001e for e e for okay Welcome to our first business meeting of March today is March 10th 2025 we entered into close session earlier this afternoon um and now we're back out and ready to continue with business we will begin with a moment of silence if you'd like to join us thank you at this time we'll stand for the Pledge of Allegiance un stes Indy and jce the first thing on our agenda tonight um are public comments in which there are no signups for that so we will now close public comments at this time and move on to action items and we'll begin with um a motion to approve the minutes and board members if there was a motion to approve all three sets that would be fabulous I move we accept the minutes as
002presented from February 20th 2025 February 24th 2025 and February 27th 2025 thank you Miss Laura do I have a second second who's got that Miss cave okay thank you um all those in favor of approving the minutes for February 20 24 and 27 um of 2025 please say yes yes yes any opposed motion passes 5 Z next on our list are some field trips Dr shifflet I believe you have that one uh yes chair HST and board members I have one field trip for your consideration Wilbur ESP Pence Middle School honor require April 24th through the 26 three students to Richmond and I do recommend approval of this field trip thank you Dr shifflet board members do I hear a motion to follow his recommendation thank you Mr Cross how about a second thank you
003miss bergoin any uh discussions or comments all those in favor say yes yes yes all those opposed say no motion to approve the field trips says presented f it passes 5 Z next up on our action items um is a policy revision chair Hurst and board members I recommend approval of the proposed policy revision as presented this is policy BCF of was presented last meeting as information thank you Dr shifflet board members do I hear a motion I move we follow the superintendent's recommendation to approve the proposed policy as presented thank you Miss Laura is there a second thank you Mr Cross um is there any discussion or comments hearing none all those in favor say yes yes yes all those opposed say no motion to uh approve the proposed policy revision passes 5 Z
004next oh Dr shifflet you're just going to keep rolling yes I have next up a series of books I have a series of books seven books and we'll start with the first one uh chair Hurst and board members upon review by the content Review Committee in accordance with rcps policy I ABB I recommend removing red white and Royal Blue by Casey mcquilton because the book contains sexually explicit content as that term is defined in rcps policy I iaba thank you thank you Dr shifflet board members do I hear a motion so moved thank you Miss cave do I hear a second thank you miss beroy any discussion all those in favor of following the superintendent's recommendation to remove red white and royal blue please signify by saying yes yes yes all those opposed say no
005motion passes 5 chair Hurst and board members upon review by the content Review Committee in accordance with rcps policy I ABB I recommend retaining philx Ever After by Cas kandler as the book does not contain sexually explicit content as that term is defined in rcps policy iaba thank you Dr shifflet board members do I hear a motion I move to remove Felix Ever After by Cas calendar as this book does contain sexually explicit content as that term is defined in rcps policy c i i AB a thank you Miss cave do I hear a second thank you Mr Cross any discussion from board members um just for public record explicit content was found on pages 200 255 and 256 of that book any other discussion okay all those in favor of removing Felix Ever After
006please say yes yes yes all those opposed say no no motion passes 41 hereon board members excuse me chair Hurst and board members upon review by the content Review Committee in accordance with rcps policy I ABB I recommend retaining stars in their eyes by Jessica Walton as the book does not contain sexually explicit content as that term is defined in rcps policy I a thank you Dr shifflet board members do I hear a motion I move to retain the book stars in their eyes by Jessica Walton at the high school level only thank you Miss cave do I hear a second thank you Miss pery board members any discussion hearing none all those in favor of retaining stars in their eyes at the high school only um please say yes yes all those opposed say
007no motion passes 5 chair Hurst and board members upon review by the content Review Committee in accordance with rcps policy I I ABB I recommend retaining fade by Lisa McCain as a book does not contain sexually explicit content as that term is defined in rcps policy iaba thank you Dr shifflet board members do I hear a motion I move to to remove the book fade by Lisa McMahon as this book does contain sexually explicit content as that term is defined in rcps policy I I ABA thank you Miss cave do I hear a second thank you Mr Cross any discussion for public record explicit content in this book can be found on pages 101 to 103 and 183 all the way through Page 190 any other discussion hearing none all those in favor of removing
008fade um please say yes yes all those opposed say no no motion passes 41 chair Hurston board members upon review by the content Review Committee in accordance with rcps policy I ABB I recommend removing tilt by Ellen Hopkins because the book contains sexually explicit content as that term is defined in rcps policy iaba thank you Dr shifflet board members do I hear a motion so moved thank you Miss cave how about a second thank you Mr Cross any discussion hearing none all those in favor say yes yes all those oppos say no motion passes 5 chair he and board members on review by the content Review Committee in accordance with rcps policy I ABB I recommend removing tricks by Ellen Hopkins because the book contains sexually explicit content as that determ is defined in rcps
009policy iaba thank you board members do I hear a motion so so moved thank you Miss cave how about a second I feel like I'm running an auction here uh any discussion all those in favor of removing tricks please say yes yes all those opposed say no motion passes 5 Z one more chair he and board members upon review by the content Review Committee in accordance with rcps policy IAB I recommend retaining the duff by Cody keplinger as the book does not contain sexually explicit content as that determ is defined in rcps policy IAB baa thank you Dr shifflet do I hear a motion I move to remove the book The Duff by Cody keplinger as this book does contain sexually explicit content as that term is defined in rcps policy I I ABA thank
