NCPS - Regular School Board Meeting - April 10, 2025

001Heat [Music] up here. [Music] Heat. [Music] Heat. Hey, hey, hey. [Music] Heat. [Music] [Applause] [Music] Very enjoying. the um April 10th, 2025 regular school board meeting to order. Um will the assistant principles lead us in this pledge? I aliance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible with liberty and justice for all. Perfect. Thank you so much. Now I will entertain a motion to approve the agenda. I move we approve the agenda as presented. Second. All in favor? Thank you very much. The agenda is approved. Uh now we are going to go into the recognitions and presentations. All right. Dr. I was getting a little nervous. Okay. All right. So the first up for our recognitions is going to be the

002VSBA student art contest winner. So slowly don't get too comfortable. All right. And also while we do that, can we have that uh slide come up for me, please? Perfect. All right. So, um we're recognizing Khloe Hernandez today uh for being the VSBA reg or central region uh art contest winner for the middle school level. And uh VSBA wants to say congratulations. Um, one of the perks of this honor is her artwork, which you see right here, um, will be hanging in the office for VSBA for the next year. Additionally, which is new this year is Khloe's artwork is automatically entered into the statewide competition uh with the winners at each of the elementary, middle, and high school being um honored guests at the annual convention which will take place in Williamsburg in November along

003with I believe a thousand uh awards. So that's pretty exciting that you have that. Um, one of the things I just wanted to talk a little bit about this, does this particular piece have a name? Like, does the fish have a name? Uh, it's a mandarin. It's it's a mandarin picture. Okay, there's enough. So, for this assignment, students selected a colorful exotic animal and then drew it on a Bristol board. They used a technique of poalism, which uses Staedler pens as a medium. Poalism is done with tiny dots of color, sometimes combined with their complimentary color set and at other times three shades of the same color. So students had uh the opportunity to study color theory and then figure out which pens they wanted to use. So was there any particular reason why you

004chose that little guy? No. No, you just like it. It ended up beautiful and we want to say congratulations to you. you get this um this certificate from the uh Virginia School Board Association or the VSBA and also able to be recognized in front of everyone and we're going to be pretty excited to see how far you can go uh for the statewide competition. So, congratulations and we're going to smile at this nice lady and then mom, you'll have a chance to take a picture. Thank you. Ready? Wait, let's scoot over. Let's take two steps to the right. One more. There you go. Miss Davis. Oh, yeah. Sure. Davis is her teacher, so we want we don't want to leave her out. Turn my phone off and be respectful. So, I'm sorry. Good job, that

005is amazing. She's drawing it. Just going to draw a picture. Sorry. I'm going to move on. So, I tend to I'm old school. I like to get close-ups. The kids hate it when I do that. And by the way, just to let you all know, that took her three weeks. Wow. It's probably over a million dots. Congratulations, that I'm an artist by trade as well and I studied fine arts all through high school in the college and became a master of what I do and I'm very proud of that work. I'm famous myself. All right. All right. So, next up we're going to recognize our uh pair of professionals. So, um, every year, um, throughout the nation, there's a day set aside to recognize our pair professionals. And these are individuals, um, we we refer

006to them quite frequently as like instructional assistants. Uh, they can also be some of our behavioral support assistants or in school suspension supervisors, but these are um, it it's probably cliche, but it does perfectly reflect what these individuals do. They are the unsung heroes within our buildings. They are the individuals that when we need, you know, a substitute doesn't show up, we need to pull them from working um so closely and individually with our students and we need them to go supervise some other things or they are some of the most flexible individuals. One second they're helping with math, the next second they're helping with reading and the next they are um really making a connection with our students and getting up and walking around the building before um behaviors escalate or things just go

007sideways. So, we really want to say thank you so much because these are the individuals that really help make the entire classroom, school, division run and and they are some among, you know, a lot of our individuals that are important, but you know, they they're not always on that front line. Um, and they are behind the scenes getting all of these things done. So, bear with me. We have a few of these uh these individuals. Um, but I really wanted to make sure that we took an opportunity to recognize them. So, if I call your name, please come up and get your certificates. All right. This nice lady over here is going to take your picture. I know everybody loves that part, but this is our way of saying thank you so much. So, the

008first person um I will say this, this a Thursday night right before spring break. We've got a million things going on throughout the county. Um so, there are a lot of people who may not have been able to make it this evening. We have um a play going on. We have a whole bunch of things going on. So, Summit isn't here. More than likely it's because they are super busy doing some other things. So, Miss Ashley Austin, is Ashley able to make it? No. Tanya Bod Bodec. Oh my gosh, how do I do that wrong? So, what that certificate says is thank you for your service and dedication to our schools in honor of Parrofessional Appreciation Day, which was April 2nd. So, congratulations. Thank you so much for what you do for our students, schools,

009and communities. So, we're going to get this picture right. Oh, yeah. You can't give it away yet. Yeah, that's yours. You want to get one? Good. Okay. All right. Good. Congratulations. Thank you so much. Appreciate it. S. Was S Campbell able to make it? So, Sannah is also at our high school. Peggy B. Sabore. Peggy. Nope. Not able to make it today. Okay. Cynthia Harper. I did not see her. Okay. Crystal Phillips. Nope. Okay. Crystal Phillips, who's a instructional assistant at our high school. Lori Banks. Lori Banks is new to us, came in to take over working with a lot of our students, being able to supervise, particularly some of our online um students. Shirley Goulby. Shirley serves as our inschool suspension supervisor at the high school. So, we want to say thank you to

010Auburn High School. Give me one second. How many Okay. For our middle school, I'd like to recognize Laura Combmes. Was Laura able to make it today? No. Okay. Jennifer Derky. Jennifer Derky is an instructional assistant at the middle school. Sierra Miller. Sierra Miller. No. And also Chris Dowy. Chris Dowy serves in in school suspension supervisor. I would imagine Chris Dowy right now. He's also our baseball coach. So he's wearing multiple hats, playing multiple roles. So, thank you so much for our middle school pair of professionals. For Rockfish River Elementary School, we have a behavioral support assistant, Angie Campbell. Angie, nope. Not able to make it today. Jennifer Klein. Jennifer Klein is an instructional assistant at Rockfish. Megan Eckles. Megan Eckles able to make it? Nope. Kelsey Gaines. Kelsey Gaines. Hope Hurst. Okay. Carrie Shoemaker, Stephanie

011Tati, Jennifer Lane, Emily Martin, and Naomi Saunders. Naomi Saunders, that's those are instructional assistants for uh Rockfish River Elementary. And for Ty River, Ty River Elementary School, we have Susie uh Blue, Marie Fitch, Rhonda Harvey, April Simpson, Kelly Woodson, Dana Bryant, Regina Campbell, Melanie Marshall, Patty Morham, Jessica Tomlin, Jessica Tyrie, Melissa Watson, and Jessica Massie. So, as I mentioned, all these individuals are s super busy throughout the day, rarely getting those breaks, but they're also super busy in the evening. So, we want to say thank you very much to our Tai River uh instructor All right. And all of our instructional assistants. Okay. We got two more groups that we're going to recognize. The next uh group, well, no, three more actually. The next group, and I know I I think we were struggling getting

012everybody out here today. Um is our librarians. April 4th was um school librarian day. So, we want to say thank you to these individuals. I think once upon a time we associated our librarians with just our traditional hardcore books, but they have now transitioned into our they are also our media resource specialist and they deal quite frequently with supporting our students with technology as well as um digital literacy and really supporting in all aspects. So, we want to say thank you to Tracy Clark who is our uh high school librarian and she was not able to make it this evening. Beth Price is our middle school librarian. We want to say thank you to Heather Herrick who is new to us and serving at Rockfish River Elementary School. And last but certainly not least, Miss

013Misty Ferguson, who is our Thai River librarian. So, we want to say thank you very much to all of our librarians. This week has been um a week that has been dedicated to another uh group of um individuals who work within our buildings that also sometimes um they're the the voice that has to call sometimes um to deliver some some news that is usually you um not always great but more and more they're able to be um positive influences in our students because they work so closely. And these are our assistant uh principles. Um we uh no longer really refer to these individuals as vice principles because that only suggests the discipline piece, but these are also individuals who are um directly related to our instructional support um being able to have more of that

014uh transformational leadership roles and their uh development and becoming principles. So we want to be able to recognize all of our assistant principles here in Nelson County. So, first up, we will recognize someone who is new to us, and that is Miss Amy Po Dexter, assistant principal at the high school. You get to hold back and then I think [Music] you're congratulations Miss Michelle Golf Michelle Gant principal at the high school. So congratulations and thank you for your service as our assistant principal as well as Okay. Congratulations Um, unfortunately I don't think Mr. Mackul Oh, yes. He's standing right in front of me. Mr. Mulowitch, please join us up here. Rob Mulowitch, he is our assistant principal. There you go. All right. You're a big guy right there. Congratulations. Thank you so much. for Rockfish

