I've got to work with Miss night I know she's all about Matrix you know and holding people accountable so I'm glad she's on the team I'm glad she will be spearheading this um
157so to Echo kind of what the rest of the board is saying these little kingdoms that that have been going on with no accountability that that ends that's done it's done we're having accountability now it's accountability time you know um so if you want to deviate from the script go ahead go ahead head but you can go over to Len County you can go whever else you want to go but you won't stay here there will be consequences if you de deviate from the script um our taxpayers our parents our students deserve better than that you know we as a board as a superintendent as assistant soups set forth a curriculum you want to go change it ain't happening so be like they said be on notice that you're on notice thanks Mrs chairman f
158as with most federal County residents I have a vested interest in the school policies and events throughout the federal County School System I have a son attending jameswood high school has been given the opportunity to follow his future goals through jameswood High School D te program his safety and education is Paramount these fact that these factors are influenced by my concerns such as uncontrolled cell phone usage in school it's a biggest distraction but it's being addressed at this point student discipline is a big factor vaping in bathrooms locked bathrooms fencing in school during class time it's not a good look teacher gender confusion and male students and girl Sports this was addressed at this month's Board of Supervisors meeting by Mr lero and he put forth that it would be prohibited from males being in
159female sports which I definitely back I find it hard to understand why my son cannot sign his own name in script maybe I'm oldfashioned but I feel it's necessary the most recent event illustrates how one student one individual can affect the whole school system we give credit to our security forces police s so SRO and teachings there the quick response to the situation it was complicated even more with threats being called in from other states showing how unpredict iable get to be in that situation and everyday events discipline is key a compliant student body is critical in carrying out our goal of a good education and safety discipline and how to handle unruly students is set by the school board along with the consequence that will result if rules are not followed teachers are the
160determining Authority in all the situations and parents should fortify that fact and enforce it at home help the STA out parents as stated in the code of student contact handbook teachers are responsible with stimulating Max learning for their students by providing a good envir M they are called to and obl obligated to set standards of professional contact that promote respect from students teachers and students relationship demand respect correct grammar and expression dress and moral habit will Aid in promoting better teacher and student relationship therefore teachers have to subscribe to to a code of ethics reflecting the highest degree of professionalism and moral standards that is a direct quote from the code of student Conduct Handbook we need to follow those and try to try to follow it is very it's difficult enough for Middle School
161pupils six and seven year olds to become a stable and productive adolescent without confusing them with a teachers personal issues it can cause a major distraction is the parents responsibility to set the moral and civil standards at home not the schools there needs to be a code of conduct for teachers and principls as stated before the school is there to provide a good learning environment therefore the school administration and I repeat subscribe to the code of ethics reflecting the highest degree of professionalism and moral standards and common sense so simply stated if there are transgender issues in an individual's life keep it out the school environment because they are being paid to teach not to indoctrinate our children we pay our tax dollars to have our children educated it's all I have to say anyone
162else oh Mr chairman if I may um ladies and gentlemen thank you so much for coming out tonight um and expressing your opinions I think it's very important that we have this dialogue and that we hear from everyone from Every uh corner of our County um I think I've made it clear to many that I don't believe I just represent those in the opin district I represent everyone up here because the votes that I make affect all of you and some of you may not agree with my votes and that's perfectly your right many of you do um having said that I want you to know that I see here and I understand where you're coming from the only people that I want indoctrinating my children are me and my wife I don't want and
163you have the right to indoctrinate your children the way you wish and that's perfectly fine now with regards to adding programs that involve uh gender identity religion or any of the things that we tend to think as family values that should be left outside of the school I believe that if kids want to create a club before or after school now granted they do have to have a teacher to supervise but that teacher doesn't have any role in what they do as far as uh what they talk about as long as safety is the Paramount in that particular club now I can promise you that the majority of you disagree with how I feel with regards to lgbtq but that's regardless doesn't matter we're allowed to have our opinions but I want you to understand
