NCPS - Regular School Board Meeting - February 5, 2026

001Heat. Heat. [music] [music] >> [music] [music] >> Heat. Heat. [music] >> [music] [music] >> Heat up here. [music] Heat [music] up here. [music] >> [music] >> Heat. Heat. [music] >> [music] [music] >> under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Thank you. >> Had an opportunity to look at the agenda. So, if I can have a motion to [snorts] approve the agenda as written, unless we need to make any modifications. I move that we approve the agenda as written. >> Second. >> All those in favor? >> I. >> Any naysay? And any abstensions? Okay. Agenda's approved. So, we're on to what we call our favorite part. It's the recognitions and the presentations portion of the meeting. So, I'm going to get Dr. Hester to come up and start that off if she doesn't mind.

002>> All right. The the first item on our recognitions, February is schoolboard appreciation month. So, we would like to say thank you so much to our school board for your commitment to supporting our student, staff, schools, division, and community. And so, uh, being a part of the VSBA, uh, we have a a proclamation. So, if you bear with me, the Virginia School Board appreciation month proclamation. Whereas the education of Virginia's school-aged children is the foundation upon which the economic, social, and intellectual capital of our state is built. And whereas locally elected and appointed school boards play an important and vital government role in decisions made by local school boards directly influence instruction in Virginia's public schools. And whereas these decisions affect the present and future lives of children and also set direction to prepare all

003students to be competitive in local, state, and national as well as global 21st century knowledge economy. And whereas local schoolboard members work with parents, businesses, education professionals, and other community members to create the educational vision we want for our students. And whereas this year's theme from strong roots come endless possibilities highlights the vital role schoolboard members play in planting the seeds for student success, ensuring every student has the resources needed to grow, thrive, and reach their full potential. And whereas schoolboard appreciation month provides an opportunity to celebrate Virginia School Board members who champion the mission of public education. Now therefore be it resolved the Nelson County School Board Division joins the Virginia School Boards Association to recognize the contributions of the local school board members to the academic success of its public school students and

004expresses its sincerest recognition to local school board members for their focus on the well-being and achievement of students throughout the Commonwealth. and be it. Finally, resolve Nelson County Public School Division declares February 2026 as schoolboard appreciation month and encourages local community members and leaders to appropriate appropriately recognize our school division's dedicated schoolboard members. So, we want to say thank you so much and we have a um a certificate for each one of you. Um unfortunately, it does not appear that our um student representatives are able to make it tonight. more than likely because we've rescheduled probably a month's worth of events just for tonight um and tomorrow night. And so we want to say thank you very much and you'll receive a um certificate and we appreciate everything that you do. Um we have another

005meeting coming up September 19th where the celebrations of our school board appreciation will continue. So you'll have that to look forward to. So we want to say thank you so much Miss Powell. >> Thank you very much >> Mr. Richardson. >> Thank you. that >> probably that'll be fun. We'll figure that one out. Give me a second. Here you go. >> And Mr. Kennedy, >> thank you. >> Here you go. All right. >> Thank you. >> Yes. >> You know, I think that while we I appreciate the recognition for that, it's really about you guys. It's it really should be more about appreciating the school and everybody tied to the school. We do appreciate the recognition for that. So I think Dr. Hester, you are still up with some recognitions there or one Nelson awards

006and I'm excited for this one. >> Okay. >> Because you all have earned it. >> No, we're giving that later. Okay. Can you drive for a second when we re we build up? All right. So, R1 Nelson um is being comprised this month of one one group. Um we typically recognize four different groups. Our students, our community, our classified and our certified groups. But um we felt that this month um we will recognize our February winners in the March. Um it's been a very interesting and complicated month, but I think u this group that we're recognizing today really um I I would say um we witnessed the true meaning of one Nelson. And so we are recognizing our classified staff that really worked hard to be able to brave the frigid temperatures and work hard

007and chip away at being able to um bring us back to school. And it was a a long arduous task, but I really appreciate everything. So um I will call you up individually, but I will read um what we want to say to you. Um, I will say, um, these nominations were by several different groups. This wasn't one group who wanted to say thank you so much. So, we want to say thank you to our maintenance workers, our custodians, and our transportation uh, employees for just doing whatever it took in order to give us a chance to return to school. Um, we had other groups that we'll also recognize that played equally as valuable role in preparing us and supporting our students. I think it was just really apppropo of being able to recognize this

008group. So, NCPS witnessed the true meaning of the one Nelson spirit in action through the extraordinary efforts of our teams during the winter storm fern. [snorts] While many people were at home or battling the elements at their own houses, our custodians, maintenance, and transportation employees showed up. They were early, determined, and ready to serve. In frigid temperatures, they worked tirelessly to break through layers of hardened snowcrete. They cleared entrances, opened walkways, clear off roads, deiced buses, and making buildings safe and accessible. Their work was not easy. And at times, the task must have felt nearly unmanageable. Yet they passed on or pressed on and because that was unfortunate. Yet they pressed on because they understood something important. Without their dedication and perseverance, our students and staff could not return to learning. Because of their unselfish

009commitment and grit, our campuses were prepared and our schools were ready to open. We are deeply grateful for these behind the scenes heroes whose hard work keeps NCPS moving forward. So, we want to say thank you to everyone. I'm going to um we have um a few of our members of that team here with us today. I am going to make sure that I read through everybody's name. So, when I get to you because you don't want me trying to file through this, please come up and we're going to get your picture. So, I know that is probably your favorite thing. Um, but it's going to happen. So, um, David Johnson, David Johnson is a custodian from Rockfish. And here's the thing, not not many were able to make it today because they put in

010well above their expected um um duties throughout the last two weeks. So, we really want to be able to recognize that it's logged in under me. >> Okay. Well, there you have it. Okay. David Johnson, uh, Rockfish River custodian. David Lane, Rockfish River Elementary School custodian. Christina Nyla, classified, uh, Rockfish River custodian. Kenny Lawhorn, custodian at Tai River Elementary School. Kendra Lee, custodian at Tai River Elementary School. All right, Isaiah, you're the first one up. >> All right, Isaiah Wood. All right, congratulations, sir. And we're going to take this. You come a little bit closer. Yeah. All right. >> Smile. >> Thank you. >> [applause] >> Teresa Raglin. Terresa Ragland is uh um Nelson Middle School custodian. Lynn Ashley, Nelson Middle School custodian. Sean Henderson, um a new member of our Nelson Middle School team

011custodian. Gordon Wy, a custodian at uh Nelson County High School. Shane Simpson, a custodian at Nelson County High School. Kathleen Hubard, custodian at Nelson County High School. We have um in terms of our maintenance staff, Buddy Altheiser um uh maintenance worker who um really battled some of this trying to plow open um gates and access points um for our fuel and so kind of get ahead of it even before anybody started doing a lot of other work. And I know HC uh battled the tractor quite a bit trying to plow some things as well, which was not an easy task. Um George Napier uh maintenance uh for Nelson County Public Schools. HC Allen, our next individual, HC [applause] AC spent a lot of time doing a lot of various activities trying to get us ready.

012So congratulations. >> All right. >> You don't want anyone. >> Thank you. You do what? No pictures. >> Okay. [laughter] >> Yeah, I I can appreciate that. Cody Burnley. Cody Burnley. [applause] >> That's you, sir. I see you. >> Congratulations. >> Thank you. All right. >> Thank you. >> [applause] >> Virginia Fitzgerald. Uh uh Virginia is with our transportation um department. Jeannie Drumheller kind of goes um works with both uh maintenance and transportation. I think actually so does Virginia uh quite frequently. So they they both um are supportive of both departments. Timmy Campbell with the transportation. PG Pontton with through transportation. PG was the one that you saw on Facebook on top of uh the bus trying to get the ice blocks off and Jeff Morris with transportation. So, I wanted before we um close

013that out, I actually have um two members over here, uh Les Campbell and um Taylor Ashley, who also contributed a great deal um to just kind of spearheading everything that needed to take place, communicating with our principles, really just trying to um be that steady and constant motivator because there were times where it seemed like why why are we even trying to chip away at this? because they understood that any, you know, I think Les said any foot, any inch that we can clear out is one less thing that we have to do um moving forward that could possibly make it more difficult. So, they understood and I appreciate um being able to do that. And they're these are also the two guys that get up early um part of the road crew and get

014up early and assess the roads. So, um just want to say thank you to you guys and thank you for you all being [applause] I think uh and Kenny Burnley, Kenny Burnley was another I don't think I was able to mention his name, but I may have. So, I just want to make sure I I cover everybody so they get their their due appreciation. >> I can personally have to dig out of my house so I can't even imagine the amount of space you had to cover in the buses. So, thank you all very very much. >> Um Dr. Dr. Hester, are we going to do um a recognition for National School Counseling Week? >> We sure are. Can you just give me >> Sure. Okay. Or not. >> Have a good evening. >> Thank

015you, too. >> Thanks, Isaiah. >> Thank you. Are they all going together? That's trouble. [laughter] >> [clears throat] >> Yep. >> Trying to get the proclamation. >> No, I'm trying to get the um the computer shut down. >> So, I'm just trying to get the meeting back up. >> Thankfully, everything is so protected and locked down, you have to have passwords and >> separate >> Yeah. authorization that you can't just easily get back up. >> Well, I tell you what, >> I'll just go ahead. >> No, I was gonna say we can do our while you're getting everything rolling, we can do our board comments. >> Uh, we got it. I'm good. So, um, this past week has been, uh, National School Counseling Week. And so, um, with that, we want to say thank you

016for all the efforts of our school counselors, um, and as well a proclamation. So whereas school counselors are employed in public and private schools to help students reach their full potential. And whereas school counselors are actively committed to helping students explore their abilities, strengths, interests, and talents as these traits relate to career awareness and development. And whereas school counselors help families focus on ways to further the academic, career, and social emotional development of their children. And whereas school counselors work with their teachers and other educators to help students explore their potential and set realistic goals for themselves. And whereas school counselors seek to identify and utilize community resources that can enhance and complement comprehensive school counseling programs and help students become productive members of society. And whereas comprehensive school counseling programs are considered an integral

017part of the educational process that enables all students to achieve success in school. Therefore, I, Amanda Hester, do hereby proclaim February 2nd through 6th, 2026 as National School Counseling Week. And so, on behalf of um all of us, we wanted to say thank you so much for all of our school counselors. Um without them, the support and network for our students would just not be as expansive. So, we appreciate that. [applause] >> So, now we're down to the comments from the board members. Are you okay starting Mr. Kennedy with that? Okay, go ahead. Floor is yours. >> Great. So, uh, first thing I got to, it was virtual. It would have been a lot more fun to have been able to go to Richmond, but got to attend the capital conference and the new school

018board member orientation. And so got to learn a lot from that about, you know, all the different facets of this job and um what it entails and um kind of how the it's really open-ended about how much um advocacy that you can do kind of as much time as you throw into it advocating with you know delegates and all the different lobbying kind of you know constituencies. It's uh it's you know it's exciting to see what could happen, but I'm I'm also like in terms of the challenges that people have expressed about Nelson County's you know funding things and the political will does not necessarily seem to be there. Notice there was one bill that got um or one amendment to kind of hold harmless. So I don't know if I you know I the

019people that I know that I messaged them for what that's worth. Um but you know I guess we'll see if that gets traction. it was a Republican, you know, um, sponsored amendment, so I don't know if it'll have traction or not. But, um, beyond that, um, I got to there was the also the adult and career education board. I didn't make it to the live meeting cuz it was overlapping with the capital conference, but I got to see that Mr. Yarzabinsky made on the made it on the call and I got the information from that. And so I'm making a point of, you know, seeing what. So I saw that there was 26 adults from Nelson County that participated in that program out of about 900. And so I guess I'd love to learn more