015River Elementary School. Colobby Lopez. Y. Oh, sorry. You were tasked with getting that. Okay. Sorry. Sorry. Sorry. Sorry. [Music] All right. Col's playing double duty tonight. There's a play going on. She needs to suggest it as well. Um, last but not least, uh, Mr. Brandon Garrett over at Tai River Elementary School. Congratulations. Here you go. Oh, a little taller. Congratulations. Now for our uh final category of recognitions and these are our one Nelson awards. And for those of you who are maybe new to us this evening or have forgotten what our one Nelson award uh is, it is um an award that is based off of nominations and it goes to celebrate individuals who portray what I like to say one Nelson mentality and that's we recognize that it takes everybody to be uh a

016part of the success of our students in our schools. And so um everybody does little parts in order to to do that. We have four categories. We have a student category, we have a community category, we have a classified employee category, and we have a certified uh employee category. And so we try to recognize individuals from each of those. So the first one I always like to recognize is our students. So Brooklyn Bennett, will you please join me up here? I was going to read. So, Brooklyn was nominated by an individual at her school, and I'm going to read to you what was uh submitted as to the reason why. Brooklyn is the kind of student who wants to help people smile. She is also an avid writer who keeps a journal and loves the

017power of written language. In preparation for the middle school celebration of Virginia Kindness Week, Brooklyn combined her two passions of spreading joy and writing into a personal mission project. She looked up personal affirmations and then wrote each one on a little post-it size scratch pad. Then she donated her pile of over 240 sayings to the school counseling office for kindness week. Her little notes are amazing. They encourage and empower classmates to believe in themselves, know their worth, and treat others with respect. School counseling laminated each of these notes and displayed them throughout the building. Teachers and students absolutely love them. I had a chance to see them and I thought they were great. Um, you can also hear uh people talking about them during class changes. So, your classmates and peers saw it as well

018and appreciated it. What a wonderful gesture of genuine kindness. Brooklyn's compassion for our community deserves our applause. So, congratulations Brooklyn on being nominated. No, show your mom. Wait, let's move you outside of the podium. There you go. Congratulations. Oh, wait, wait, wait. Other thing is Oh gosh. Okay. Well, I'm going to play Jenga here. Believe me, there was something. Here you go. Drone mug with one Nelson inscripted on it. So, I'm going to keep it in the plastic and the bubble wrap so I don't break it. Congratulations. Another round of applause for Miss Brooklyn. All right, next up is our community member. Um, and this uh award goes to Miss Beth Anderson of Anytime Fitness. Yes. Congratulations. All right. And I will do just the same. All right. As a manager of Anytime Fitness, Beth

019has consistently demonstrated her dedication to building a strong, supportive community. Her commitment extends beyond the gym as she organizes an annual school supply drive to support our schools. This initiative highlights her genuine concern in the well-being of our community and her drive to make tangible difference. Beth's daily efforts to encourage fitness and camaraderie at the gym combined with her charitable activities reflect her deep committed her deep commitment to fostering unity and support. Her tireless work and generous spirit make her an extremely exemplary candidate for this honor. It is a privilege to recognize Beth Anderson for her exceptional contributions and unwavering dedication to enhancing our community. So, congratulations on being a one Nelson winner. We're going to look at this lady right here. Anybody got Oh, yep. [Music] Yep. Congratulations. And let me give you Here

020you go. Thank you so much for all that you do. Wish I would have recognized the one that was open before fighting with the other one so much. All right, the next category is for our classified employees. So, Mr. Sam Bryant, will you come join me up here? All right. Sam drives the school bus and is always willing to drive for other trips as well. He provides a good example to students and is a positive male role model. He recently drove the FFA to the Virginia Tech campus for an event. He was a safe and attentive driver and also helped out where he could during the event. Sam made sure everyone was taken care of, gave advice to the students about the competition because you are a recent graduate and participated a great deal with

021FFA and he also made sure that everyone was taken care of. Um, he delivered everyone to where they needed to be and did so on time. Sam was very well-mannered and kept a calm and engaging demeanor with everyone. So, we want to say thank you for supporting us and your continued commitment to us and congratulations on being a one Nelson winner. So, congratulations right there. There we go. Just want to make sure we congratulations here. There you go. All right. Thank you. Yep. Thank you. We have one more one Nelson winner and that is for our certified category. So, Miss Gabriella Sabina, will you join us please? All right. Oh, this is small print. Okay. That means there's a lot written here. That's why. Yes. So, Gabriella Sabino is an inspiring educator whose passion for

022teaching and commitment to student success are evident in all she does. She approaches each day with positivity, professionalism and a reflective mindset, making her a valued colleague and role model within our school community. What truly sets Miss Sabino apart is her dedication to student learning. She has intentionally cultivated a culture of literacy within her high school science classroom, ensuring that all students have meaningful access to scientific texts. Through the integration of writing, reading groups, and targeted vocabulary instruction, Miss Sabino empowers her students to build a deeper understanding of scientific concepts and how they connect to the world around them. Miss Sabino exemplifies the one Nelson spirit not only through her innovative classroom practices but also through her willingness to collaborate, grow, and learn alongside her peers. Her contributions to both student learning and professional culture

023make her an invaluable member of the Nelson community. That's also in addition you do some other things for us, correct? Yes, I do. I'm a coach. Yes. She spends a lot of time outside of the classroom working with our students. So, we want to say thank you so much for what you do. We're going to take this picture and we're going to take Congratulations. Thank you. Thank you so much. Now we will have comments from board members. Miss Turner Giles, would you like to go first? Sure. Um, so certainly I just want to say congratulations to all of our award winners. I am just in awe of you. You know, it is this is what makes Nelson so special. It is the little things. It's the big things, but it's what you do that makes

024a difference in students lives. Um, Chloe, oh my gosh, I am still doing like stick figures. I don't know how you drew that, but that was absolutely amazing. Amazing. Beautiful drawing. Just so proud of you. Um, and Brooklyn, I had the pleasure of reading some of your sayings. So, thank you. You need to put all of that in a poetry book and sell it. They were Oh, they were beautiful. Just beautiful. Um, so just so proud of Nelson. You know, it it's amazing. And as much as I appreciate the honor to serve in this capacity, um there very often I get phone calls from individuals that talk about um the things that go on at the school um good, bad, and indifferent. But there are more occasions that we hear all of the good stories

025and it is just attributed to this amazing team of teachers, amazing team of leaders that we have and I just want to thank you. Um, this week has been one of those special weeks where we have gotten lots of phone calls about things that have gone on. So, I think it's important to recognize that Nelson, it we may be small, but we're making a big difference in people's lives. So, thank you for that. Um, the only other thing I will say is I'm so looking forward to the play at Rockfish. Um, I know several of people are there tonight and I plan to be there tomorrow. So, just looking forward to attending that. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chief. So, I want to echo what Miss Turner Giles said. Uh, Chloe, that was amazing. You

026You've got real talent. That is an amazing gift that you have. Um, and I wish you luck in the in the state competition. I think you'll do well. Um, but I I agree the uh the one Nelson Awards I think it's I think it's really important that we recognize people for uh great efforts that they do and and things that they do to help our students in the community and help our schools. Um we do have a great community of people uh unsung heroes as it were uh people that come and help and they don't raise their hand and say it was me me. So, it's important that we recognize them and congratulations to all of you because without you, it would be extremely difficult to we couldn't be at the level that we are,

027but it would be difficult to do many of the things that our school system is able to do. So, um thank you to to everybody. Thank you so much. Um I just want to say thank you to everyone. appreciate all your hard work, your dedication to the school system and to the county. And um without y'all, we couldn't make each kid's life special in some way or another to this county and to this state and we appreciate all of y'all. Thank you. You guys don't believe me much by the time you get to the end of the line here. But um hey, listen, I um I'm all that they said for sure, Chloe. I mean just I don't even understand how people draw. So it is an incredible talent and I think it probably you

028get it honestly throughout your family. So congratulations to you Brooklyn. You are amaz I mean just to do that. We talked about the the young man who stopped and helped somebody um a couple weeks ago a couple months ago here and we see you doing these good things passing these positive words of affirmation out and and I think we just have to continue to think about there's a whole lot more good and with kids like you in this world coming through it's it's it's the best. It's the best of what we got. Um, I want to acknowledge Sam, too. We've got a student who is not far out of school that is being acknowledged for a one Nelson award. And again, this talks about our kids that graduate that come back to do a lot

029of good things here. So, thank you. One thing we haven't talked about that I want to throw a shout out to is our FCCLA program. They just got back from their state competition and knocked it out the ballpark. And so I think they're in the early days of doing those competitions and now they have people who have qualified for nationals and this is a big deal, right, Mr. Walker? Huge deal. So, and then one of the students is their student rep that's not here tonight because again, everybody's doing something more than the one thing that they're set to do. So, um, a big congratulations to them. Thank you very much. And I'm just going to echo what you guys said. Um, it is an amazing uh group of people that we have, a group of