164that I agree with you that I don't think anyone should be indoctrinated in our schools and I certainly don't do that in my own School the concern that I have with uh 23 sorry I don't have my glasses on1 2133p the concern that I have with that I agree with a lot of what miles had to say um but I disagree with the fact that this to me is very similar to the reasons I I don't support 2133p for similar reasons that Miles supports 11 19p the fact that I fear that a teacher's individual rights and the ability for free speech would be called into question depending on who the administrator is or depending on who the teacher is or who the student is um I personally don't think that a rainbow flag indoctrinates anyone
165but if that teacher stands up and starts talking about their lifestyle and how wonderful it is and how and if you know that to me is not okay because that has nothing to do with the curriculum it would be like if I flew a Nazi flag and started talking about white supremacy you wouldn't want that either so I teach Civics and there are many instances where I have to show different aspects of human of American culture um politics um from both sides and I show them equally or at least I try to um my students have no idea which side of the fence that I fall on and I can tell you that many of our board members here would also uh agree with me in the sense that we've had wonderful discussions where I've
166agreed with what they have to say um and they agree with what I have to say we are on the same page with most things um I think it's important that we understand for one n for for 23p and 11 19p there has to be so the first amendment is is a very tricky Amendment with the freedom of speech we we can't really say that we have a blanket freedom of speech uh a court case in 1922 essentially um stated that you can't call fire in a crowded movie theater so there are some limits to free speech which when it involves the safety of of the citizenry um when there when it comes to public meetings whether it's here in Washington DC or in Richmond there's a limited Free Speech as long as it doesn't
167disrupt the meeting then you're welcome to say um and do as you wish but if it's disruptive to the uh meeting at hand to the business at hand then you um are out of order and the chairman is within his or her rights to gavel you um and ask you to sit down or to settle down and in times of extremeness maybe even remove you um I'm I'm on both of these policies I voted no on both of them because I am afraid that we are going to beat this horse to death and make it so impossible for for all of us to really understand each other if we don't allow each other to express ourselves in a I guess I would say in in a in in a way that's showing decorum uh that's
168courteous so I I don't know it's I'm I'm still on the fence with this as as with regards to um what miles brought up with regards to the uh Facebook posts I hope we have a conversation about it I'm not sure that that is the proper form for people to dump their whatever um but certainly there can be an argument made to speech so that's something that we all have to discuss and make a determination um what I have biggest concerns about is that well actually not concerns actually what I respect the most about you folks that are here and I'll say this honestly those of you that come up and speak Dodie you're one of them that comes up week after week and I applaud you for that and I respect you for that
169that I think that it's important this is your opportunity to speak and express yourself now unfortunately we don't hear from more of our constituents that may have differing opinions and I'm not saying that the differing opinions are right or wrong but Brian you come up here every week and you express your differing opinion your one voice to the many I think that all of our residents should think about coming to our meetings and talking about how they feel about certain things and so that they can express themselves as well and if we're here till 5: in the morning so be it um and the last thing I want to bring up is just a plug for tomorrow night tomorrow night the Board of Supervisors will vote and uh determine whether or not we will be
170getting a fourth High School um regardless of how you feel about that I hope I get to see some of you out there because I certainly will be there and I will be voting in favor of the fourth High School I've made no secret of that I think it's important that we understand the growth of our community and see that our schools are completely overcrowded and there really isn't much of a choice um left to us um but with that I'd like to say again thank you very much um I know we've been here for a very long time and I'm sure Linda would like to say a few words maybe good night thank you Mr chair you don't have a comment okay uh just to address one point I've been accused of not folling
171through with one of my campaign promises which was the books and I would like to correct that situation this evening if you will review the Winchester Star article by Molly Williams from April 2nd 2024 it says that I was taking aims at books if you review the Winchester Star article from June 4 2024 it says School Board chair's first challenge denied by two high schools I then brought those books uh I got two books books successfully removed from the list the third book that I was going after I changed my mind after actually reading the book and realizing that there was no there there and the fourth book was brought to the instruction committee and I was aiming to have that removed and it was shot down by the two other members on the instruction
172committee Mr Atkins and Mr Bell so I did try and get some books out of the school um I'm one person out of seven the next school board meeting is November 19th 2024 do we have a motion for adjournment Mr chair Mr Atkins like to make a motion to adjourn second motion has been made properly seconded any discussion we jour