020even in that like rural health transformation program if there's any way to kind of connect the career like pathways. That's I just I just don't know enough yet in terms of what what all what those 26 students were studying even like what you know in terms of the where what's what what to serve what's what what needs are there in terms of what what we could even do within Nelson County. I don't know what that looks like in the future. But um that's the little bit of input I had on the adult and career education board. I haven't I wanted to respond for that. Um, and then the last thing I wanted to say was just that uh something I'd love it if we could look into is um for homeschool students if there's any

021possibility that they could with an activity fee play sports at the schools in Nelson County. Um I know that's not a thing right now. Um, but I've had multiple families that homeschool say that for them that would be awesome because that's something that they would assume that they'd have to pay for, but that it would allow them to get to know some people at the high school. Um, and I think kind of connect them to the that school community. It would it would be a it'd be a bridge for the home school and the the public school community. So, I just want to investigate that and figure out what the pros and cons and details would look like. Thanks. >> Thank you. Child on fire. It's getting you're getting started quick, right? You guys had

022a lot of meetings right off. Um Mr. Richardson. >> Well, [clears throat] like Mr. Kennedy and and of course as well everyone um participating in the um new school board um uh training was uh really enlightening. Um like a lot of things it's brought a lot more questions um but it did bring many many answers and and a lot of direction uh to where to u seek out uh answers and um uh yeah I just want to tip my hat to everyone really in the room um you know welcome back to school. I I know it's been an absolute uh human, you know, just a a real struggle to uh get to where we could open the school today [clears throat] and and you know, it's um I'm very happy about that, of course. And

023uh really very grateful and appreciative for everyone's effort and uh I just like to say thank you. >> Well said. Well said, Mrs. Rush. Dr. Rush, >> thank you. Um, ditto to the two Joe's about the VSBA training was great. It was a little overwhelming and a little um, dear in the headlights sort of feeling, but it gave us, I think, our first taste of the depth and breadth of the work that is involved in this and I'm delighted to be a part of it and to get to work. Um, I went to the prep board meeting with Amanda on I don't know what day. January I don't know what day it was. 27th maybe. Nope, that was that other meeting we went to. Anyway, it was thrilling to see what is available in Nelson

024County for students with disabilities um across the region. I don't I'm just getting a taste of it. I know that these things exist. I didn't know how available they were to our children, but they are and we're very fortunate to have this organization um close by so that we can access their their services. Um apart from that, just again kudos to the to Les and his crowd. I don't know how you did it. Every morning I'd wake up and think, "Thank God I'm not him." It's just there there, you know, from one day to the next there was no and we don't have any precedent for this. It's not like you could say, "Okay, here's the protocol for this." There is there was none. And even tonight when um Dr. Hester mentioned the person that

025had to dig out the place for the fuel didn't even occur to me, you know. So this there's just the work that you did is phenomenal and and superhuman and thank you so much for making this county safe for our students to to get and staff and everyone to get back to school. Thank you. Now the next few weeks will be getting parents u mental health back in place. So, if [laughter] you have any suggestions about that, >> Rachel, you're up. You're up now, Rachel, for that. >> Yeah, [laughter] >> that just handed the baton. Um, thank you each for your feedback. I do want to say a big thank you to the teams that got us all back in shape. I do think it was I know, as I said earlier, how hard it

026was just for air little space to get it up and operational. So, I can only imagine what it was like for the team. So, Les, Taylor, thank you. Taylor, I think um it sounds like today your your team did a phenomenal job navigating everything. And I don't I mean I can't drive in the snow and ice. I can't drive hardly period, but much less at a bus full of kids that are coming back to school and they are probably wild. So tell your team thank you. We don't always get to see you because I know you're super busy, but it's I hope you know how much and how often we talk about how appreciative we are of your team. >> Same thing to you, Les. I mean, you get to hear it every every month,

027but we really are so appreciative. While we have Mrs. Connell here too, we want to say thank you to her. They um if you don't know this and you haven't followed, her team has done a phenomenal job getting food home with their kids. So, great job. And I know that that is um that is quite a lot to have to pack all those meals. And I I got to see some pictures from Dr. Hester of many groups if you get kids involved. Like it was a community effort and I loved seeing that engagement. So, thank you for being here. Thank you for being here so that we can tell you what an incredible [clears throat] job your group does. your group's fun to watch, too. They um they do some fun stuff and have a

028good time. And um I think that's it. We're back. We're getting started. Kids are back. So, move forward, man. Well, before you know it, it'll [clears throat] be the end of the school year again. Um and to the fellow board members, hang in there. Like, this is sort of drinking from the fire hose at this point. [laughter] So, just hang. I'm still learning. Hang in there. Um important dates. Dr. Hust, do you want me to take this one? You want to do it? >> Um I'm happy to do it. Um, so there's a lot of February is a big month for celebration of a lot of different initiatives. Obviously, the schoolboard appreciation month. Um, celebration of Black History Month. Celebrating February is Career and Technical Education Appreciation Month. Um, and then celebrating February's Love the

029Bus Month as we will have Mr. Ashley um, uh, lead us in that. Um, National School Resource Officer Appreciation Day is coming up. Um, so we um they uh they were wanting to be here this evening. We're going to invite them so everyone can meet them in March um just so our board can become familiar with our SRO and these are the individuals in our buildings. Um so uh you know building that partnership with law enforcement with our our school community. Um FFA appreciation week is coming up on the 21st through the 28th. Um President's Day which is a division holiday will take place on the 16th. um random act of kind uh kindness day on the 17th. Uh as a reminder, we will on the 19th, which is a Thursday, have our um public

030hearing of the proposed FY20 26 2027 general operating budget. Um that will be 6 p.m. here in this room. Um March 6th, kindergarten registration. So that is a big date for us in order to really promote and educate our community about registration um for kindergarten. Um our musical this year from the high school is Greece. So pretty excited about that. I know they they are feeling the challenge of rehearsals and preparation um as well uh to be able to get together to put on a wonderful production and uh March 12th approval of the recommendation. Uh that is our ne that is our March schoolboard meeting. That will be our our final um presentation and approval of the schoolboard budget. Um, and we would then hand off our budget to um the county. Um, we have

031to do that by April 1st, but we're going to try very hard to make sure we get that to Miss McGary so that can be incorporated into the county's overall budget. So, we work pretty closely to make sure we're handing that over. Um, end of the third marking period is coming up on the 13th of Oh gosh, I guess that's a Friday the 13th. Um, Uhhuh. And then an asynchronous day is currently scheduled for the 16th. Um, so >> I would like to reiterate the February 19th it is the public hearing. So if you or anyone you know has input on our budget, please encourage them to participate in that meeting. sign up to speak during that time because we really do um we build this budget for our kids and our community and you

032have a direct impact in line to that and we want to hear from the people that it impacts. So February 19th public hearing on the budget and then we will have discussions as a board after that on kind of what we will begin to present for launch. >> All right. I know one date uh is there's like a Virginia School Board Association says there's a regional spring forum >> on the 17th. >> 17th. Yes. >> That was at 4:30 and it was at Louisa High School. >> I didn't know if I saw that there was a registration forum for that >> the VSBA spring forum at Louisa >> spring forum. I'll take care of that. Just let me know if you want to attend and I will take care of that for you. >> Sure.

033I I saw I didn't want to submit redundant registration forms. >> Yep. No, I'll I will take care of that. >> If you have any interest, I mean, let's all >> Yeah. I mean, I'd like to go. >> Perfect. It's a really good one to go to, too, because of the artwork. So, if anybody has any interest, just kind of we'll send you a text or whatever. Let her know, please. [clears throat] >> Perfect. Thank you for bringing us a good catch on the date. Okay. Dr. Hester, you're up. >> All right. He had my bonger. He had my bonger. Okay. All right. So, give me one second real quick. Pain of T. [laughter] It's Kelly, >> you're going to do what is it? We always say the hard restarts for your computer always happen

034at the most inopportune moments. Always. [clears throat] >> Restarted before the meeting and I was all set to go. And no, >> if I preempt it, would it be okay? >> I don't know. >> Okay, we're going to do this. We're We're going to do this a different way. Okay. All right. Okay. So, um I do think it is important to um kind of reiterate um with our um community about inclement weather and all the different things that go into it. And I'm not going to go into detail. Um all our families have been sent out our inclement weather document that outlines what goes into the decision making and then what our various codes are. um you know coming up with the codes was uh through a suggestions of several um community and staff members

035saying it just gets confusing sometimes because the the media doesn't always show the same thing on each of the channels. they can show the codes. There's very limited. Um, so we did adopt that and um, and so I would just say I appreciate everybody's flexibility and understanding when we make these decisions. We do not make them um, I don't make them lightly. I am fully aware of the impact that it has on all stakeholders. Um, and I know that some people kind of get a little frustrated. I think sometimes we hear we heard this a little bit yesterday. Well, it's not snowing at my house. And when you remind people it's 470 square miles. Um, and we have I'm learning um kind of distinctive weather zones in our county as well. And as we learned

036really quickly, once you get to the light in Lovingston, things change. And then, you know, and they did quickly yesterday. So, I appreciate that. Um, I think also we get some questions about remote learning days. The state allows us um no more than 10 remote learning days, but there's some caveats with the remote learning days um obviously about um work, but also feeding our students. And so, you see a big push. We send um a magnitude of our students home with some meals, you know, our atrisisk students with some meals every week. But as you mentioned, uh Miss Pal um Miss Canel and her team of um school nutrition um ladies and and do you have a gentleman? Yes. and gentlemen really came together to be able to provide because there was no way that

037we were going to allow our students um to go home before that storm without knowing that we provided them meals and um whether you know it was one of those like I think we felt confident that a storm was coming in how long I don't think we I didn't anticipate it was going to be almost two weeks but we knew it was going to be significant enough and so there was no way that Miss Canel was going to allow our students to be gone from us that long without meals. Um, so we do provide them. I think it's one thing to really acknowledge that we have a long day. Um, instructional hours are calculated off of the shortest day. Our shortest day is 6 and a half. That's our elementary. It's 7 hours, but you

038remove lunch. Lunch doesn't count as instructional time. So that's 6 and 1/2 hours. The state allows you to count 180 days or 990 hours. So, at the start of our school year with like 175 days, we started with 1,137.5 hours. So, we have quite a few bank days in time already built in. Some people don't do that. So, you'll see some people adding days back or adding time to the end. Some of them are doing that just to get to make sure that they get to 990 hours. other people are doing that just because they feel like they need to add some time. Um, when we do remote learning days, it isn't, you know, sometimes it has um an understanding that it's not counting if we do an instructional um remote learning day. It doesn't

039count against hours lost. We don't we don't pretend that that replaces face-to-face learning. We fully acknowledge that it is not the same. But what it does do is it it has a connection. It has a connection between the students and the teachers. Um I it has a connection between the educators and a connection to the content. We are nowhere trying to think that it replaces our teachers. It won't. It can't. Um but it maintains that connection um level of engagement and a level of connection that is so very important. Um, so I try as best I can when we have snow days come in, little kids, big kids, adults, most people like that first day of a snow day to be able to enjoy it, but also as we experienced with this one, work had

040to be done to address the impact of it. And kids are involved in that sometimes. Um, I remember I spoke to um an IIA, she's like, I had to go chase my cows down. I you know, um, and I know Mr. Richardson, you experienced that. So I think you know you really recognize life beyond um just that immediate impact to instruction. Life is going on around us that that storm um influenced and so I just want people to understand we don't think that the remote learning is replacing the facetoface instruction but we do believe in the value of establishing remote day to keep that connection between the kids and the teachers or the IAS or even principles and then also with that content. Um right now um if if we didn't even count those remote

041learning days, we used seven of them, so we would have three remaining. Even if we didn't count them, we'd still have nine days, almost like 8.9 um days left. So we still have a lot of time. Um so when we're using remote learning, it's not trying to save ourselves from having to add days back to the calendar. We still have time built in. Um we have been um surveying our staff about do you feel like you need more time? If so, we may come to you and say we need to add a day back. Um, so that is something that we are surveying. You know, I think also in all fairness our our community, but if we have to, we have to. Um, and we recognize that we had established those dates on the calendar,