030students that we have that just make us proud all the time and the people that do all the hard work in the schools every day. Um, really, you know, we couldn't do it without them. So, also, uh, thank you so much. I'm looking forward to the play at Rockfish tomorrow and, um, yeah, spring break's next week, too. So, just to roll kind of right into important dates. Um, spring break is next week. I know everybody's looking forward to it. I hope you have a really nice, sunny, relaxing week. Don't worry about a thing. We're gonna take care of everything while you're gone. No, I'm just kidding. We're not. Um, then we have just a few little things going on and then all of a sudden school year's over. You know, it is crazy how close

031that um end of the school year is. It's just around the corner. So, keep it together. We're going to do okay and we'll get there. So, that's all I had to say. Um, now we have I guess the student representatives aren't here, so we'll skip that part. Okay. Um, I missed that. Uh, and now we'll have the comments from the superintendent. Okay. All right. So um um that will be I I don't think they did but Oh yeah, but they are so Okay. Yes. No, but thank you for trying to look out. I appreciate that. Um I think they appreciate that. Yes. So, um I do want to and I'll talk a little bit about this in the pathways to success about what our each individual departments are working on. Um you know, starting um

032in January, it is a furious um effort to make sure that we're building a budget that reflects all of our needs and and um items that are necessary for success. Um so, uh in March, you all approved uh my proposed budget. I appreciate that. Um, but a nice development was uh board of supervisors coming back saying, "We know that it takes a while um to order buses and we know that you guys are in need of replenishing the fleet to make sure that we are upholding the standards that have been set forth. So, they have encouraged us and we have done so in purchasing four new buses. So, we're pretty excited about this because the last time we purchased buses was really through a grant for our electric buses. Prior to that, it had been

033quite a while. So, we appreciate that support in really um rebuilding up an aging fleet and that that uh goes to support the safety of our students, our staff, and our community. So, we want to make sure that um everybody understands how much that is greatly appreciated. Um also continue to monitor state and local legislative updates. Um the reconvene session has ended and has passed all those decisions back. Um May 2nd is a targeted time to learn more about the state updates as we continue to keep an eye on all things that um could potentially impact um not only our our budget but also our policies. Um I'll I'll draw one example to that is uh potential changes to the cell phone policy um that we see coming down that would take place for next

034year. Uh that will be codified um meaning it will be ba based into the the code of Virginia. So uh we keep an eye on that. we make sure that we're we're staying a breast of that and to u be flexible enough to make any adjustments that we would so need to u when it comes to the pathways if we can get that one up. All right for um administration department. Am I not Yeah, there we go. We got to turn that one on, don't we? Um so, as I mentioned about the buses, well, we uh did a I appreciate Mr. Ashley um doing a lot of research about the best possible buses to make sure we ordered. We ordered four. Um and uh Miss Irvin was integral in being able to work through the

035the purchase orders and getting everything straight for that. So we want to say thank you very much. Um last year, uh Miss Urban was recognized but with the Cardinal Award through the VSBA or the Virginia School uh School Board Officers Association and was also recognized most recently at the Southeast Association of School Board uh business officials um for um being Virginia's outstanding building official for 2425. Um she uh continues to um follow court cases that are potentially impacting our rate uh funding and also some things that could impact our um community eligibility provision or C. That's our free breakfast and lunch. Uh so we continue to watch those court cases as well as other pending legislative updates. Um, also continue the other um, day-to-day things like filing reimbursements for bond anticipation notes that will go

036towards our uh, high school renovation and then looking at options for voluntary um, insurance and benefits. Making sure that we're staying on top of options for our employees for voluntary benefits and um, health insurance consulting and all those things to make sure we're we're supporting our employees the best we can. um instruction. You know, I I uh after tomorrow when we come back on Tuesday the 22nd, we'll have 24 days left of school. So, that will be um a condensed amount of work, but this has been taking place all along. um continuing to support the instruction by doing walkthroughs and team walkthroughs and doing reflective practices afterwards. Working with um a group of our um instructional teams through a division improvement team where we've broken um had opportunities to break uh teachers and IAS and

037everyone into squads um to work on things that they feel are going to impact and support the school goals. And so I look forward to um uh either in May or June having some of those individual uh present some of the projects they've been working on. So because it's innovative and it's cool and it goes directly back and it shows the input and feedback of our staff into what they do on a daily basis. Um if ever we should be concerned about the future of our students go to the BRBGS presentations. Um, their capstone projects are seeped in community service, but they're also kind of that internship experience where our seniors get to present and show what they've done to have a community service aspect to a project. And the the work that they do

038and the thoughtful kind nature that they do and how they give back is is amazing. And it really is um it it really has that that faith in what our future in Nelson is going to be. Uh, and they do a great job. Um we've had uh multiple family um engagement opportunities and through literacy nights and and a few other things and the continued professional development uh for English learner PD. Um starting to plan summer learning, believe it or not, that's on the horizon and being able to work through that. Um as you see right back behind Mr. Perkins there, uh that portrait of a graduate. We've spent a great deal of time and energy building this, developing it, and we have been implementing it into our lessons to try to develop those five items

039that contribute directly to um not only career but college and life readiness that we know will be the necessary skills. Human resources, um this is the hiring season. We talk about it every single time. Uh so they're going out on recruiting visits to various locations including the high school career expo where we had our human resources uh team representing um any potential uh high school students who may want to come back and work for Nelson County Public Schools. I'll show you on a later slide where Mr. Ashley was there representing the transportation department. And we know it works because Mr. Bryant was just a recent graduate now drives for us and stays connected. So we know that that is a great pipeline for us. also creating um further partnerships to be able to to have

040a grow your own and a pipeline of individuals whether it's IAS becoming teachers or just being able to get uh certifications for our staff to uh be able to do uh the best they can for us but more opportunities. Um, also collaborating uh with retired staff, working through our e-re program to make sure that we're aligning their skills, their certifications with our needs and not just uh only using them for a substitute, but making sure that we're we're really um aligning them to what we need them for and they've done a great job with it. U also received approval from the VDOE to bring it to Nelson County. So, we're pretty excited about opportunities there. our pupil personnel, Miss Reinger and her team um have been uh conducting along with the instructional team class observations

041and that has been completed for early childhood also early childhood special education students working on fine and gross motor skills as you can see the different activities that they work on. Uh in the last couple um meetings we've discussed lifebridge and bringing in some opportunities u for counseling. Um it has been pretty popular to the point where we're looking to try to see how we can expand that because those are giving supports directly with our students and necessary. We've talked about this in our community. It's a little difficult at times to get some of those mental health resources. And so this has been a a pretty nice addition for us and it has been um it has been we believe working for us um successful fifth and sixth grade transition meetings for students as we

042have our fifth graders transition to the middle school. It's important to have those meetings so everybody understands um the needs of the students and how they can be accommodated and have that successful shift to the middle school. Um I know we are looking forward to a couple activities that are coming up like the tournament of champions that will be held at Louisa where we have some of our students going and and um I invite all of you to be able to visit that if you can. It is Friday is that the 26th 20th 25th um to Louisa. It is an exciting event and it's it's very worthwhile to to see our kids participate. Miss Denno here. Yes. Yep. Um so she can attest to that. Um also um that's it. Uh technology uh Mr. Cargo

043and his team Chromebook updates. You know, we were able to um we like our bus fleets. We also need to keep our Chromebook um cohorts up to date and operational. So we need to order them um on a on a rotational basis. So, we were able to get those orders in and get them prior to any kind of um supply chain um issues or price issues. So, I appreciate the uh the heads up on that. Cyber security training, first round of simulations, making sure we're um keeping a watchful eye. Um we are surrounded by areas that have that are battling cyber security issues and it it'll be an ongoing thing. So, Mr. Cargill and his team are making sure that our staff is trained in how to recognize an email that is uh suspicious and

044that could be potentially dangerous for us continuing considering we have very uh important critical uh information that we store. Um also being able to uh provide our staff with um innovative resources to be able to do some things. They can um check them out with the technology group and being able to do different activities or exercises or things like streaming. um he is already um getting consistent requests for different um streaming of of events and so that takes up a a lot of time but it is a way that we are able to show our community our extended family that aren't able to make it to events they're able to still see it and connect and stay connected. um zero eyes. Uh we had a a test and a run through to make sure that

045those alerts zero eyes is that um weapons detection system integrated into our uh security cameras. Um it is working. Um we've had some tests with um from uh local authorities and and those text messages were coming through. Um, I will say heads up over uh spring break on the 17th and 18th um partnering with I say partnering but really the Nelson County Sheriff's Office is going to run some active shooter training uh ops um at the middle school side. So that's on the 17th and 18th. We've alerted zero eyes, so we won't be getting messages saying, "Hey, something's going on." But I also bring that because if you're driving by the high school, middle school campus and you see some things taking place, it's planned. It's deliberate, and it's an effort to um be able

046to provide our students, our staff, and our community um a safe connection and response in the event something should happen. and it familiarizes not only um our sheriff's office but those who would be cooperating any kind of response. So we appreciate um Lieutenant Brandon, Sheriff Embry, and everybody who's going to be involved um in uh putting that that training on. Um Canvas, Canvas is our uh learning management system. Um we have recently learned that the state will continue to support that, which we're pretty excited about. Um that was one of those things that was in jeopardy of not being um continued, but uh we do know that that is um something that we will be moving forward with. Um and again, like I said, you know, like we're being streamed right now, uh those requests