042but um, the instructional piece is important. And I just wanted to take a chance for people to understand there's a lot of thought that goes into this. There's a lot of tracking of instructional hours. Um and it goes beyond just trying to save time in the end. It's trying to to really maintain that human um component of this. >> Yes, ma'am. >> Um you you you mentioned it, but it didn't quite register. Do that does the when the kids have remote learning day, are any of those hours of that day credited or taken away or whatever? Do they count towards those 99? >> The remote learning count counts towards as instructional hours >> with a verified packet from the teacher. Does the student not get the hours if like they don't turn in the >>

043So, it's not an individual student's hours. >> Great. >> It's the it's the it's the division's operations hours. >> Sure. >> Um and we try really hard like please don't the day they come back, you know, it's due and then we're grading it because we have kids who are experiencing a lot of different things when we are on those breaks. Like we want them doing that work. >> Huh. I said it's tough enough to just make sure that everybody has got all their packets their elements. There's a lot to pay attention in their folder ready to turn in >> and I did have some parents when we on that one Friday where I did not call remote learning like oh my gosh thank you so much like yes I'm aware like it it we know

044that that it impacts the whole family. Um >> I'm glad that there's the that the ability to cash in on those those hours effectively because I want to make it to beach vacation too. I I think we're all we're all very aware of spring break. We're all very aware of summer. We're all very aware of our accountability and accreditation. So, it's that balance of what's in our best interest and and supporting students. Um so, I I think that's a really good point. Um and I I think it's just something that we try to pay attention to. Um and we don't try to overuse. Um in state of emergencies sometimes they offer waivers but you have to exhaust all other opportunities of building back time and we already have so much time. So those waivers are

045some sometimes not as um as as easy to apply or as necessary to apply. >> So if it's a remote learning day it's credit for a day of instruction. Yes. Okay. >> Yes. >> There's no devalue. >> Okay. That was right. >> And in some and in some instances that's why school systems use it. some instances that's school systems use it so they can feed their kids. Um you can't have a you know it's a balance. Um and in in some of these reimbursement opportunities you don't get the reimbursement unless you're having the learning. Um but yet the human element of this is that's a child >> and they they need food. So I think it's it's um I and I appreciate Miss Canel working really hard to find the opportunities for that those reimbursements

046that that give us the flexibility to be able to do that. It's not just the food, it's the emotional connection, too. I mean, I think you spoke to that a little bit. We don't know what some of these students go home to. And so, 10 days in that home without a connection outside is a big deal. And so, the ability to from some requirement kind of standpoint, right, if they're on snow days, then we we don't contact them. But in a remote learning day, there's going to be a touch point with those kids. And that I don't think any of us recognize in some families how important that is for those children. And I would say there's I would say there's probably right many of our staff that do reach out even on snow days.

047Um it's not a have to, but I think that there are some um examples of some of our staff doing that just to make sure just because I think like we miss them today for me. Um just to be able to see our kids uh and to see all of our staff in uh for me was a celebration. So yeah, I just wanted to be able to to talk a little bit about that. All right. Pathways to success. Um I I think it's safe to say that Ms. uh Irvin has been diligently working away on um kind of going through and understanding our needs in terms of building our budget and and having several conversations with all different departments and and really weighing and working um just even leading up to the meeting working with

048our county administrator to be able to to understand some things. We still want to talk about that impact of LCI. Um as Mr. Kennedy talked about there is legislation out there for hold harmless. What is hold harmless means legitimately don't hold us accountable for that that funding um or the really the locality for that funding through no fault of of our own to see those significant um increases. And so that's it's a it's it's kind of constant um evaluating what those numbers are and that funding that we get from the state. >> [clears throat] >> Um also um focused on um some claims and working through Vay Corp. Um working on a budget for Head Start. Um Miss Irvin is also uh wearing dual uh many hats and serving as a deputy clerk, you know,

049coming back and and making sure that I'm I'm I'm doing what I'm supposed to be, making sure I remember to do the things that I need to do. Um that's a lofty task in and of itself. Um for instruction um golly just keeps going. All right. So made progress across instruction programs and assessment worked hard with our technology team uh to prepare the launch of magic school and that's a magic school AI for teachers with professional learning uh we have coming up on February 11th and collaborated with division leaders at T uh at Ty River on our targeted school improvement planning. participated in VDOE webinars on teacher effectiveness and dual enrollment grants. Continued with BRVGS steering committee and held title one parent meetings at both Rockfish and Tai River. Curriculum teams have been busy with

050K- through2 math at secondary ELA textbook adoption reviews and we prepared community surveys to gather input. On the assessment side, we finalized fall testing and WEDA testing for February 9th. Spring testing prep is underway, believe it or not, and the ESBAR submissions, discipline and um student information submission submissions are coming up. Uh facilitated VTSS, leadership meetings, SDC meetings, and initial NAPE coordination. As we said, uh this week has been National School Counseling Week. Special education team has stayed very active in both professional learning and compliance work. There was a recent region five sped director meeting which focused on dispute resolution. We also held IPOP session for early childhood special education and VPI teachers who received training and planning. Um despite the weather disruptions, our eligibility and IEP teams continued meeting virtually to ensure we stayed

051on track with all the required timelines. So even even when our teachers aren't here physically in the building, they are still continuing with their planning with their meetings. And that is the nice um nice ability that we have to be able to still continue with the virtual uh meetings as we go through. And then also um working on maintenance of effort report self-participated VoE training on graduation pathways for students with disabilities and recognizing national school counseling week human resources. This is, believe it or not, we are now swinging into the recruiting season. And this is at the heart of what we do because these are the highquality staff that we want to have working with our children and working um in our division. It's centered on uh the recruiting, the partnerships in strong statewide coordination.

052We also participated in educator recruiting fair at Bridgewater with about 25 other school divisions which gave us a valuable chance to connect with future educators and highlight the opportunities in NCPS. So attended a multi-reional HR meeting in Henriiko where we received legal updates on ADA and FMLA lensure and policy updates and shared best practices with HR teams from across the state on working more efficiently and collaboratively. And for the spring of 2026, we've already um placed about 12 college students in NCPS classrooms. So, we are, you know, partnering with local school um local uh high institutions of higher education to bring in and recruit uh potential employees here in in uh Nelson County. We also continued VPI coordination and made sure weather delays and closures were clearly communicated to local media. Technology made solid progress

053on several technology upgrades across our division. Our final extreme switches are now installed at all locations. And a special thanks to our maintenance team who remodeled part of uh our closets at Tai River to accommodate larger equipment. We appreciate the extra effort. We also received five new Prometheian active panels. Um these were purchased ahead of um new teacher and administrator laptops arrived at Ty River and Rockfish on their refresh cycle. These were purchased ahead of recent price increases. As I think you'll remember our last meeting, we talked about just really being able to think ahead at um um chain supply um potential issues and then cost potential fluctuations. So, I appreciate that um forward thinking and being able to save some money. Also, the distribution plan for May and August, we've completed device setup and

054Google workshop support for our new schoolboard members and production is underway on next year's student uh Chromebooks. And um expected later this month, we will um support our rising fifth graders with a onetoone model through 8th grade. So, we're excited about that. I think you see a lot of snow pictures. That's pretty much where their life has been. Um during the week of January 19th, our maintenance team was fully focused on preparing for wintertorm Fern. They coordinated with our propane uh provider to make sure fuel levels were sufficient and worked with Honeywell. I will say the planning for this was a week in advance, well a week in advance when we started paying attention to the weather models and really understanding this could impact us. We need to have that fuel because when you don't

055have that fuel keeping even if the temp even even if the inside temperatures of our buildings are not as warm as they would normally be when we have all of our students in, you have to keep it or else the pipes freeze or other major problems develop. So when that fuel goes out and you can't have access points for our providers, other major problems develop. And so, um, just trying to get a highlight of like the planning that goes into this. Um, Honeywell verified all HVAC systems were operating properly so the buildings were able to stay warm. Also coordinated closely with our snow removal contractor, uh, so parking lots could be cleared as soon as conditions. Um, Thomas, um, one of the local contractors was on one of the skids in the high school parking

056lot, um, just clearing it. And when I say all day, it was all day into the evening to where his lights were on and he just, you know, Nelson County graduate is not wanting to give up on trying to get us ready. Um, and just so thankful for our community to support us on that. [snorts] Um, it brought significant ice which really pushed our equipments to the limits. Our maintenance and custodial teams worked tirelessly to make the campuses safe and ready for our students. also began preparations for the next potential storm by pre-treating sidewalks and lots. When the chemical supplies ran uh short, we had to send out a delegation to go hunt down more chemicals to put down. Um and I think going as far as like appamatics that we have to go to

057to be able to find more uh chemicals to be able to to be prepared. Transportation and safety and security. Um, it's been a stretch of snow and ice and more ice for our transportation team and they've done a great job navigating very challenging conditions uh and schedule disruptions. Even with the weather impacts, we continue making progress on staffing. Um, CDL testing was completed and we're excited to welcome Brian Thomas and Britney Williams who both passed their CDL exams and have already taken on new routes. That's a big win for our transportation capacity and reliability. We appreciate the team's flexibility and persistence during a very demanding weather. um in school nutrition. Again, just thank you so much for everyone. I know um some students um our school nutrition teams across the division came together to really

058be able to work um not only at the initial uh Friday before the storm um came in, but also we had another redistribution of meals earlier this week. Um and that's that's not always easy to be able to make sure that we have enough food. Um how many of our families need it? are people able to get in safely to be able to pack them up and then distribute them? Um, but I have every confidence that those families um that did need them and want them um were able to be supported by our our school nutrition team. Um, Taste Test Tuesday at Rockfish where students tried a new scratchmade chicken tater tot bake. I can tell you from um personal experience that it was very tasty and the kids that I spoke to were particularly

059um supportive of having that. Um the middle and high school students sampled over oven roasted vegetables. Um at Rockfest, the winning milk drive class was recognized with a celebration hosted by a cafeteria manager, Amy Jackson. During the ice and snow, our nutrition staff along with volunteers were able to distribute meals. As you see there on the right, the meals served during January, 11,030 for breakfast, um 15,197 for lunch, and then um the suppers that were able to be served. And I'm not sure that's inclusive of the ones we distributed. Yeah. And so that would be an even higher number. >> Um community engagement. We didn't, you know, because we were we're down for about two weeks, but we still are um anticipating and welcoming Hall of Fame inductees and those there to support them coming

060up this weekend. Um our our um contractors and community members helping us out with our storm cleanup. Um the the middle like this is particularly uh meaningful to me. our kids were back with us today um enjoying and and and back and learning and enjoying their peers. Um but leading up to this meeting, we still had um indoor track meets going on, basketball um and and just kind of hoping um that today and tomorrow we get back into the swing of things and are able to really um finish up this season strong and head into the spring. And just big thank you to our NCPS school counselors during National School Counseling Week. So we appreciate everything that you do. Any questions? We're >> good. >> All right. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> So, our

061student reps are busy trying to catch up from all the stuff that's missed. >> I did have one question or at least something to clarify down the line is. >> Sure. >> You mentioned Head Start. >> I didn't know if we were doing that or the Virginia preschool initiative. I know that this year the Head Start had like or was it like LA it was the end of last year? I I'm I'm trying to remember exactly like the the preschool. It >> it's been very um disjointed. >> Okay. >> Um we've had multiple providers over the last three and a half years um whether it was MACA or CDI and now the um Head Start grant was was um applied to uh United Way of Charlottesville. However, the structure of it was nothing like MACA

062or CDI. It was a pass through structure. So that means we have to absorb everything and um very concerned about um Head Start sustainability in terms of federal. It seems to be the first thing on the chopping block every single year. It's you know whether you have a shutdown we we went through a period of shutdown where we couldn't get communications as the transition to United Way. So I think we feel more comfortable. um we are not able to sustain that head start but we are wanting to build up our VPI when we take a look at our data our VPI programs are successful when it's um developing our students for kindergarten we see the data where it's successful and in the future working with VoE to then adopt perhaps a three-year-old program >> yes

063what does it look like even to just [clears throat] make sure that we're insulated from like the politics of it all kind of I'm I'm interested in knowing how we like kind of make the preschool program for Nelson County like predictable. >> I think I think the direction we're going in through VPI is the most >> if you say predictable, sustainable. It's through the Virginia Department of Education. We work, you know, we work with them. I think we feel like it gives us the best opportunity to be successful and sustainable. Um, and we had, you know, you're competing for students who qualify and it meets certain criteria and that competition with Head Start last year actually depleted a class at Rockfish. >> Um, and and we need to build that like we want to build

064that back up over at Rockfish, but we also want to set the stage of perhaps moving in a direction where we also have three-year-olds. Um, we want to build up what we can for our Nelson um, citizens. like not even if you're in our kindergarten, but just giving that opportunity to be able to build it up in a way that has that strong academic um and also whole child approach. And I think that's going to give us the best opportunity where we can rely on what's going on and not be at the the mercy of whatever is happening in a much bigger level. And that's really why we're heading in that direction. Um we want to be able to support everybody, but sometimes you have to recognize that that was not working. Yeah, >> it

065hasn't worked well for us over the last few years. >> Right now, still pursuing the head start at >> finish out the year is head start. >> Okay. >> Y >> and then for next year, the idea is to seek the VPI. >> Cool. >> But that we're still in conversations with with the VDOE about ironing everything out as well. >> Yeah. And our families have had a roller coaster with the Head Start Macka CDI. Like it's just it's been it's been really tough for them and and that program is to some degree out of their hands. So, I think I like the idea of us pursuing something that's more sustainable and more internally managed so that we can provide a service to our families that they can rely on because right now it's it's

066tough. >> Also, in some of the conversations that we've had with United Way's potential to um we need to get more information. We had an initial conversation and um I think I want to investigate some of the other opportunities that might be able to broaden some of our services for our community. Um, but I need to we need to really check back in with them again um to be able to do that. >> But then also just I guess anything that comes from these third parties, it's that kind of dependent on whether or not their grants come through and things like that, right? In terms of like building out our services, just making sure that it's something that isn't only supported by things that could be taken away. >> Correct. I mean that is our

067hope is that we make this as um not seamless but as as I keep saying it sustainable and successful. That is going to be a big P for us. Um, and because those those programs also they support sometimes our ECSC classes, they you know there's a lot of we try to have a little bit of of those connections and inclusion like we want to be able to build this up so our our staff understands what's going on and the expectations are our students understand, our community knows and feels comfortable that it's continuing. >> Thank you. >> All righty. Um, is that do you have any more questions though? Anybody? So, comments from student reps. We will be sliding right on by because they are busy doing student stuff. Do we have any comments from the

068public? Anything? No. Okay. Um, because we like to make it an open environment. Does anybody have any comments they'd like to make even if they did not sign up? Okay. All right. We're down to the consent agenda. Barring any questions regarding any of the items on the cons consent agenda. If I can have a motion to approve as presented. >> Make a motion to approve the uh agenda. Consent agenda as presented. Okay. >> Have a second. Second. >> All those in favor say I. >> I. >> Anyone oppose? Anyone abstain? Okay. Consent agenda has been approved. So now we're down to items for information. Come on up, Mr. Taylor and tell us about the love the bus month. >> We love the love the bus month. >> It's a very special month. >> It is

069for a lot of reasons. >> Uh good evening. Um welcome to the new board members. Um we're happy to have you guys. My name is Taylor Ashley. I'm the [clears throat] supervisor of transportation here for Nelson County Schools. Um so every February um we like to um recognize something called love the bus month. Um it's um again celebrated each February and um basically it's there to recognize and appreciate the uh and uh the dedicated school bus drivers and the transportation professionals who safely transport students to and from school every day. It was established by the American School Bus Council in 2007. Uh the observance highlights uh the critical role that uh school transportation plays in student safety, access to education, and overall school success. Love the bus month also serves as a reminder to communities

070of the importance of school bus safety and the shared responsibility to protect students on the um on and around school buses. So with that, um I'm sure you guys have a copy of the proclamation. So, um, I'll go ahead and start reading that. So, love the bus month 2026. Whereas the yellow school bus is a trusted and familiar symbol of public education and student safety across communities nationwide. And whereas school buses comprise the largest form of mass transportation in the United States, safely transporting millions of students to and from school each day. And whereas each consist research consistently shows that the yellow school bus is the safest mode of transportation for students carrying approximately 26 million children daily. And whereas the yellow school bus the yellow school buses are designed and manufactured to meet stringent

071federal and state safety standards. And school bus drivers receive extensive training and ongoing preparation to protect the student in their care. And whereas the yellow school bus provides equitable access to education for students in rural, suburban, and urban communities, including students with special needs. Whereas student transportation supports educational opportunity by enabling participation in academic programs, extracurricular activities, field trips, and school sponsored events. And whereas the use of school buses helped reduce traffic congestion, improve roadway safety, and lessen environmental impact by decreasing the number of individual vehicles on the road. And whereas the professionals who plan, manage, maintain, and operate school transportation systems demonstrate daily dedication to student safety, reliability, accountability, and service. Now, therefore, be Well, I guess do you need you guys need to read this part or do you want me to just

072keep going? So, all right. Now, therefore, it be resolved that the Nelson County School Board recognizes and values the essential role the yellow school bus plays in education and in the life of our community. And be it further resolved that Nelson County School Board hereby proclaims the month of February 2026 as Love the Bus Month and encourages students, families, staff, and community members to join in recognizing and appreciation appreciating the contributions of our school transportation professionals and the vital service that they provide to student well-being and success. [applause] >> Good job. >> Much appreciated and welldeserved. Yeah. Alrighty. The Tai River School Improvement Plan. >> We get the whole team up today. >> Takes all three of us. >> Takes a village. [laughter] >> Good evening. I'm Heather Coughlin. I am the principal at Tyler

073Elementary School. I think you've met Miss Reinger and Mr. Bleco before. Um I think Miss Reinger is going to start us off with um kind of the why we're here tonight. >> So um we really have been very thankful for the opportunity to really look at our student performance data. It's given us an opportunity to really be proud of and celebrate the accomplishments of our staff and students. And it really is provided us that opportunity to have an open dialogue about not only what current resources we have available, how can we utilize what we have and what else might we do in order to have sustainable growth for our students, you know, in the coming years. um because the data that we looked at and the results that were provided um really a third of

074those students maybe more if we were to take count them one by one have you know are no longer they've been promoted from Ty River. Um so we wanted to make a plan that looked at the the needs of our current students as well as reflected upon data that really is you know was provided to us you know gathered at the end of last year. So, um really our plan, overall plan is just working on that desire to um grow both in instructional delivery and in our services to students as opposed to trying to find a really just a quick solution. So, >> sure. So, um, [clears throat] what we've we've spent a lot of time, even though the snowcrete caused a lot of disruptions, it gave us a lot of time to work through

075a lot of information that we were looking at over 35 data points. We did um a very extensive needs assessment to create a um a theor a three-year plan. Hopefully, it will only take one year. Uh, it it's re um evaluated every year to see if we would still need to continue with the targeted support and improvement plan. However, we established three goals um and those three goals are there as well as evidence-based practices to help our students make um more expedited growth. So, our requirement is to have um goals to identify in the identified areas where we needed to have more growth and have more students making more progress. Um, and in that process, we talked a lot about what evidence-based practices are more appropriate for the students that we have currently versus the

076students that we had last year and what our teachers are teachers and our staff need in order to be successful in their own growth because this is growth for them as well. So, um, it's not I think we talked a lot about this is not a gotcha moment. This is oh, this is how we, you know, grow in our craft and and make ourselves, you know, better all around. So our three go uh three goals that we identified. The first one um is in reading. So our students with disabilities will increase our pass rate to 70% or demonstrate growth of um on the Virginia reading so um again these are three-year goals. So that hopefully achieved by May 31st of 2029, but we're hoping it's May 31st of 2026. Um for math, there you go.

077For math, our students with disabilities will increase the pass rate to 70% or demonstrate growth on the Virginia math so um and then regards to our evidence-based practices. Our teachers of students with disabilities um will implement evidence-based practices in daily instruction as observed through lesson plan reviews and observations. So, we were um tasked with finding an evidence-based practice in reading and in math. Um, in regards to our plan, you know, one of the things that we talked a lot about is there are more than one there's one more than one evidence-based practice for reading that we want to use with our students. And what you may need may be different than what you may need. Um, but generally what we were doing for reading is teaching students to identify and use text um organizational structures

078to uh help with comprehension, learning, and remembering content. And then for math um we're going to be using well-chosen set of concrete and semiconcrete representations to support students learning of mathematical concepts and procedures. >> Thank you. >> So kudos to Miss Coughlin and her team as you know when the state told us that uh Tai River was in targeted support we had a pretty quick turnaround time. uh tomorrow everything is due. So they gave us about three weeks. And typically this happens a lot earlier in the school year. So again, the nice thing with Miss Coughlin, she had time with with all the snow days and whatnot, a little more time uh to devote to assessing, okay, what is working and what is not working. So what we decided is we will be putting in

079a a grant request to the state uh to support M-Class instructional kits and professional learning for our teachers there at Ty River. And what MClass is is it's a uh intervention interventionbased reading program. uh it groups students automatically every 10 less or 10 days based on progress monitoring thing monitoring that is ongoing and it uh targets uh phonics, fluency, vocabulary and comprehension. We would also like to send a team uh to the uh making schools work conference uh which is a conference that's held in July and uh that is held each and every year and that conference offers hundreds of sessions and topics ranging from literacy, math and science to uh addressing unfinished learning for students. So, uh, we will with your approval be sending that request off to the state and hopefully we'll be

080funded so that we can provide the professional learning for our our teachers, our instructional coaches and admin uh, as well as purchase the kits that'll support a lot of the other things that we're already doing to make sure student learning is progressing. I think just as a reminder, this data is based off of students who aren't even like we have 15 students who aren't even in that building anymore. So, I just want to say thank you to this team and and the others that kind of were a part of the the committee decision and and feedback because they rather than going for some decisions that, you know, may have been just for right now, you know, adopting something that will just help right now, they're choosing to look at a bigger picture and to see

081how can we build from this opportunity and g like professional learning. That's the gift that keeps on giving. That's not a onetime um impact. [clears throat] That is training the capacity and building um so our our staff can continue to grow our students, but also these kits. It it's just goes beyond just with a small group of students. It it is able to impact a greater um number and longerl lasting. And I think that I appreciate their thoughtfulness on this and really seeing beyond just I have to get this done and just putting anything in there. They put a great deal of thought and really considered the big picture and the kids that they have and the kids that are coming up behind and what their needs are. A lot of work went into it.