047are constant and it takes a lot. So we appreciate Mr. Cargill and his willingness to do that because we know it has such an impact on our community. Maintenance maintenance continues to be busy. Not only we working through uh still um prepping for the uh renovation project, some other things still continue to happen. um taking time to work with our building and trades department, our students in building and trades to install electrical wiring for our book box. As you'll remember, our book bus is no longer unfortunately is not operable anymore. So, we've replaced it with a book box. And so, um integrating some of our students to be able to participate in prepping it so it can provide a little bit more excitement. um also took advantage of both non- studentent days that we had

048March the 17th and the 24th to be able to to deal with some um water leaks and some other uh maintenance issues. It was a perfect time to do so without interrupting instruction. Honeywell finished the installation of the chilled water pipes um to the new water uh cooled chiller. Seems like we've been talking about this for all three years that I've been here. Um but it was a very large endeavor and we've been able to figure it out. So, thank you uh Les for staying on top of that. um also conducted interviews on Friday to fill a position so that we've been trying to fill. So, we're pretty excited about that. Uh we're going to ramp up some projects. So, it'll really be important to make sure that vacancy is filled. Uh we had some

049storm damage for the most recent storms, not only with some trees falling on one of our fences, but also um over at Rockfish, another tree. You could you could start to see the branches were going to be pulling. That's it. It it runs right where our parents um are driving through for parent pickup. So, I appreciate uh Less and his crew coming through to be able to to clean that up, but also to save the tree. Um food nutrition. Um oh, nope. Transportation and safety. I'm just kidding. It's not food nutrition. Um I might not be able to do this. No, I'm kidding. Um submitted uh pathways on time. So, I uh value everything that our departments do and I and I pestered them on a monthly. I need I want to know all the

050great things that you're doing so we can make sure that we celebrate that. Um so, he was able to get everything in on time. We're pretty excited about that, but also um participated at the high school expo. Um being able to kind of be able to advertise the different positions that we're looking for and open our students eyes to they can have jobs here um and stay in Nelson. You don't have to go somewhere else and and we're a perfect opportunity. We're the largest public employer um here. Uh and so we can provide wonderful opportunities for our students. um also conducted the annual spring drive safety meeting with our transportation reviewing railroad crossings and student loading and unloading. Um you'll hear time and time again. Um I I say it over and over again, if

051that school bus is stopped with the stop sign out, do not pass the buses. It is incredibly dangerous to do that. Um so when that arm and that stop sign is out, do not pass us. Also, um we've been testing internally. So tested Britney uh Wright for her CDL and she is now out and in routes driving buses and also worked with Nelson County Service Authority helping them out by training one of their employees to get a CDL. So we appreciate that effort. Food nutrition received a second site visit um from uh VFVK which is the Virginia Food and for Virginia kids. It's a cohort um using the Chef Anne Foundation. Our senior student intern whose name is Christian Proctor. You see him in that middle picture. um great exceptional young man um and through

052this PD learning how to make smoothies for breakfast in between working the cash register at the middle school. So he's a student intern that we have working and he's done a phenomenal job. Um I know all the ladies in school nutrition will be very very sad when he graduates because they've they've all kind of embraced him and taken him under their wing. So um he's done a great job. Um Miss Canel also attended the school nutrition association of Virginia spring conference. um so receiving valuable information. So we talk about um growth not only just for our students but for our employees as well. I always like to highlight the amount oh gosh um the amount of meals that we serve. Uh for breakfast this is for uh March we serve 13,15 breakfast almost 20,000 lunches

053and 834 after school meals. We've really kicked it into high gear with our remediation programs. And with that remediation program, we're able to provide some um after school meals for our students to to help kind of keep them going. We uh really pride ourselves on on encouraging and finding ways to get our community involved. And one of the ways we do that is making sure that we um really invite them into our space, but also our students out into theirs. Uh we had the career expo. Our um FFA students participated in block and bridal competitions in Virginia. We talked about our F uh CCCLA high school students as you see in the red jackets at the bottom, but you also see our middle school students off to the right. Um so that is a a

054pretty big undertaking at both our high school and our middle school. Obviously, Miss Khloe Hernandez um fish um stippling or um poalism picture. Um we continue to encourage individuals for prek and kindergarten registration. Um, we had the third grade through fifth grade Tai River concert last night. Uh, the art exhibit. Um, sixth grade uh, orientation. We had, I think, eight of our high school students that have artwork at a um, Smithsonian Associated Museum. Um, and you see that in the bottom uh, bottom right. WCT had a nice little um, segment on those art students. Um and also some of our drama students throughout the county participated in something in the community and put on a wonderful theater um show. So just really like to highlight um the community engagement because we talk about one Nelson

055and it takes everyone um to be a part of this and it takes us being a part of the community as well. Again, thank you to our pair of professionals. Um thank you to everyone. Without them, we could not have the success that we do. um our school librarians uh are are very special to us and then our assistant principles. Um we thank everyone for what they do and contribute back to us. And that is my one Nelson presentation. It's just amazing. All goes on, you know, in between school board meetings. It seems like you're saying it like from the whole year, you know. Um so Margaret, I have a question. Um, in regards to zero eyes, I know that we have implemented metal detectors at our schools. Where are we with that implementation for

056athletic events? So, I think that that's um one of the things I'd like to look at for football is as we go through the renovation process, how can we see some changes that we can make right now where we have handicap driving, that's also our entrance to games. So, how do we set up those um weapons detectors for not only outdoor events, but we're looking, we knew that this was going to be a phased process when we brought the weapons detectors because we really wanted to see how is it working, how does it impact us, um how are we responding and I think we've responded really, really well. And so, we have our next iteration or evolution in that. and it's to try to see how we integrate it to um you know indoor and

057outdoor events because we know that that's when you're going to get a whole bunch of people. That's going to take a great deal of communication um not only to our community but to all um individuals who plan on attending our events. Um because you know it it it what it picks up on is just we have to be very very mindful of communicating that out um and say you don't need to bring everything with you to a game. you you just need to bring the essentials um unless you you you want to take a little bit of time getting in. So that is a part of the next step and next phase process, but we really need to be thoughtful about how we set that up um and how we communicate that out. Um but

058the football and soccer and all that like especially in the spring, you have a lot of different events coming in and we want to make sure that we're we're um setting it up in a way to do it well. Yeah, it's good to hear that that is on the horizon. traveling to lots of schools. It is implemented um around us um for the indoor as well as the outdoor. So, I just want to make sure that we stay ahead of the game of that. Yeah. And I think there's some um sports divisions that have instituted a clear bag policy at events. So, I think there's some things in in talking with our um Dogwood district like where where are others um that helps um and and really looking into how did you implement this and

059how did you do it? What what would you do the same? What would you do differently um and how can we um apply that to our practices and and our facilities? Perfect. Thank you. Sure. Great question. All right. So, now we're at public comments from the public. What? Oh, sorry. Mr. Michael. So, we've had one person sign up to speak, Michael Heer. And um you know the rules, right? Hopefully I don't take up too much time. This is Michael Heer, uh 111468 Road, Four, Virginia. and I'm here today to talk about uh there's a forum that was been brought to my attention from more than one less than 50 folks from our area and it's the federal funding forum and uh I'm concerned about that because while this event is uh it's presented to be

060informative session uh this issue is highly partisan um and uh I believe it's only going to present one side of the story focusing on the cuts. And if we focus on only the cuts and not where the money is being spent, uh I think it gives our uh our public, our our citizens uh only half of the story and I think we'd be doing a disservice to those that we want to we want to serve and we need to ask these questions. Um and especially with the current environment going and uh the questions that need to be asked is the is hard questions. Is it is it how are the federal and state funds being cut? Um I know I saw the uh the joint uh meeting with the board of supervisors and uh school

061board and I admit I don't follow this as closely since I don't have kids in the school system but it was uh the amount of funding that is being cut is is outrageous. And I was able to reach out to Amy Laugher and uh Tim Griffin and to hopefully propose a amendment to this uh to this upcoming budget to maybe help uh with the schools. U but the the questions that also need to be asked is are there are there duplications? Are there inefficiencies in way we spend federal dollars? And it's not just with the school board cuz it's not with the school system but also there had DSS and some other agencies that are dealing with this as well. Uh but also is what safeguards are being placed to ensure tax dollars are being

062uh are being used wisely. Um to ignore these questions. uh again um make sure that uh that we have transparency through the public through other taxpayers and also uh now that I am the chair of the Republican committee, partisan issues is what I deal with and uh the the budget and the school system and y'all have done a great job at keeping politics out of this and the the fact that this forum is being presented and being uh run by a by a partisan group and using county employees to to uh portray that in a political echo chamber uh is not a way to build the trust of the community and then especially in this in this day and age in this environment. Uh so I hope that things are being reconsidered and I hope

063that uh that this message comes across with the heart that I that I presented with. Thank you. Thank you. All righty. We're going to go ahead and move on to the consent agenda. Um, does anybody have any questions uh on the consent agenda? I'll make a motion to approve the consent agenda. Second. All in favor? I. Okay. The consent agenda has been approved and now we have items for information. The first two items, actually maybe the first three items are minutes. So, you know, read those over, make sure if there's any corrections or uh adjustments you want to make, you let our clerk know and then we can take care of that before we have to approve them. Finally, um the third one is the policy updates. That is the second reading for those. Um,

064so I believe I think you guys all have had a chance to read over those and asked all your questions already for those. Okay. Um, and then um, April is VSBA VSBA workforce readiness month to be that. Yeah. Okay. Right. Will you do the us the honors? Yeah. So BSBA um has put out something that they would like for the the public schools, the schools within Virginia to acknowledge and recognize. Um so I'm going to read this and then we can decide to adopt it. Whereas workforce readiness is essential to developing skill sets for students in Virginia's public schools to be successful beyond high school graduation. And whereas the demand for highly skilled jobs over the next decade in Virginia will continue to increase and can be filled by qualified public school students. And whereas

065we recognize increased collaboration with business and industry, the community college system and the core school setting is necessary. Whereas the promise of public education is for every child to be successful in school and life. Whereas it is important for Virginia families, students, teachers, and school administrators to be actively engaged in supporting the importance of workforce readiness as part of the educational experience. And whereas we recognize that limited funding, resources, facilities, partnerships, and qualified CTE staff impedes student access to workforce readiness opportunities. And whereas the VSBA's established a work task force on workforce readiness to make recommendations and to stay at the forefront of these discussions in Virginia schools. And now therefore, the Nelson County School Board recognizes the month of April 2025 as VSBA Workforce Readiness Month and April 16th, 2025 as VSBA Workforce Readiness

066Day with the intention to advocate and increase awareness about the supports necessary to promote workforce development opportunities that enable students to be prepared to succeed in a global economy. Recognize this day, 10th of April, 2025. Thank you very much. Uh, next we have updated information on the capital improvement plan project. My personal favorite. [Music] I'm sorry I didn't introduce some. So, as Mandy said, the um the water chilled uh water cooled um chiller has been piped in um with some a little unfortunate news. The uh we have there is a mic there is a software glitch that Carrier is sending out a representative to work on. Um so, we're waiting to hear from the representative to see it's all in the communications. So, let me ask you a question. Mhm. Because it seems kind of

067ridiculous. I haven't asked this question, but what does a chiller do? So it so it the your water flows through we we cool and heat with water. Oh, excellent. That's all you need to do. Okay, perfect. Thank you. Um so Honeywell has finished the remaining uh two aircooled chillers. Um the insulation crew has finished the insulating of the chiller pipes on chiller 2 and they uh the insulating crew will be back on the 15th. just insulate the pipes on chiller one. And uh both of those are scheduled to be uh started up by carrier on April the 16th and 17th. So those should be in circulation by that time. So and I included some pictures there to show you what is your where you've been studying. That's where I hide. Watching it. I should have

068moved sitting to notice it wasn't going to fit. Yeah. Right. Um so um moving on to some of the renovation discussion for phase two. Uh we had our kickoff meeting with MB contractors in Mosley on March the 24th. Uh MB is planning to work evening shifts with all of their subs until school dismisses for the summer. Uh that shift will be a 3:30 to 1:30 a.m. shift. So they will be at night after school working. Um uh they plan to uh work during spring break to install the 4-in water line to into the school cuz we got to with all the repling and all we have to have another service line in. Um Corin main will be on site to perform the wet tap onto the main system that we have going in front of

069the school. Um and the service authority will be working with MB and their sub to install it next next week during spring break. Um, we have progress meetings. We we they're held at the second and fourth Thursday of every month for the duration of this renovation. We just had a progress meeting this morning uh with MB contractors in Mosley. Um Nelson County, we're we're obligated to uh hire a third-party commissioning agent and a special inspector for this project. Um as of we we've been working hard trying to find one. We finally found um they are facilities dynamic engineering um and we actually was able to acquire their services through a cooperative uh Commonwealth of Virginia contract. So um we that was just as of yesterday we was able to affirm that. Um some of the

070other items that that we'll talk about and then I have some notes that aren't included because there again we just had a progress meet today. So I'll go over those. Uh a little bit about the uh the domestic hot water system situation we have right now. Um the return hot water pump and the motor starter component shorted out causing an electrical damage and pump failure. Uh Honeywell has sourced another pump and has placed an emergency purchase order for the pump. Uh the pump was installed this past summer when we installed the new tank. So it's 8 months old. Um, so it actually the the contacttors and all actually when it shorted out, it blew the cover off of the motor starter cover out in the floor. I found that Saturday morning. So, uh, with that

071said, there's been some discussion with Honeywell about who's responsible for this because the motor starter is technically on Nelson's side. Um, and they they were thinking that the motor starter shorted out causing the pump failure. when um when evaluating exactly what was going on and looking through the uh the manual and reading up it's we found that Honeywell actually installed the pump upside down which was against the manufacturer's specifications. So therefore, after some discussion back and forth, they're going to assume the cost of replacing the pump and that pump. Say that less did a really good job going out and taking pictures right away. And it was those pictures that really helped say, "But take a look at this." Uh, exact. Yeah. And so, um, rather than taking it after the fact, um, took it

072right away. And I think that was that really helped craft that narrative of responsibility. has done an amazing job of covering. Yes, you have. Can I just asked a question? How long is this contract with Honeywell? How how long is the That was the right question. Yeah. So, that's a a complicated Okay. Um I know I've asked complicated answer. That's a a simple question but a complicated answer to the the service contract but also the um connectedness within the project. Okay. Um Honeywell is a very large company and they own a big share of the market. So they're almost a sole provider because when you go to other companies, they already own those other companies. I get it. So when you install things that aren't yours, the service isn't there. Gotcha. You might appropriately summarizing.

073And so when you are able to provide the installation of things and you ser service them, if you install items that are not from that company, they're not going to And to speak to that and to that point, um the controls that we'll be installing during the renovation, um because there's licenses for different controls. There's several Honeywell makes many different controls. Um, and you just you're licensed through whatever company you work for. Like Southern Air may be uh licensed to put in a tridium product which is a Honeywell product, but we work through honeyill corporate and they have a different product which talks to our uh EBI system at the main brains if you will of all the HBAC equipment. So the Tridium product doesn't directly talk to the EBI. So therefore, the Honey Wells

074corporate puts in their controls that talk directly to our computer system. So it's it's kind of really intertwined pretty tight in there. Yeah. Intentionally. I'd like to know how long that's going to last. I will say I think that they've come up on the raw end of this deal the last few times though. They paid her a lot of money with the the children being tall. Yeah. Yeah. So maybe they there's some lessons going on. I will I will have to say this and I and I appreciated it through the email back to Honeywell is I appreciated them standing behind their work by owning the the the pump being installed the way it was. Uh this pump is is probably around $15,000. So um I did acknowledge that with them that you know we do

075appreciate you standing behind your work. that and and I think it is also due to they have monthly meetings on Wednesdays where they convene um and and I have been a part of at least one of those meetings where it it was difficult you know um we had to share I I shared my frustrations with how I felt things were going and the impact of a lack of action or poor action and how that reflects on us and how our staff or our community would look at us like why can't you figure this out? Like we have. We're just trying to work through it. But I will say that after a couple adjustments and some time invested in in talking through this, they have made some changes and they have been responsive to the concerns

076that we brought and and to the point of, you know, we've been able to communicate with them and shown them some things and they have been um taken responsibility. So, you know, I think it's taken a lot of work, but I would say that particularly in the last few months, it's really felt like it's improved. Um, still work. Um, but it is improving because pro perhaps that trust is being built in that understanding is like we're paying attention as well and we aren't going to tell you something that we don't believe in or that isn't right. Um, and I think that that it's taken some time, but I do appreciate that they are um they are standing by their work and and we they are working with us and some of that they recognize they

077need to make some staff changes too and that has come about in the last six to eight months. So, um things are improving them better on that end. Um some of the notes I took today, I felt it's important to let you guys know for the renovation. Um of course I spoke about the 4in line. They're going to be working on that next week. Um uh also uh they'll be starting to uh demo the ceiling and I shared a map. You'll have a map there in front of you. Um they're going to start demoing the ceiling um as they go through because quite frankly we we want as much cosmetics as possible because a lot of this money is being put into MEPs. So, uh, we we we agreed that instead of putting trying to

078put the ceiling and ceiling tile back and look hodge podgeed, we would prefer to go back with new ceiling once we're done. Um, with that said, um, they will be tearing out the ceiling starting in section 10, which is that blue section, starting next week, cuz that's where they're going to start running the main water line down uh towards the that goes down by the auditorium down towards the um the office, the high school. Uh and then the this this renovation is going to be done in phases. So they're going to start in 10 and 11 and 11 is the entire CTE wing. Um so they will be taking the ceiling out during this period of time. Uh they are going to secure everything in place like our cameras, our light fixtures, um all of