082[clears throat] >> Can I ask a question? Are the class um materials available for other schools in the district or is this like a licensed? >> No. So that's a great question. So, we actually purchased about six weeks ago kits for both Rockfish and Tai and our reading specialists and reading interventionists have already been trained. And based upon what we've seen, the training that we've received so far, we thought that it would be fantastic for our special education teachers to have that as a tool as well. So our goal obviously with this funding we can only use it for Tai but we are looking to also purchase the same kits for Rockfish because what benefits Tai is going to benefit Rockfish and vice versa. So we are going to do that with a different funding

083pool and they'll those teachers will be part of the training and the professional learning uh as well. >> Wonderful. Thank you. Um, quick question. I know last month you had mentioned is these are like the section 10003 funds. Is that the same thing? >> So this grant is in and of it it's it's entirely different. It's separate. Yes. >> Mhm. >> Okay. >> Any other questions? >> But I guess is this all connected to like the targeted support the TSI? Like so these grants are separate from that but putting the plan together is a part of getting >> the those like GSI funs requirement. >> Okay. >> Yeah. >> The plan is required whether we ask for financial support or not. So yeah, >> they could have chosen not to. And there's several divisions saying

084we're we're we're good because, you know, nothing is free. And sometimes what you have to do in order to use that money, it it it actually takes away from the productivity of what you can be doing. And so that's why I really appreciate they saw an opportunity to take advantage of the money that is available, but also to make it productive. um and not just to spend money to spend it, but they're taking advantage um to see the value in it and being able to make it a little bit bigger. >> It's a very encouraging approach. I agree. >> Yeah, it's great. Thank you. [clears throat] >> And the positive to the end class, too. It it goes all the way up to sixth grade. So, I know our reading specialist at the middle high

085school has also received the training and will be able to utilize uh that training to help our sixth grade students as well at the middle school. Well, good to be to see the outcomes >> like the benefit of all of that work. >> Any other [clears throat] >> Thank you all. Good job. >> That was a quick turnaround. We appreciate it. >> Are I guess you're staying up to talk to us about the inclusive schools action plan. >> All right. >> Thank you. Right. So, I just want to provide you all with a little bit of background as to why I'm even standing here today sharing with you um the results of our self assessment and inclusive schools plan. Um three years ago, so it was the 2022 2023 school year, all school divisions in

086Virginia were required to do an inclusive practices self assessment and then create an inclusive schools plan. Um, and it's supposed to be updated every three years. Honestly, here in Nelson, we really began really looking at our practices la at the fall of last school year. So, just to give you background, there's the House bill and the Senate bill as to why all school divisions are required to um engage in this plan. And so, really some background on how results were gathered. uh in December of 2024, which was slightly over a year ago. As I said, we we have been really building this process for over a school year, a [clears throat] survey was administer administered school administrators and special education staff. And we also developed an inclusive schools committee that convened uh a few times

087both last school year and this school year uh to brainstorm our former plan. brainstorm. He talk about how we are and and as a division and what we need to do moving forward. Additionally, um VDOE provided school divisions with a resource called the Virginia Inclusive Schools Planning Guide. Uh and school representatives [clears throat] from all four of our schools submitted that prior to our winter break. Um and then we I also and a a big piece of this as well is sharing information and offering the opportunity for feedback from our special education advisory committee which is our you know parent meeting. And so those that those are the pieces and facets of how we gathered our information. So I just wanted to share that we had uh members of the committee from all four of

088our schools uh representing um ex different experiences in our school division um different ranges of experience with special education also different lenses. We have um you know our building leaders and um some of our special educators who taught more in the collaborative setting also those who might have taught who might teach more in a more adapted functional uh smaller group setting. So we had a wide range of members um and really from this we also we uncovered quite a few accomplishments and so thank you. So through the process we there are some things over the past few years and I you know I'm not going to read these just verbatim out loud to you but just to summarize uh we've really had a focus on our eligibility teams really defining what that speciallyesed instruction is

089to for a student to qualify to actually receive special education services. Um we have established a help desk that convenes monthly. We rotate to each of the buildings uh to provide an opportunity to prov for special education support either to answer questions or to provide professional development on self-identified or division identified needs. We also have really established a partnership with TEAC which is a free opportunity to provide training and professional support to both general and special education teachers. Um, and then we can go to the next one. Additionally, continuing with our accomplishments, we've been working on schoolwide behavior support systems and matrices, really tying into VTSS. We have worked really strategically to build our plans to help our students transition at those critical points from early childhood to kindergarten, then again fifth to sixth, 8th

090to 9th, and high school to postsecary. we really have been working on utilizing what we need um for our our student needs and and applying our staff to the appropriate places so that we're meeting our students exactly as they need to be met. Um and additionally, we've started during the onboarding process. So when we have those new teacher uh trainings at the beginning of the school year, we're talking about what is your role as the general educator and what is your role as the special educator both in the classroom and what is your responsibility during special education meetings to really from the get-go help support them with that. Thank you. Um, and additionally, we've really been um making concerted efforts on engaging our families. So, we uh I know Dr. Rush, you just were at

091a prep meeting the other week. And one of the things that they provide that we give to our families monthly is that newsletter that doesn't just have um events for Nelson, but it gives them a more global outreach of trainings and supports that they can um receive in order to navigate parenting a child with a disability. Um and you know, we we work with um just having those activities. We're having one coming up in February on the 18th uh to provide an opportunity for uh parents and students with disabilities to engage together in our family fund building night that we're going to have at Rockfish. Okay. So, I'm ready. One of the things that um we are I I'm most proud of and it warms my heart um to think about that day and and

092how we built this was our inclusive schools vision. This was created by um many different stakeholders. It was facilitated when we had an IPO meeting and it was just to us what does inclusion mean and what does it mean when we to meet the needs of each child. So I won't read that verbatim to you. All right. So moving on to our what exactly is our inclusive schools plan. You can see there are 10 quality indicators here and as a committee you could choose whether we were in the initiation phase, the imple implementation phase and the excellence phase and really um and uh both Deina and Heather can attest to this uh when I convene the committee to say okay I looked at all your results and I had a few more ranks in the

093excellence than we see right now because we re We really wanted to hone in on excellent really being top-notch. No, we there's nothing else we can do. Um, you know, we're really in a good spot. So, we moved a few back to implementation while acknowledging and celebrating our accomplishments knowing that, you know, we still we don't want to stop at just good. We want to be as great as possible for meeting the needs of all students. So you can see that you know really collectively the area that we know we we need to grow in is our collaboration among educators and um I'll get into that when I talk about the goals about how how we want to go about doing that and I'm not going to read each of these goals verbatim to you

094but just overall what we want to work on doing as a division is further building that common vocabulary and language regarding inclusive practice. ices. Um, and additionally, we have we have our divisionwide goal, but we have four very unique and individual schools. Um, that also we we want to work with those schools on creating their own vision about where they want to be and what inclusion means to them and how they want to move forward with this. So, that's that's um we where we are looking to grow. Additionally, um we really want to look at being creative, acknowledging where we are and having that common planning time preserved because we believe that that's the next steps in meeting the needs of all learners and also in um providing those inclusive opportunities. So that is one

095big place that we want to go. Um, additionally, um, we want to provide more social also social. We talk about instruction all all oftent times in schools, but a lot of times for our students with disabilities, they also need that opportunity for some structured social opportunities. So, we'd like to grow in that as a division. Um and we would also like to maintain our inclusive schools committee and our ongoing uh free support and training in with JMUTAC uh to continue because we know there's always a refining process with how we deliver specially designed instruction because our students are always changing and they're all unique and they're all individual. And then also for co-eing new collaborative partnerships arise um people could teach you know a collaborative class one year and not the next. So we we

096know that that's an ongoing process. So those are the goals. Um my next steps really I don't submit the plan to the VDOE. We maintain that as a division. I I complete a survey for them and then we just proceed forward with working on the goals that I just again am so thankful for my for the committee members to help with this. Anyone any questions? >> I don't have a question but I would like to say Nelson County is so lucky to hear what you're or fortunate lucky isn't the word fortunate to hear this conversation and the goals that you've written and the process that you're going through. This is the kind of thing one would expect to hear in a very affluent, very highbrow kind of school district. And kudos >> kudos >> to

097you guys for really working hard to to hit the mark. >> And I'm super excited that collaborative planning time is in the focus. It's one of our our big >> so important and so under under um >> supported but under what's the word? implemented implemented >> under under implemented underappreciated under under misunderstood easily misunderstood how important >> and I think the key is is acknowledging that no setting is perfect and we need to work with the resources that we have. So it may not be this oh yes the every day they have the same exact planning period and they sit together that entire time and work. That's not that's not reality in many places, right? So, it's how do we foster that for what we do have and being realistic about what we do have.

098>> Well, and that's another thing that that good for Nelson County is the flexibility and the and the creativity in the in the scheduling process, the the scheduling um flexibility in the schools is just amazing to me. and you guys have really worked hard to um to make that work and to offer opportunities for teachers and kids to to engage in a number of different opportunities through some creative scheduling. So, thank you. >> I a couple questions just like in the quality indicators >> is clear and consistent vocabulary like the vocabulary that the the school uses or >> so that is one of our goals. Yes. So um we had that vision and the committee members the division level team has that common this is exactly what we mean when we say this. But what

099we really want and the only way we can move forward with really being as inclusive as possible is for the each school to be on the same page not only with each other but also then with our division vision of how to include students. >> Yeah. Yeah. >> Well, at first I didn't know if that was like whether or not the students are using a clear and consistent >> and in an ideal world. Yes, we we jumped to that too. Yes, absolutely. >> Absolutely. Okay. >> Thank you. >> Alrighty, Miss Shannon Irvin, come on up. >> Is going to talk to us about the recommended 2627 budget. >> All righty. Sam, how many of these? >> This is my 33rd, I believe. >> Nice. >> Say maybe. >> Nice. Stop it. >> Um, not allowed.

100>> My goal is to not say um 100 times tonight because I seem to have a tendency to do that in a to get to the next point. So, I apologize in advance if that happens. Thanks. [clears throat] All right. Yeah, I seem to be having something going on and my vision is a little blurry. So, I went out and printed the colored copy so I could see it up close and personal. Um, I know that several of you are new and you're getting to know me and I'm getting to know you and so I don't know if you are a cliffnotes kind of board that you'd like to just get to the chase or whether you want a learning opportunity so that we can explain a little bit about our budget and what we

101do. So, I do have a presentation that's prepared and if you would um or are you if you go to a bookstore, do you like to read the back cover to find out what the story is about and then go back and read it or or not? So, I do have a cliffnotes version if you really just want it in a nutshell. Um the presentation uh starts out um [clears throat] talking about a measure mission and fiscal responsibility. And so our commitment is to provide a highquality education that empowers every student to succeed while acting as responsible stewards of taxpayer resources. This budget reflects a strategic balance between necessary investments in our people and infrastructure and the economic realities of our community. So, our executive summary um basically irons out where we anticipate spending differences

102in the coming year. Compensation is a big issue. As you'll find out as we look at our budget, 80% of our person our budget is personnel related between salary and and benefits. Our compensation recommendation is to follow the guidance from the governor's budget and include a 2% cost of living adjustment uh to all scales all employees equally the 2% and to give a step on our salary scales which is about a half a percent um to keep them functioning as they should. Our salary scales are strictly seniority based. So one year of service is a salary and the next year you bump up basically a half a percent for most people. People that are at the end of the scale don't get those step increases. And then there are some scales like the administrative scale

103when you look at that the first 10 years or so with the same salary. So a half a percent is zero. Uh so keep that in mind as we're looking at um what we want to do with compensation uh moving forward to the board of supervisors. Health insurance, our numbers have not come in yet. We know that medical inflation is high and we also know that we have had some severe um illnesses and utilization of our health insurance plan. So, we put in an estimated 15% in our budget for health insurance. Hopefully, we can lower it if it comes in lower. Um, if not, we'll have to make some hard decisions between what we can fund and what do we pass on to the employees. So, keep that in mind. Uh, student programs, we wanted

104to implement middle school sports. There's been a group fundraising trying to get that to come to reality. They don't have enough money yet. And at the rate they're funding, it'll be several years before they can um raise enough money to be able to ready the fields, buy the uniforms, buy the bats, the balls, um and the equipment that would be needed for a middle school program. So, we did put in the budget $50,000. It's just startup money for them to get them ready to play. Um, our hope is that it will be a sustainable program moving forward and they'll be able to fund raise or through any admission fees or things that they could do on their own that it wouldn't be an ongoing necessarily um obligation of the school board. Um, and then the

105final uh pillar is to um reinstitute a VPI program at Rockfish. There is sufficient space. The program would require the hiring of a teacher and an instructional assistant. Um, we do have individuals that are working currently in Head Start that would be looking for employment that we would like to consider um in various roles within the division. Uh, but we did want to make you aware that that request is in there, but there's also state money to offset a part of it. So, the additional cost to the division for the teacher and the aid is about $36,000. The next is uh student demographics. We wanted to get you some information about the students that we serve. Um, and to take a look at our enrollment numbers. In 2016, we had 1,879 students. I can go