079our fire related devices. uh they will fix those to where they're above and any low hanging wires above uh anything that students can grab a hold of uh that will and that ceiling will remain open for the duration of this phase. So and they're planning as of this morning the plan right now for MB contractors is to complete 10 section 10 and 11 by the end of this summer. So the the ceiling will be put back by the end of this summer. Uh also part of that uh process is we're we're by contract we have to give them a minimum of four empty rooms so they can start renovating those as well uh at a time and I working closely with Kevin matter of fact he's coming in the progress meetings and all and um

080so I felt it's important to keep him up to date with everything and so they will have four rooms at a time they're they're supposed to give us a minimum of two weeks notice so Kevin can have time to adjust to move classes around. Um, and so part of even in the classrooms there's there's light mechanical electrical plumbing uh fixtures that are going in in the classrooms. There's some plumbing um that run through classrooms above a ceiling to get to like the cosmetology area and all. So, some of those areas will be work. We'll have some plumbing involved, but each classroom also will have new ceiling. And we discussed today and they're actually going to start painting the rooms as well. So, when they finish those four rooms up, we will have new ceiling and

081brand new paint on the walls. So, um yeah, it's going to be busy. And the the effort is going to be, you know, um concentrated work in the summers to get the bulk of the work and then work through the school year, but not like we're going to try to get done in the summers to avoid or to minimize disruptions and impacts on the daily operations. So that that is you know obviously construction is construction but that is the um the effort being placed and to try to minimize um we know that you know we have some this is our second big project that we've had in two years um but it's important um there's a safety component to this. We need to make sure that all this is replaced and things are as safe

082as possible. So um there is a concerted effort to minimize disruptions and inconveniences. Um but I appreciate Mr. Walker taking some time to be a part of these conversations because he knows his building, his staff and his students and can can provide some guidance on that. The other thing also too is the civil work that was that was um they brought to our attention during this whole sur when they done the civil survey the parking lots they also will start working on those this summer too. They're going to start on the middle school parking lot and work their way around to the front bus loop and to the uh student parking at the high school. I'll work with uh Mr. Ashley to coordinate uh for summer learning drop off because we're going to utilize the

083middle school uh for secondary for summer learning. So, yeah. Okay. Thank you so much. All righty. Mrs. Kim Douglas coming to show us the summer learning proposal. So yes, summer learning proposal. It's hard to believe June 9th through 26th we'll have our summer learning plan for the summer and we work as a team. So as Les mentioned, we'll be rearranging and working at Ty River and Nelson Middle School this summer. But it really takes all of the admin, the teachers, all of us working together to really make this plan happen. Um maintenance, transportation, food services, sped, ESL, Title One, you name it. I mean, so we all wrap our our hand our heads around this and kind of make a plan together and make it work. Um, we're going to have a robust program again

084with K5 remediation 68 912 with credit recovery and remediation. We have um enrichment for second through fifth grade. We have title one tutoring available. We're going to have English language learner um time for our students, whether that's all day or we'll might have one hour or twohour sessions with our students for title one and for ESL. Um we're going to have an open library available for our students once per week. We'll have the book bus or books box I should say again um and CTEmmies. So that's our plan currently. um we're trying to work around the parameters of um the same we did last year as far as the portrait of a graduate and working towards career readiness for our students and that starts in kindergarten through fifth grade. So we're taking our program like

085we did last year and we're rearranging it for that exploring pathways to career success theme so that we can all work towards that with those five C's and implementation of the relationship of um preparing our students for future careers. So, anything that we do, whether it's in the STEM lab or in the classroom, will be related somewhat to that um theme for the summer. Um I want to also me mention that uh there's a $22,000 donation from Wintergreen Foundation. Um and that's going to be funding um a actual STEM teacher for us, t-shirts for our elementary students, and three field trips for elementary students. So, we're really happy to partner with them. Um and they're going to be working um talking to us about future farmers and agriculture and what that might look like in

086Nelson County. Um so that's part of what their thing will be as far as in the STEM lab and the donation of that funds will um encompass that area. Uh let's see for the information that I provide you tonight. I've given you the proposal with the financial components of summer learning and what that looks like and that's a total of $216,82 and the bulk of that is for instructional employee cost. Um so that's the the main component of that and that's in that packet that I gave you the last three pages there that'll go through the individual cost between transportation employees and materials for instruction. We have a one pager. We'll be post posting this upon the um proposal for our families. Um of course families are part of that partnership and be able to

087work with us with within our hours that we provide summer learning from 8:00 to 3:00 during the school day um Monday through Thursday that 9th through 26th. And the other um item of information I provided for you is this um program of studies which kind of explains in depth what we're going to be offering this summer. Each summer we try to tweak things a little bit. Um I know that uh the Excel Academy is going to be offering entertainment design and technology areas, hospitalities, tourism and recreation and science engineering and math um programs for our students. And then when we're working with CTE, they're working through cosmetology, culinary arts, construction, engineering, marketing, and agriculture. Are there any questions about I just I just don't understand why I can't enroll in That's my problem. The the

088emperors do close. I mean, the just the amusement. I love the titles. Um, and I know that the kids just absolutely love these experiences. So, thank you. Thank you for planning it and thank you to the to their team that that joins in to help make that all happen on the ground. Very good. It's incredible. It's a great experience. It's it's really nice to see summer school turn from just remedial work to expand expansion. It's it's really nice that I like that you guys are getting our students engaged. So that's absolutely I think that's the key is those the reference to summer learning like summer school connotation isn't quite the same as getting everyone is learning and is learning for all different reasons and all different types and all different things. You see it easier

089for them to re-engage when they come back in the fall, right? Like the gap is not quite so big and those brains are still staying active for portions of the summer. Absolutely. And we we have a boost academy we offer the week prior school starting. So that's part of the plan this summer as well. Um that's an a bridged version of what we do, but um it is an invite for students. So So some kids are invited and then other kids are invited strongly, right? Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Encouraged. encourage. Yes, thank you so much. It's great. Yeah, it's great. Okay, now we get to hear from Dr. Yarzinski on the Perkins 5. So exciting. [Music] Well, since we were celebrating assistant principles a little earlier, I'd be remiss if I didn't give them kudos

090for the start of the spring so test administrations. We started off with integrated reading and writing in the fifth and eighth grades. So, Mr. McCullawitch, uh, Miss Lopez, and Mr. Garrett have knocked it out of the park. And it always feels good to hit a home run before we get into the main meat of the test administration. All right. Well, I will be presenting on the 2526 CTE local plan and the budget that we have proposed and how we will spend that money. Um, one component of the Perkins application is a review of our annual performance benchmarks. Uh, the APR benchmarks are comprised of 15 standards, uh, including graduation rate, academic proficiency, post-program placement, non-traditional concentration within the programs, and program quality. Um, and as we can see up here, we have met 14 of

091the 15 indicators. And you can see certain indicators uh measure the performance of all students and some measure uh include special populations. Our special populations would be our economically disadvantaged, our homeless students with disabilities and etc. Um 14 out of 15 we're in pretty good shape. I think that is a solid outcome. I will say longitudinally last year we did meet 15 out of 15. The year before we were 12 out of 15. And in the 2021 school year, we were 8 out of 15. So, we've shown improvement. And I will also note that these performance benchmarks are not static. They do change. As we exceed them, they increase them. They don't want us to rest on our laurels. And I'll get into the meat of some of these. So, some of our highlights, academic

092proficiency, this area increased the most. Um, and we can see that CTE completers uh both outperformed the benchmark but they also impro excuse me outperform the outcomes of the nonCTE uh population. Uh a little bit of improvement uh but mostly flat from the year but again uh those have gone up the highest and we still exceed all the benchmarks. Additionally, uh the number of students attaining post-secary credentials continues to be a celebration. Uh with only a handful of CTE completers not earning an industry credential. We always meet with our teachers. If a student's in the CTE program, the expectation is we get them into a sequential program. Auto one, auto 2, carpentry 1, carpentry 2. And if they are in the sequential completer, we get them to pass a state approved credential. So kudos to

093my teachers and the CT program. They have knocked it out of the park at that regard. Our area of growth, the only shortcoming came by way of nontraditional program concentration and this is the number of males in a predominantly female pathway or the number of females in a predominantly male oriented pathway. Um this is a cohort measure and the drop can primarily be attributed to fewer females in automotive and carpentry programs in this cohort. Um in addition to fewer males in the nursing and cosmetology programs. Um there's often variance from one cohort to the next with the number of non-traditional students even though the number and I'll get to the next slide um is relatively substantial the number of non-traditionals but again concentration within cohorts. So with small cohorts, small changes equate to pretty uh

094large fluctuations in the overall percentages. You know, we dropped from 28% to 15% and that came by way of 12 students. So, the Perkins application does highlight initiatives and strategies to increase the enrollment of non-traditional students, primarily by ensuring sufficient opportunities for career exploration and experiences in each student's educational pathway and articulating more deliberate and robust ways to create, review, and revise each of their ACPs, which is our academic career plans on an annual basis. Uh these strategies also align with the state board's revision and new expectations of the ACP and ACP planning process. And lastly, in the Perkins application, we included two new potential pathways, emergency medical technician and fire science. Uh these pathways are presented in hopes and in preparation to capitalize on a potential partnership with Keech. Uh, I've met with about