106back to 1993 and we had over 2400 students. So, you can see over time that there's been a uh continuous decline in student enrollment. For this year, when we did our um SRC report, we were at 1383.5. The current recommended budget from the governor, they're using a number of 1361.8. So, that's the number that we decided to build the budget on because it wasn't so far off from the budget that we would have presented to you based on our own um moving of the cohorts from grade level to grade level to grade level. Of course, the great unknown is kindergarten enrollment. Um, I could used to find kindergarten enrollment or an estimate by looking at the number of live births in Nelson County 5 years ago, but I guess through most things, technology changes and

107the way that information is shared is different. So, I don't have a really good feel for the kindergarten number. So, I used a number similar to what we had this year. um didn't want you to think that though the numbers of students um are declining that we don't take a look at our personnel needs and when I started I know we were over 400 employees and through the um loss of students we've adjusted staffing so now we're in the 280s to 290 so we we do pay attention to class sizes, we do pay attention to um program needs. So um though our regular uh student enrollments are declining, that's not necessarily the case for our disadvantaged students or our limited English proficient students. uh we are showing 760 disadvantaged students uh which is a a

108big drop from fiscal year 2024. So I don't know what impacted the wealth of the county in that period of time but we are seeing that uh those numbers did change. Our limited English proficient students have doubled in size since 2016. So we're predict we have 90 students currently that fall in that ESL category. Um, the current budget that is recommended by the governor is putting more resources in the LAP uh category which would require us more than likely to have to hire another teacher for the ESL program. Uh, we're looking at something with our grants to possibly um change a person's position that could be covered by a grant. and I would use that money to do an ESL position if we needed to. So, we wouldn't be asking for additional money from the

109county. I I think it would be using grant money differently. Um, special education students, uh, you'll see that number has stayed relatively steady over the course of time. In 2025, we have 32 students in early [clears throat] childhood special education classes. We have 266 in the K12 program for a total of 298. So those numbers seem to be increasing and those particular students um usually require additional resources so that they can access the curriculum to um be successful in academics. All right. So taking a look at the current financial landscape, our sources of funds. U the local composite index as we all know has um issued us a significant blow. Our state SOQ incentive categorical and lottery funds are down 1,194,214. Sales tax is predicted to be up 63,959. And sales tax is a estimate

110from the state. So they're not guaranteeing you the money that is in the calc tool that it will come to you. It will only come to you if they have the sales tax based on um the economic purchases. Uh we're predicting $115,692 less in federal revenue basically because we've been using carryover of funds that we haven't had to use for a number of years because we had asked for money. So now that we're using them there will be a decline in what would be in the budget. And then our other revenue of 40,690 is mostly from our food service program. um thinking that we would not have um catering services to Head Start for the coming year and hopefully we won't have any major equipment breakages. But so the total um revenue shortfall from sources

111other than the county of Nelson is 1,286,637. So that's just the revenue side. Um the consumer price index for the period of December to December came in at 2.9%. So if you look at keeping up with just inflation, you would expect our budget to go up 2.9%. So I'm happy to say that the budget that is being recommended to you is only going up 2.49%. Um so our budget relies heavily on county funding. Um as our composite index indicates that the county has a high degree of responsibility for the budget. Um the current budget has a contribution from the county of 20,518,914. Um given the numbers from the state, um federal government and local [clears throat] government and other funding, our budget deficit with the added expenses is $2,129,215. Sorry, it's getting a little bit

112jiggity. >> Yep. So, our budget in in terms of expenditures, if you you have a sheet of paper that looks like this. It has highlights on it. The numbers that I highlighted are the ones that I think are very significant to understand is that the total proposed budget including those things that we talked about with the salary increases with the health insurance increases with the added 50,000 and with the added uh VPI classroom our total expenditures would go up $842,579. $9. Um the percentage change in the budget is 2.49% which is probably as low as we could could make it. Um the deficit over there is the 2,129 215 factoring in the less revenue from other sources of 1,26 286 637. So we have a graph that shows where our recommended expenditures are going. Um

113the state has an account coding system that talks about major categories. So they have um instruction and they want you to spend at least 60% of your budget in instruction. Then there's administration. They want you to spend um 5% or so and on administration and that's basically where their um guidance ends. Nelson County is a huge county in terms of size. So transportation makes up 11.9% of our budget. So we have 474 square miles and our buses run 3,000 miles a day. Um there are some needs that we have in transportation and we'll address those a little later. Um maintenance at 9.6%. There was a time when we had new buildings and our maintenance needs weren't nearly as great as what we're experiencing now. uh thankfully for the ca for the county that we've been

114able to secure some grant funding and then the county has issued bonds to update our high school which is our biggest facility. Um taking out decades old uh plumbing fixtures and updating the electrical capacity to be able to have things uh charging in the classroom where we only had two two outlets. Um, now we can have more. Uh, we have digital signage. We have so many more electrical needs than we had before. So, uh, still thankful that we were able to get this done. Even though when you look at it, you're not going to see great things, but what's under the hood, so to speak, uh, should last you for years to come. Um, food services is only 4% of our budget and technology is 4.9% of our budget. So, our total recommended budget is

11534,636838. Um, I will say for food services, they are the only uh department that has to raise its own fund. of as much as they are able to their sales from the lunches or the reimbures for lunches pays for their programs to operate. So kudos to Miss Connell and her staff for keeping the costs down um so that it doesn't take away from the other programs in the school division. All right, this is grant has a lot of information on it. This is how our monies are spent um based on the type of expenditures in the budget. So >> am I on your right side? >> Um no go back one I think >> or Dan. >> Keep going. >> That's it. >> Yeah. Okay. >> Yeah. So the state has an account coding system

116where they u lump like expenditures. So things like salary items go to one account code at the very end. It's four digits. And we know that when we have that expense like a salary expense, it goes to those four codes. And so they have codes for salaries, fringe benefits, purchase services, internal services, utilities, communication which is telephone and postage. Insurance includes auto and general liability. Um leases is leasing equipment u to be able to um do a need for the school division. Most of the time we're uh leasing lifts so that we can get up to the light poles because we don't have anything that would take us from ground level up to the light pole safely. So we do lease those on occasion. Um travel is um travel that teachers use going between buildings.

117It could be administrators going to conferences. Um that's 114,510 and that is to reimburse them for driving their own vehicle. We used to have a couple of county cars, but due to needs of getting students to where they needed to be, they were forfeited to the transportation department for student transportation. So now we are pretty much reimbursing everyone for driving their own car. Miscellaneous is basically anything that doesn't fit anywhere else and dues and subscriptions. So us to have a subscription to Newsweek or Ed Week, they would go into that miscellaneous category. Materials and supplies, uh that would be classroom supplies, that would be maintenance repair parts, that would be food for the nutrition program. Um so there are a lot of things that are folded into there. software licenses. You'll see that that has

118grown a lot in our budget as you compare it to past years. Um there are a lot of new uh programs that the state has rolled out as part of their all-in programs where um researchbased programs that have high academic impact like Zern or I know that we use egeneuity and these were things that we didn't use a few years ago. So they have been added and highly increased our budget there. Non-c capitalized hardware that would be Chromebooks or anything less than um a $5,000 uh threshold for capitalization. Um joint operations they are our partnerships that we have with um PREP primarily. Um, so we also have some other grants that we're participating in for special ed and those fees go into the jo the joint operations category. Capital outlay replacements 852,000 that's primarily vehicles.

119We have in the budget four vehicles coming out of um the operational budget and one out of 6B if we used our carryover funding. Um if we use the 6B money, it has to be a special education bus. It can't be a regular bus because it has to have special um accutraments. um cap capital outlay additions that would be any kind of new technology or new item that we don't currently have. For example, if we needed an assistive hearing device and we don't already have one, it would go into the capital outlay additions category. Uh fund transfer, that is the transfer of local and state funds into our textbook account. the textbook account and the cafeteria funds are the only funds outside of the general operational budget that we manage and the cafeteria fund rolls

120over year to year to year and so does the textbook funds year to year to year. So we we monitor those because we have to look at the adoption cycles for textbooks because currently the books are very very expensive and it takes years to accumulate enough money to do an adoption. So, um, those monies would be deposited into our textbook fund. All right. And as I was looking at what our priority should be, I thought we're a school system and our priority number one has to be students. And so, I put our first priority as startup money for Nelson Middle School sports. And why did I think that was important? Uh research consist consistently links participation in athletics to improved attendance, behavior, and academic performance. Students who feel connected to school are more likely to

121succeed in the classroom. It expands access and equity. Additional funding helps ensure that all students, regardless of family income, can participate. It supports transportation, equipment, uniforms, officials, and coaching stipens. So, that's what those monies would be used for. Um, middle school is a critical time to build lifelong habits of physical activity. I didn't always pay attention to that, so [laughter] I've got some catching up to do. Anyway, um before we needed to look at anything else, I did feel that the need to uh look at the middle school sports program knowing that they are trying to raise funds to get it moving. But, you know, it may take three or four more years before they have enough money to do everything to get enough money to get it started. So, we did put it in

122there as my well, it was my first priority. I will say that I don't I think Dr. Hester agreed maybe. >> Yeah. And I would say that particularly with the middle school, this is born out of several conversations with community. Um it was brought up at a town, not a town hall, but another community meeting about mental health, but it was brought up about, you know, what are we doing to expand our youth opportunities in sports? um it's it's brought about from wanting to provide access and inclusion for more opportunities for our rural uh students. But you know, there's another piece to that. It also provides a pathway of success for our teams that we already have established at the high school level. So by exposing students to the knowledge and the skill based at

123younger ages, they're able to be more successful and safer in how they compete and a better quality of um of an experience. So I I I am particularly partial to the experience of athletes. Um I would not be here today if it weren't for my opportunities that started at four. Um, and so I believe wholeheartedly in this, and that's been a conversation that we've had with community members is I believe in the value of this, but you know, we want to expand it. We want to be able to do this. It it's just building on top of what we're doing and we want to be able to do that, but you know, obviously when we're working with budgets, we want to be able to be mindful of how we do it. But I I believe

124in the value that it offers um our schools, but our students and our community overall. I guess I had a question about where the like what current offerings from Nelson County Parks and Wreck are there for middle school age students and where kind of is the overlap with the middle school sports? Um, you know, I I don't I don't know what the answer is for that, but I'm I'm interested. >> I feel like they may have separated Did they separate soccer teams this year or maybe basketball teams? So they they have soccer, cheerleading, um flag football, basketball, um >> and I I I that's coming to mind. And so I think they're looking to find ways to bolster. We also have a pretty healthy um travel soccer program in the county. Um [clears throat] so

125there are opportunities, but I think once upon a time we had baseball. >> Yeah. [clears throat] Yeah, >> I'm I love the idea of middle school sports and my son's going into sixth grade next year and I think that's a it's a great especially building the pipeline of you know the the high school sports. I'm just curious where like is there a service that parks and wreck is offering now that will like will middle school sports either pull people away from those or you know I'm I'm just kind of curious what what that >> I think we do have a gap and and maybe Miss McGary can can chime in sorry if you can call in but I don't think that we have any volleyball for female sports or any softball for females so I

126like the idea of this that it may be more inclusive Middle school volleyball volleyball. I did. Thank you. I knew I was missing one. Um but I I think we hear a lot from our softball uh I I'll be honest like from the beginning it was our softball parents really bringing this. They're on travel ball teams um having to travel a great distance and we're hearing like Cove, you know, Cove Creek for baseball and Cove Creek has all this and our kids have to go to either Cove Creek or Amherst to be able to participate. So, I I think being able to, like you said, bring those opportunities to the middle school and then hopefully that helps um generate that interest at even younger ages. I think I will say that that sometimes the struggles

127that we have nowadays are getting the adults um to be the sponsors of those sports um at the very young ages. Um and then even as we go through um it's some it's hard. Everybody's pulled in different directions. So making sure that we have good positive role model adults to be able to consistently commit their time and I think we we feel like we have the interest of our students but also being able to maintain that interest and I [clears throat] think we have good solid facilities to use and a commitment from community member to be able to say I can help you with more space um to be able to use. So this has been a conversation a year and a half to probably two two and a half years in the making to

128get to this point to see how what are our what what is the interest? What are the needs? What are what do we have? What are our resources and moving forward? >> And then is there any like transportation provided for after school programs at this point or is there anticipated transportation needs for that? There would be >> that that's folded into >> what we are assessing our needs. Um I think um Mr. Ashley I mean I I think >> those have been considered. We would know space and um we would need to have some transportation. We already do activity buses >> um from our our um >> high school and middle school campuses for activities >> kind of be folded in like the sports will be folded into that activity bus kind of >> our

129our remediation students um that's that's a multi-purpose activity bus if you will. >> Okay. >> Yeah. But some of those practices may not be on our campus. You know sometimes even currently at high school level we have it at Ty River or Heritage Center or different we use different spaces. So really kind of calculating that into our expenditures. >> Would you anticipate that like do high school students currently like pay an activity fee or anything to participate in sports? >> Not for sports. No, it's not a payto-play >> um uh structure and and we are seeing that in other states and other areas, but we still maintain like we want to have that access to all of our students and not not have them be able to participate in the sport because their their family

130can't afford it. That we want to make sure that >> could we get any money out of the homeschool students? Maybe >> I think so that's a bigger conversation because we participate and are a part of the VHSL. >> I'm sure. Um so that's a a a separate conversation. >> Yeah. >> Our second priority [clears throat] um was our staff and investing in our human capital. Uh why 2%? One is that it is what was included in the governor's budget. But we also know that employees have gone to the grocery store, paid their electric bill, paid their house insurance, and we know their costs are going up. Um they have less discretionary money, so we're trying to give a little bit of that back um so that they can meet their needs. surrounding counties are

131also offering uh or hoping to offer competitive adjustments and we've got to um maintain the pace so that we can u maintain the good quality staff that we have. Um the step increase on the scale is sometimes a bit of a dilemma because when we give a uh 2% raise to set to to folks and then they're do a a step on the scale, they're getting their 2% plus the step. But you need the scale and you need the steps to give credit where credit is due for experience and the quality of an experienced teacher versus a brand new teacher is very very different. So um we want to honor that scale but we also need to make sure that all of our SOQ positions are given two 2%. So if we gave one and

132a half% and then a half a percent on the scale and some people didn't get that step then we're not giving them the 2% that the government. So it is an ongoing issue that we have um because we do have the seniority based steps. Um and again overall employee groups it's about a half a percent. Um let's see where you are this slide. Several um boards ago the school board came up with a target group of counties or cities that they wanted to be in the uh comparison model of. So, our goal was to be the 25th in the state at all levels of the of the scale. The VA does a good job of combining everyone's information across the state and they put out a report every January and so they uh rank localities

133based on how much they pay teachers at different levels. So, at zero years of experience, that's a brand new teacher coming right out of college. Uh Charlottesville in this case is the and our target group is the um frontr runner where they offer 58,232. Alber is next. Um they offer 57449 and we're the third one in our target group assuming that these localities are the ones that you still want us to compare to. So the comparisons are Charlottesville, Alberall, Buckingham, Amoris, Wesboro, and Augusta and Rockbridge I think is on the end. The ones at each at each level. So at 0, 5, 10, and they top out at 30. Um I have the salaries in that chart for you to review. And the number under them is their rank in the state. I highlighted the

134one that was the leader in our target group with green and their ranking is ninth for Charlottesville. And then I also highlighted in red the one that is the least um aggressive in our group. And then I did the same for master supplements. So you'll see where Charlottesville does very very well on their salary scale. They don't put as much value in a master's degree as other localities. So the low was Charlottesville at 2316 and the high was Amoris at 430. [snorts] So just interesting information and and if you review those counties, if you would like for me to change the target group to include a different locality, just let me know and I can work those numbers up. Um I would say this is something that every division, every superintendent, every financial person is

135doing. We're constantly creating and evaluating, comparing and contrasting not only teacher salaries but classify all all these other classifications. And this is a constant evaluation in order so we can continue to be competitive um as you know we can explain why that competition is so necessary because of where we're located. From a a competition standpoint, from a staffing, [clears throat] are these the communities that we still compete against more than others or there other communities that we need to add in? >> I believe it's a valid group grouping. >> I know that we lose folks mostly to Abber, Charlottesville. We gain um some from Ammeris, but some go back to Ammerst because they live there and they want to be on their kids' calendar and there other reasons, but um >> we do from Lynchburg

136quite frequent. >> Okay. >> I think I think to make it relative, I I don't speak for the rest of the board, but I think it's what we're trying to do is compare to the people that could potentially pull staff from us. So, if that's somebody, then let's add it. Let's add it in. >> I agree. I mean I it seems like city of Lynchburg might even be a more relevant comparison than Rockbridge at this point if Rockbridge >> and I think even um Miss Ch who is like a primary point of contact in terms of recruiting because we put our sign out as I had in that presentation we put our sign out about what we pay particularly our beginning and that's what you know like they're they're recruiting but they're also scouting you

137know as they go around to these different groups to understand like what the other offers are and so she is very super sleuth when it comes to really understanding and like where we're getting our our employees from and where we can um really pull >> right so I guess for a history lesson when I started in 1993 when we were looking at where we were at various stagees we were in the 120s 130s and so over the course of time through cooperation with our county board u we've been able to make significant ificant improvements. In fact, um before we could get to where we wanted to be, we made a strategic decision to frontload our beginning teacher scale. And that was because we had a large number of people getting ready to exit the the

138workforce and we needed to replace them. And so we needed to be attractive enough for them to drive because Nelson County does not have enough teachers, licensed teachers to step into the classroom that folks have to drive from other localities from Lynchburg or Ammeris or Charlottesville to teach here. And so we really put a lot of emphasis towards the beginning of the scale to try to get folks here because we thought that once they come here and they realize what a great place it will be that they would stay with us and it worked. So we we've been able to fill our classrooms and we've been in a much better shape than some other counties trying to find uh teachers in this environment. We um are pulling back a bit from our beginning teacher scale

139because we had gotten so far ahead at the beginning of the scale and so far below at the end of the scale that the last couple years we have differentiated pay based on where you were on the scale. Um you'll see that Nelson at zero years we're 16th in the state. you know, that's much better than 25 where we want to be. Um, at five years we're at 18 and at 10 years we're almost there. We're at we got 26, but you'll see that we're still behind at years 15, 20, 25, and 30. Um, we're a little better at year 30 because we at part of our differentiation was to reward the most experienced teachers that had hung in hung in there with us. but also realizing that those that are on plan one or

140plan two for VRS, their lifetime income behind us or beyond us is affected by the highest three years of salary. So that's why that number dropped from 59 to 37 is that we want to help those folks after they leave us and to thank them for the work that they've done for us. uh French benefits. That's often the overlooked part of employees compensation packages. People think about their paycheck and their take-home pay, but they don't realize how much employers have to pay beyond just the salaries. Um we know that medical inflation is high, but we also know that we have had um an excess utilization. And so we are predicting the 15% increase in um health insurance for the coming year. We know what the cost probably will be, but we don't know how we

141would split that up. So we anticipated the 15% rate hike that was on the employer portion, the employee portion would also go up 15%. So, if our insurance came in at like 10 or 12%, maybe we could take some of that 3% over and pay it on the employee side. Um, health insurance is something that young people especially don't appreciate, but as you get older and as life throws you curves, insurance is probably the most important benefit that we offer. All right. Um, the impact on support staff. So, the backbone of our school division is our support staff. Our custodians, our bus drivers, and our cafeteria workers are the backbones of our schools. They're often the most sensitive to inflation. This is a reality check. Miss Powell and I were talking about this earlier that

142for a staff member earning $25,000 a year, a 2% cost of living adjustment is $500 a year. So that's modest but critical um to retain folks in a tight labor market. But if their family plan goes up the whole 15% with no subsidy, their take-home pay would go down $10,683.76. So, uh we are proposing that the um Nelson County Public Schools absorbs as much of this increase as possible. And again, if we pass the full 15% on to our employees, it would fully negate any raise they would get. That's all doom and gloom stuff. So, let's talk about some good things that have happened. So, in the governor's budget, they uh did include the rates that were uh approved by the VRS board for plan one and plan two. um members. And the the people

143that are in plan one and plan two are your professional staff, which is your teachers, your administrators, your instructional assistants, and your um secretaries. Um we have a non um professional group that consists of maintenance employees, custodians, bus drivers, and mechanics. Uh so they're in a whole different um program than what um our plan one folks are. But plan one and plan two uh retirement expenses will go down 312,81909 for the coming year. Um that's because the rate went from 14.2% down to 12.2%. Um rate changes for the retirey health insurance credit is also going to save us 29,83680 due to a decrease and a reduction in the group life insurance rate will save us 14,64219. So the total plan savings in plan one and plan two are 356,79808. So plan one were is for

144those employees that were hired prior to July 1st of 2010. And then they had a little window of people that were hired between uh July 1 of uh 2010 through December 31st of 2013. And then anyone hired after um 123113, they're part of a hybrid retirement program. A hybrid is a part defined benefit and a part defined contribution. So part of their premiums go to guaranteed income. The other part goes to whatever investment earnings they can get based on their choices. There was auto escalation that took place on January um where January 30th payroll that increased our cost by half a percent. There's also um employer matching requirements if they change their the level of contributions that they have. So when I built the budget, I looked at each person that was a hybrid member

145at the levels that they were contributing after the uh autoes escalation took place and calculated what that would be. For any person or position that has yet to be filled, I'm assuming that they're going to invest um the full 4% where we would match it with three and a half%. So the rates there are are calculated so that our increase would be 92,16309 for retirement costs. And then the local disability program which provides income guaranteed should someone be um unable to work u would go up 13,3704. So the hybrid plan is actually going up 105,000 um 53313. >> And I think it's important to note like this is a moving target. This is one of those complicated aspects that like in order to constantly because you don't know you don't know what someone coming who

146you're hiring, you could hire a new teacher who's hybrid. You could hire a veteran who's on the plan one. So it's a it's a constant moving target that it's tough to always plan for. So trying to be um really thoughtful about how it can impact us. >> Thanks. >> All right. So these were the actually rates that um changed. The VRS rate went um to 12.2, the retirey income health insurance credit. 888% group life insurance at 1.06. That's the the professional group. For the non-professional group, the rates are different. uh 4.92 1.98 1.06 um the hybrid plans are different rated um BRS at 15.7 over in group one and I can't read that and my thing is cut off here so if you could >> 15.7 >> for the hybrid plans under the 55562 group

147>> 5562 for the h uh plan hybrid so VRS 8.42% 42% um RHIC 1.98% GLIP 1.06 and VLDB 79%. >> Yeah, thank you. >> So those rates have been calculated into the budget uh to take advantage of the net savings between the the two. All right. talk a little bit about our utility. And you'll see these slides and you'll see where each entity has um indicated that we will have increases for the coming year. The co-op at 7.7 the um heat heating oil and propane they want us to have a buffer of 8%. water uh uh increases. And I'm not increasing our utility budget primarily because the high school will be not operating or the middle school this summer. So, we should have a a buffer of a month. But keep in mind next year

148when you're building your budget, really look hard at utilities to estimate what that year will be. I think we're okay for this year, but maybe not the following. Um this is a picture of the high school just as an example. And this was even using uh fiscal year 25 information that we spent $197,589 for electricity just for the high school. Um, you can see how increases will affect the budget because we use a lot of electricity, especially at that place. And if we have more outlets, chances are people are going to be plugging stuff in them. [laughter] So, all right. Um, little information about the other buildings. Um, a lot of people talk about new schools, but just to give you the statistics, Tai River was built in 1995, and there's been no major systemic

149renovations done, but we have done some things along the way. So, we had to replace the windows um probably in the mid uh 20s, 201 u because they were installed backwards from the installation. So, they were leaking and water was getting up underneath them and saturating the sheetrock. So, we had to replace windows. We have replaced the roof one time. Um, and we did the shingled roof at a different time than the rubber roofs that are over the flat portions, but the shingled roof has been done one time. But again, the school is now u 31 years old. So, chances are you'll have to do another roof replacement um not too long in the future. Rockfish opened in 1999. Um, that has only had the shingle roof replaced, right? That has not had the membrane.