095a dozen students so far this week and have a few more meetings tomorrow to explore the feasibility of scheduling these courses at a remote location and ensuring a fit within each potential students course schedule for next year. Uh, I'm excited to capitalize on this opportunity and I think we're making the appropriate strides. Current CT enrollment relatively the same from last year. It uh mirrors our overall enrollment trends. I would say slightly fewer uh students identified as economically disadvantaged. Biggest change would be the number of English language learners enrolled. That number almost doubled from last year. The overall Perkins budget um some information is slow to come from the state and from the federal government. So, this was based on last year's numbers, which uh there has been little variance from one year to the next

096with only a couple hundred change. So, $39,165 is what we base this off of. And the funds will be leveraged to increase awareness and exposure to students of CTE programming, especially the non-traditional students in all program areas. Uh we're going to leverage some funds for the implementation of the CTE summermies to provide career related field trips to businesses and industries within the area and region in addition to transportation for our students to their clinicals, internships and other work-based learning experiences. Uh we want to make sure we can provide opportunities for credentiing and lure attainment at no cost to our students. We'd like to modernize and improve and expand upon CTE programmings including modernization of equipment which is currently used in the field. Provide professional development opportunities to CTE teachers through professional and state organizations along

097with access to VDOE trainings and industry workshops. And lastly, implement CTSO. These are student organizations in all content areas to increase exposure, hands-on opportunities, and chances for students to showcase their ability in competitions as evidenced by our FCCLA. So, I'd be happy to answer any questions you have regarding the Perkins application at this time. Thank you. Kudos to the teachers. All right. I'm next on the agenda as well. Okay. Stay up there. Yes, ma'am. New course applications. I'm going to propose three new courses. And I know we typically do this in December, and I'll uh get to the the why after I present the courses. All three of them are AP courses, AP Seminar, and AP Research. You combine these two together as part of a new AP capstone uh diploma stamp that we're looking

098to implement. And I'll be verbose on these, my apologies. AP Seminar is a foundational course that engages students in cross-curricular conversations that explore the complexities of academic and real world topics and issues by analyzing divergent perspectives using an inquiry framework. Students practice reading and analyzing articles, research studies, and foundational literary and philosophical texts, listening to and viewing speeches, broadcasts, and personal accounts, and exper experiencing artistic works and performances. Students will learn to synthesize information from multiple sources, develop their own perspectives and written essays, and design and deliver oral and visual presentations, both individually and as part of a team. Ultimately, the course aims to equip students with the power to analyze and evaluate information with accuracy and precision in order to craft and communicate evidence-based arguments. AP Seminar can and will be embedded into the

099English department and students will be able to earn an English credit towards graduation verified credit as well because it will also accompany the English writing so EOCSOL. Um, it is also a prerequisite for AP research. So AP research is the second course in the AP capstone experience and this allows students to deeply explore an academic problem, topic, issue, or area of individual interest. Students design, plan, and implement a year-long investigation to address a research question. Through this inquiry, they further the skills they acquire in the AP seminar course by learning research methodology, employing ethical research practices, and accessing, analyzing, and synthesizing information. Students reflect on their skill development. document their processes and curate the artifacts of their scholarly work through a process and reflection portfolio. The course culminates in an academic paper of 4,000 to

1005,000 words accompanied by a performance exhibit or product where applicable and a presentation with an oral defense. It's kind of like a mini dissertation. And lastly, this is not part of the AP capstone. This is just an opportunity to embed an additional AP course in the history department is AP human geography. This is a college level introductory course in human geography that introduces students to the systematic study of patterns and processes that have shaped human understanding, use, and alteration of Earth's surface. Students employ spatial concepts and landscape analysis to examine socioeconomic organization and its environmental consequences. They also learn about the methods and tools geographers use in their research and applications. So the Y. So I realize again course requests typically come in December. However, in response to the updated school performance and support framework,

101which is the new state accreditation model, uh we've been analyzing numerous variables that could potentially impact future accreditation outcomes. One of these variables is the high school master schedule, specifically courses offered that would influence outcomes with regard to the new 3E readiness indicator. This is going to be what replaces the CCCRI. It is more robust and it's a little bit harder to get points in it. One component of the indicator is enrollment which awards points for the completion of credit bearing college ready courses and exams specifically AP and dual enrollment courses. The specific criteria is posted as you'll see it's dependent on both the number and course or AP score outcomes. the more students take the better their score. I will interrupt. Um what you will hear is particularly when it comes to 3e readiness

102is it's additional add-on. So it's not instead of and so you can the more you offer the more opportunities students have to get these points in different areas that then count towards the school's overall score. So that's where you'll see some schools getting 120 for a score. um an overall score. It's because they they're able to get points from each of these of the three E categories. So, it's not a it doesn't cancel one out. It's a very complicated thing. This has been something that the board of education has been working on for months um to try to figure out how is it best to implement this. Um because what we've articulated is if you're in a bigger school system, you may have more opportunities to have some classes than small rule. Um, so this

103is us, the why of why we're trying. One, we want to be able to give our students the opportunities and pathways that they want to take and will set them up for the most success in whatever avenue they want to take. So, um, the other piece to this is how does it impact us as a school and how do we set it up to to be as successful as possible. Um, so it is complicated. You have the, you know, um, Dr. Yarzinsky, did you explain the different ease? This is this is the enrollment piece. Enrollment. There's also the employment which is CTE completers who also get their credential. And there's going to be variation between high demand, high wage, high demand, low wage, and just a regular credential. And we're still differentiating the credentials and

104their identification. There's also going to be a regional impact. What is high demand and high wage in Nelson County may be different than what is in Fairfax and Newport News. So, as he just walked through Perkins and expenditures or why are we spending it this way? Why are we targeting certain things? Why are we making sure students are taking sequential classes um one because it gives them the best opportunity to be successful and highly trained in those areas that they can be, but also there's another piece is making sure that we're we're supporting um the accreditation piece. It's more about giving the students to an opportunity to be successful, but we have to be mindful and strategic about it. And the other E is um no enlistment. Enlistment. Oh my gosh. The ASVAB which the

105ASBAB is kind of transitioning not just a mil it's not solely a military assessment. It is more career-based assessment. So really taking an opportunity to look at that and how do we apply it to our students and it's a really good opportunity for students who have created an ACP and had their interest inventories taken at the middle school to be re-evaluated to see how that has changed and then they have a more robust uh medium through the government websites to explore potential careers based on their ASVAB results. And and for those of you who blank, ACP is the U academic career plan. Academic career plan. And that has really been something that we've discussed making it a part of our conversations with our counselors and our um our administrators about you know particularly you know

106the development of it middle school but really our parents our students our teachers our counselors our administrators aware of a student's um career plan academic career plan and making decisions based off of that and having a a collective collaborative effort in communication about this is why you should schedule this class because you've done your inventories. You've done your assessment of what you want to do. You we've sketched out this plan for you. This is how you're going to get there. So, all of this is so strongly connected with each other. What he presented before in Perkins, the the discussion about, you know, enrollment and providing opportunities for higher level classes. Okay. And the second why is the college board offers what is called the AP capstone diploma program in which students can either earn the

107AP capstone diploma or the AP seminar and research certificate. It's easily articulated up there. The capstone diploma is granted to students who earn scores of three or higher in both seminar and research and then take four additional AP exams of their choosing. And the AP Seminar research certificate is granted to students who simply earn scores of three or higher in both AP seminar and research. Integrating this opportunity into Nelson County High School's programming provides rigorous course options that align with the vertically articulated English language program being implemented across all grade levels as well as providing strict alignment with the Nelson profile of graduate and the five C's communication, collaboration, critical and creative thinking and citizenship. all which were articulated in the course descriptions. And lastly, it would provide students with the opportunity to engage in

108rigorous coursework and preparation for college. It would also help students bolster their college applications and keep them competitive relative to peers outside of Nelson, as several schools in the region are currently offering or plan on implementing the AP Capstone program as options to their students. Again, the implementation of these courses is dependent on several variables, including the fit in the master schedule, qualifications of instructional personnel, and the training requirements set forth by the college board. Uh, we just want to be prepared to execute viable options should the opportunity arise to us. Uh, and a big thank you to Jennifer Campbell and Kevin Walker for helping me explore some of these and flush out some scheduling options and, uh, engaging in conversation with colleagues around the state. and we met with a lady from Fairfax today

109to really dig into this and how it worked for there and how it could work for us. So, I'd be happy to answer any questions you have regarding the new AP courses. That's wonderful. I love the the new course offerings. Love the fact that you're exploring this early on. So, I appreciate that. One question, I don't know if you can answer this or not. Looking at the new class schedule um of offering, I noticed that humanities is not listed. Do we know what happened to our humanities classes? AP length. AP what? Length class. Length. Yes. I don't grade class. So, did that replace the humanities class? Yes. Okay. So, that's no longer an offering those Yes. Okay. Is it covering the same or is it a different a little bit more robust? Okay. Okay. I