150>> The membrane >> that you did the membrane, too. Okay. So, you should have just a little bit more time on that situation than you would at Tai River. But that doesn't always mean that that's the case because the wind at Rockfish, if you go over into some of those fields, it will knock you down sometimes. So that roof gets a lot more wear and tear than the Tai River, more than likely. Um, high school and middle schools, there are different iterations of the building. There was a 60 uh it was opened in 55. There was an addition in 63, an addition in 74, and then an addition and the construction of the middle school in 2003. Uh thankfully, you know, again, with support of the board of supervisors and some grant funds, we've been

151able to do a lot of the, you know, under the under the ceiling, but under the floor as well. that kind of work that um you don't necessarily see but is so necessary with plumbing and electrical um needs fuel in the fleet. Again, uh Nelson County covers 474 square miles and our buses travel 3,000 miles daily. Diesel prices fluctuate. We're currently spending around 275 a gallon. Every penny increases in diesel cost us $540 annually. Thus, if the price of diesel rises to $3 a gallon, we'd expect the expenses to increase 135. You know, that's a hard number to um put your hat on because if we have a major hurricane or some um foreign crisis that impacts the cost of oil and uh you know, we can only go with what we know. And so,

152um we we think we have enough in the budget, but if things go haywire, you know, we have to watch that closely. Mhm. In terms of our bus fleet, um the Virginia Department of Education you utilizes a dual standard guideline for school bus retirement. A bus is typically recommended for replacement when it meets either of the following. The age 15 years of service or the mileage of 200,000 miles. Um, you'll see those buses that are in kind of a pink. Those are the buses that we would identify that need to be taken out of service based on the guidelines from the Department of Education. We do have four buses that we ordered um last spring that should be coming in by the end of the month. Um that will, you know, help us take some

153of those off of this list. Um and we do have in the budget for four additional ones to take some more off of this list, but again, there will still be many others that need to be replaced, but we'll just have to chip away at it a little at a time. BPI expansion. Um the Virginia preschool initiative provides state funds to schools to provide quality preschool education for at risk four year olds. Um we know that Head Start is um leaving at the end of this year and they currently have um a list of students that are in the 4-year-old program that we hope are going to transition directly into the VPI program if they still meet the criteria of enrollment for VPI. Um it though the cost to add the teacher and add the

154aid again was um what $170ome,000. The offset from the might have been $130 some thousand. Sorry. The offset from the state to pay for that the additional cost to the county is $36,000. So, just keep that in mind that it's 36 is a lot of money, but it's not nearly the cost full cost of adding a whole program. Um, now here it is. After state reimbursement of 101,859, which is included in our estimated revenue. So, if we didn't do this, we'd have to take 108,000 101,859 out of the expected revenues for next year. um after the revenue is subtracted from the expense, it's only 34,46 and those applications for VPI programs have been advertised and put out there and we are getting I think over 30 so far um that have have put in their

155applications. So, we're confident that we have the uh interest in it. Um and that's just to make sure that we're bringing it back at both schools. is VPI just for four year olds or is it three and four? >> It could be four three year olds. Um we could have more classes if we had um the state has allotted us 38 slots and then you can go in and make a case for why you want more. But with having only two classes, we would be filled up with what we had with four year olds. But at a future date, if the state say if we can make a case that we want three year olds, we could do that and possibly have more state funding. >> And that was what I was referring to is

156our our goal, our our vision is to be able to look to expand because we believe in the value of it. >> Okay. So, the budget requests summary um of what makes up our 842,579 is compensation for staff of 477,363. Health insurance at 15% is 575,670. um fringe benefits overall other than health insurance uh would be going down due to the rate uh differences from VRS of 251,264 um adding the VPI teacher and assistant but again the offset to that is in revenue in revenue. uh middle school sports, we had we put in $50,000 just as a startup to get them up and running again, hoping that they can take it over um as they raise funds. And then other decreases um and expenditures are that grant funds, you know, what we have available in

157grant funds, we have expenditures to offset. So, where our grant funds are going down, we are taking um those expenses that were covered by the grants out of the budget because they were strictly grant funded. Um and there were some other miscellaneous adjustments. I know I did something with postage because we are relying more and more on email and scanning and emailing. Um so, we're not using as much postage as we used to. So there's a little bit that mix up that other than grants, but the total increase um to the budget that makes up the 2.49% is 842579. So if the requests aren't funding, what does it mean? Um it could mean staff turnover, effective pay cut for staff due to in insurance and inflation. will probably lead to resignations because people just can't

158afford to commute or they need to look elsewhere um to to earn more money. Um if we don't fund the um wait the VPI classrooms, we'll have 18 families that would be turned away from VPI preschool services if we only have the one class at Ty River. Um I wish I could see it. >> Operational cuts. We will um have to really evaluate raid the instructional supply budget. Um we do quite frequently do audits of >> materials or things that we're using. But that may come down to rather than um hey, we just don't use these as much that we may use these but this is an area we're going to have to cut in order to create more space to fund the the other items. Right. So, board discussion questions based on the information

159that's been provided. Um, first one is, does the absorption of the health insurance align with our longterm retention goals? Number two, is the makeup of the target group um for salary comparison still valid? Do we still want to try to be at the 25th level um across the state for teacher salaries? And the third is should we give differentiated um pay increases between steps or between employee groups? For example, should support staff have a higher increase than um other other groups? Um, next question is, is the VPI expans expansion a priority um for the board now that Head Start would no longer be available? And then, can we afford to add the middle school sports programs when we have such a loss of state funds? So, those were the closing questions I had for you.

160And so now if I could answer any questions from you be happy to try to >> this is a lot to absorb um and I think requires really careful you know thoughtful process on it and one of the good things when we have our work session as we move into that that gives you an [clears throat] opportunity to really take a look at this and think through um and provide that feedback and and considerations for Thanks, >> Sam. That's amazing. I mean, you do an incredible job year to year to year. 30 three years, you've perfected it. >> This is very clear in [laughter] >> Well, you could you could print it. >> Are there any questions for Shannon specific to this? Um, I mean I guess you know just the middle school sports question

161is kind of relevant. You know, not that obviously I love middle school sports but that is a fair question of you know is it necessary or not? I think if we're looking at middle school sports versus um health insurance, middle school sports goes and and that's just the brutal truth that and that's something that you will also have to weigh in on that. But if you're my my opinion is our primary role is to instruct our students and provide the safe and secure environments. Those are our primary roles. And yes, I want my middle school sports to be able to develop, but our primary focus is as it starts out with our student outcomes in our instruction and those programs um supporting our staff. Um we don't get those student outcomes if we don't have

162the high quality staff um to be able to support that. So when we take a look at our budget, and I've talked about this before, it it is we are building a budget for success and it is based off of our needs. And so 80% is compensation. That's because at the heart of it all, those individuals are going to drive the student outcomes and we have got to really have a commitment to being able to support that. Um I had a conversation you know you don't want just anybody in front of your child like this is someone that you are entrusting for you know seven plus hours of the day depending on the level and you really want the best possible individuals to be in front of them and we also know that retention and

163sustainability um leads to higher outcomes. when there is um turnover, it impacts outcomes. I you know I've heard a lot from families about the importance of the middle school program and I don't think there's any question we like that but but at the end of the day budget time is very tough and it's very tight and we have to take care of the people and the things that are here right now and and to do that it's got to be I think pay compensation benefits have to be prioritized for those people because you're exactly right they're the ones that drive the student outcomes if we can't take care of um we can't do the kids. >> Is there like a for the health insurance premiums? Is is that like calculated based upon like their like

164assessed risk of like our group of teachers? Is is that the premium increase or is it just an across the board premium increase for all of their customers? Yeah, we are part of a local um statewide insurance pool called the local choice. And so they do a bit of rating of the group with other like groups, but then there is a portion based on your own experience um in terms of how they calculate what the rates will be. Mhm. >> Um sometimes our costs go up a little bit because other districts are experiencing um some of the the highs and sometimes um we get the benefit when our expenses are high and theirs are low that it's offset for our expenses. >> So we don't have those numbers yet. Um, we were hoping to get

165them by the end of January, but it's a little late and [clears throat] providing well, they're not. They're usually always February, so we were hoping. Um, hopefully by the 19th we'll have them and so then you can see what the budget will be. >> Any other questions for Mrs. Irvin or Dr. Hester? Well done, Shannon. Great job. You make it simple so we can understand it. >> Okay, we are down to items for action, you all. And I know we're we're in the marathon again, but we're we're closing in. Um I are there any questions in regards to a couple of the field trips? We have the first one being the out ofstate field trip for BRVGS students to Washington DC. So not the first time they do this trip generally. Um, what are the

166required trips for BRBGS? >> Any questions about that? May I have a motion to approve the out ofstate field trip request for BRBGS to DC on March 5th, 2026? [clears throat] >> I'd like to offer a motion that we approve the out ofstate field trip request for BRBGS uh to Washington DC on March 5th of this year. May >> I have a second? >> Second. Okay. >> All those in favor? >> I. Anyone oppose? Anyone abstain? Okay, field trip is approved. Second field trip we got is again a tag student field trip out of state to the Washington Holocaust Museum on March 2nd. Any questions? Again, this trip is not it's not the first time they've done that. So, any questions in regards to the trip? >> What is tag? >> Talented and talented. >>

167Okay. >> Yep. Um I believe this may have been a trip that was scheduled earlier in the year, but we had a shutdown and some other things going on. I believe this is the one that we reschedled. Am I right? Yeah. There were some some things that we didn't feel comfortable with taking our kids to DC at the time. >> Is it is it an overnight trip or just to >> DC >> day trip? >> Yeah. >> Out of state. >> Sure. >> So, we approve any out of state. >> I make a motion to approve the tag trip to the Holocaust Museum on March 30 or second. >> May I have a second? >> Second. All those in favor? >> Anyone opposed? Any obstinations? Okay. Field trip approved. Um, so now we have the

168submission of the budget workbook for the school improvement grant application that was discussed earlier. We had some question time there, but any other last minute questions before we ask for a motion? If not, may I have a motion to approve this submission? I move that we approve the budget submission. Where is it? And so this is just for Die River. >> Yes, this is a part of the TSI they the presentation they give. Yeah, this is part of that grant or yes, the grant that they're applying attached to the TSI for >> So that would just be type of >> I move that we approve the submission of the budget workbook for the school improvement grant application. >> May I have a second? >> Second. >> All those in favor? >> I. >> Anyone opposed?

169Anyone abstain? Your green is approved. Way to go. Okay. Now, we need a motion to go into close session, please. We'll need that motion for personnel matters, student matters, and legal counsel. >> I move that the Nelson County School Board enter into close session for the purpose of discussing personnel matters, including employment assignments, appointments, performance, resignations, or retirements, as well as the performance of central office employees, and professional personnel in accordance with section 2.2-3711A1 2-3711A1 of the Code of Virginia for discussing matters related to student discipline investigation in accordance to section 2.2-3711A2 of the code of Virginia and for discussing legal matters related to personnel student and school board's legal authority requiring the provision of legal advice to schoolboard counsel in accordance with section 2.2-3711A7 of the code of Virginia. >> May I have a

170second? >> Second. All those in favor say I. I. >> Anyone opposed? Anyone abstain? We are now in close session. [music] >> [music]