110really similarities. Gotcha. Gotcha. I appreciate that. I'll dig into it more. I just noticed that the the curriculum offering just look different. And I was wondering, are we replacing when we bring on the AP, are we replacing it with other classes? Do students that don't want to go the AP route still have the opportunity to do those other offerings or are they now having to go down that route? We're not trying to pigeon hole anybody. Um, okay. We are still going to have honors level courses being offered in English department. Um AP seminar is unique in which if an English teacher instructs it, it makes the student eligible for credit English. AP research is not embedded into the English department. It would be an elective based course. So you'd still have your 11th and 12th

111grade honors and AP lit options in the English department. Um, with regard to other AP exams, no, they're not looking to replace any uh, honors based courses. A lot of things we have to consider is the number of students requesting humanities. And when we implemented AP Lit, I do believe the requests for that exceeded that of humanities. So, not viable to implement a course with five, six students in the master schedule. And I can't say it was five or six, but I just remember, hey, we had to make a decision. I just want to make sure as we are offering new courses, we still have those courses available for those that may or may not want to go that route. Yes. Um, so thank you for that. Absolutely. You can take an AP course and

112not take the test though, right? You can. However, with the new 3E model, it is highly discouraged because it's not based on the letter grade you score at the end of the term. It's based off of the letter grade and the score you receive on the AP assessment. Well, I mean, you know, I'm I'm thinking of a long time ago when a lot of school systems are willing to pay for the first six, five, depending on where they're at, AP exams. That way students are encouraged to maximize the accreditation indicators. However, still have the opportunity to take more should they choose to. Um, we're exploring and engaged in conversation with that on how we're going to incorporate uh support just like CTE credentials. We don't want the burden to be on the student. Right. Okay.

113Yeah. I like I like this and I I like that we're looking at continuing to provide more and more rigorous classes for our students, but I also like this specifically with the research in the seminar in that um it's going to help our kids learn to critically think, critically evaluate data and information coming at them so they can create a formed not a formed opinion, but a formed thought process on it. I I tell you what, I um went to Zion's Crossroads to to judge and score some of the uh governor schools from the not just Nelson County, but from the region. And in those conversations, I asked some of the upper cortile students there like how did you get so much more in depth? How did you research? I mean, they were miniature dissertations

114and some of them even said my research course, my seminar courses. So it provided the foundation to make these kids and their their governor school projects just exemplary. One of the things that we've heard as our kids move on into, you know, if they decide to go into secondary into college or or courses there, um, one of the things that we've heard is that the preparation, right? Like are they ready for the rigor, the independence, the research and and I think courses like this really help. they take a course like this, they're they're miles above their peers in in getting started on some of those courses. I mean, it's really it's a huge prep for some kids. The research and seminar and the conversation that we had with Fairfax representatives today, they're not exclusively for

115honors level and higher students. They were offering this up to CTE students with certain interest, agriculture students wanting to explore a local environmental issue. And you know in the AP seminar they're working as a team to explore it to gather data and so they're peing their own interest and it's forming their trajectory through high school and their classes that they're taking as a result of that. So it's great critical thinking it is no matter what could truly be a formative course and I think the the misconception of AP is only for a collegebound student. These classes are really supporting, you know, we keep talking about the portrait of a graduate and 5C's, but like that is a career ready preparation because what is it we hear from employers? We need, you know, they're they're not

116they're not able to solve problems. They they want to be given the answers. They don't have the initiative. They don't know what to do to go find the answers. Um, and so this is the type of course that yes, it'll give you a leg up if you decide to be um, post-secary, but it'll give you a leg up in this current work environment of you're the person entering in in an entry level or maybe getting a job that you don't need the handholding. You know how to go get information. You know how to think critically and solve problems, work with others, be creative about it. And and I think that that's what I we really appreciated about these courses is the opportunities is not specific, you know, I think we take pride in we don't

117want to just promote college. We are promoting careers. Um not not specific jobs like careers. What are you going to do? Um and you're prepared to be in college, but if you so choose to go in the direction of a career, you're ready to go. And that overall life ready. I think if anything we saw from COVID and and other things is like people just weren't the life piece of coming back out of it and being prepared and being able to move forward. I think that that's um something that's really important to us is that we're just prepared for whatever direction you go in and not you know pigeon hoing well you're AP then if you're AP then you can only go this direction and you must go to college. You're just being prepared and

118I think that that's important to us. Well, and I I really like your examples, your example of of saying whether you're a CTE person, the ability to do this course and find some life skill, some work skill out of it. Excuse me, Mr. Yeah. And I think that's the important point. I think it's how we communicate it and market it to our students because I don't think everyone has that understanding. Um, and I love hearing the different avenues and that creative approach of how we get all kids into those classes. So, I appreciate whatever new communication or marketing we can do as we talk to our students about their next path because I do think there is a perception out there that those courses are only geared toward individuals that want to go to two

119four-year colleges and there's also a perception that they can't get into them. So, I appreciate hearing that and the thought process through that. Yeah. Thank you. Absolutely. I'm excited that um this is all-encompassing because, you know, once kids understand what this is about, it is going to help kids prepare. You know, part of going to college is is understanding how to be a college student, right? How to prepare a paper, how to research, how to footnote properly, all of those things. But in the CTE world, in the working world, but even as a consumer, it's hard for young people to see this far ahead, but eventually they're going to have to buy a car. They're going to have to buy a house. And you need to be able to research these things, you know, so

120that you can protect yourself as a consumer. And yeah, it just makes you a more rounded well-rounded person. So, I'm I'm very excited about this and the other things that you all are doing as far as evaluating students in middle school and then re-evaluating them um in the high school um which you know we've had many conversations about those things and I'm just very excited about that because it just helps them down the road no matter what they decide to do they're going to be more successful doing that workforce readiness thing. That's right. I just think that the way you're presenting it the the child, the student can go back to the parent and help them understand, you know, the opportunities that they have and then the parent can easily easily understand what their child

121is trying to do and not say, well, this is not for you. That they understand there's a component here that will help them further their education and do some of the things that they thought maybe their child wasn't ready for. So, I appreciate that part of it, too. I think it's great. Makes me want to go back to school, but not really. 5,000 words. That's hard. Thank you so much. Absolutely. Thank you for your time. All right. Now, we have a budget update or no, budget update. Yeah. I think I I may have um stolen down. I think I'm in trouble. All right. Tell us. So, we good. We're good. Yeah. I think right now we're just awaiting Okay. state budget um federal I mean we're just awaiting more information. Okay. Right. But in the

122pro but I will emphasize in the process trying to think through if this happens this is our response or this is potential um decisions that we'll have to make. I mean, we want to be prepared to know what we can do, you know, if if something happens with rate, if something happens with C, if something happens, we need to be thinking through um, right? So, we're like in the calm before, right? Before the call. Um, okay. So, now we're at items for action, which we usually zoom through, but I just want to ask you this question about this one. You ready? Okay. Um, so I'm just going be calling for some some motions here. So, first one is approval approval of VSBA policy updates. The second reading of those policies. Any questions or comments or

123anything like that? All right. Then I will entertain a motion to approve those policies. I move that we approve the VSBA policy updates February 2025. I'll second. All in favor? Okay. Now we need to um approve the 2425 Perkins 5 CTE local plan. I move we approve the 2024 2025 Perkins 5 CTE local plan as presented. I'll second. All in favor? I. Perfect. Perfecto. Now we uh need to approve the BDOE authorization of sign signature and absence of the division superintendent. I make a motion that we're approved of the video um approval of signing the division superintendent as absent. Second. All in favor? I I um now we have surplus items to approve. Is there any I didn't ask anybody this questions or anything like that, but does anybody have any questions? Um Dr. Hester,

124do you want us to just say even though the the donation one, do you want to do them separate or the same? I think you can do it in one. Okay. So, um I need a motion to approve surplus items. Disposal of surplus items. I'll make a motion to approve the disposal of surplus items. All in I second. Sorry. All in favor? I perfect. All right. And now we have an overnight field trip request. I move that we approve the field trip request by the FFA for an overnight trip uh for the Nelson Middle School Nelson County High School to Virginia Tech for the state FFA convention. I'll second. All in favor? I I I Perfect. Awesome. Okay. Now, we would need a motion to go into close session. I believe it's only for personnel

125items or if we don't have any questions or anything. Just personnel. Just personnel. I move that the board go into close session to discuss and consider the personnel report and other confidential personnel matters as authorized by Virginia Code 2.2-3711A1 2-3711A1 for purposes of discussion or consideration of prospective candidates for employment, assignment, appointment, promotion, performance, demotion, salaries, disciplining or resignation of specific public officers, appointees or employees of any public body. Second. All in favor? I. Perfect. We are now in close session. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. [Music] [Applause] [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat [Music] up here. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Applause] [Music]