010you Miss cave do I hear a second thank you Mr Cross board members any I'll give that discussion board members any discussion oh I'm sorry for public right here sorry uh for public record the the explicit content Pages can be found on page 34 52 and 53 65 through 68 75 83 91 95 105 to 106 131 to 132 138 148 to 149 165 167 to 168 176 to 177 and 224 to 225 any other discussion we have a motion to remove the deaf all those in favor say yes yes all those opposed say no motion passes for one that wraps up our action items for this evening next up on our agenda are two information items and we'll start off with a Rockingham County Special Education report um given to us by Mr Chris
011Bryant I'm going to let the team get up here real quick before we start will you introduce your team to us yes I will that was part of my plan oh good so chair HST members of the board Dr shifflet thank you first of all for um offering an opportunity for special education to prevent brag about our Department uh what we do for um students and teachers and staff families in Rockingham County Public Schools uh couple of school board meetings ago uh our special education advisory committee presented uh kind of an update on special education from the parents point of view and I appreciate um Amber ham our president of the seak sharing that information we have some seak members here tonight and we want to just follow up with some additional data that I
012think supports um their their focus for our department so like to introduce you to the Dream Team this is the Dream Team uh from my childhood anyway that was the USA basketball team we have uh Miss Carrie Miss Carrie Wilburn Carrie is on the West Side supervisor for special education Carrie was in schools this weekend working and planning for stud a teacher who's out on leave I mean that's the kind of thing we've got going uh Dr Ashley Hal out of District school placements Ashley is fantastic ftic with helping students who need more supports and our schools may not be able to provide it so we appreciate Ashley Miss SAR wymer East Side supervisor excellent she's know been known to be in an elementary school on the weekends planning for a teacher who's out and
013we need lesson plans so that's the kind of Dream Team we've got very proud and honored to be a part of it and I'm going to get out of the way so I can show them off a little bit uh but I'd like to recognize two more staff members Jen Baker if you raise your hand Jen come on excellent special ed teacher we stole from Peak View um so sorry Peak View but she's been great for us with 504 student study child study and Miss Sarah FY any any student 14 to 21 years old transition postgrad they do a great job so we started with a slide that just really represents what we're all about and that is just some of our programs the students and teachers and staff uh that we love and want
014to support so we started out that way because we want the public and you all to know how much it means to us to work for these young people um what I would say is tonight we're going to share some information we're really proud of some successes we're going to share some challenges we we feel we're facing uh just due to the natural course of growth in our department and some data and some graphs that will be accurate information um and will help you be informed about maybe the future of our programs so with that first graph the first graph is really what we call the December one count for the last couple of years um and for those who don't know every year we need to report to the state an accurate number of
015students who receive special education services and in Rockingham County you can see 20124 and our current today today so uh small stairstep growth and kind of evidence shows you that we're 11% by the way of students with disabilities in our school division 11% of our students have a disability uh I want to read a couple things on this slide in addition to the current students noted in these graphs who are in our public school buildings we have an additional 157 students served by special Educators that include walk-in speech students under the age of five grad class students students served by a teacher in the home students served in a daycare setting and students served in private placements in residential settings additionally our special Educators support 38 students with individualized service plans and are either homeschooled
016or in private parochial schools so there are another 157 students on the yellow that we make sure we provide for that don't come to our buildings this is a graph of all 13 disability categories nationally that all public schools need to Monitor and make sure we take care of um it's small uh the main things that I would like you to know about this slide are there a lot of even steady growth there are a couple disabilities that stand out with more significant growth and I really want to talk about those um and focus in them why we we want to Target that so with those are the four breakout disabilities we have on the farle speech language impairment other health impairment next autism and visual impairment are the four categories um speech is increasing
017and the need for speech language Pathologists is not going away so uh we want to make sure we we Pro provide uh children with the spe language Services they need uh so they're intelligible and they can understand the spoken word we will be looking at our speech language pathologist need uh other health impairment you might typically see that with students with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder what we're seeing is more mental health needs and we want to meet those needs anxiety depression and mental health needs are something that is very important that we make sure we address um in addition to Liza Kaufman's Department who does a fabulous job with those mental health needs autism is on the rise nationally we want to meet those needs we have asked for more autism programs year to year
018um we've got this team here supporting teachers of students with autism and it's growing and then for some reason we've had a swell in Vision impairment we've just had an increase and our vision teachers do do a great job but I got to see a little guy at Pleasant Valley who types with Braille and he's the cutest thing in the world if you get a chance go to Pleasant Valley and see that guy do his thing it's awesome and then they walk the building with his Cane to make sure he can navigate um the community that he he goes to school in so awesome stuff um so a couple of percentage points and then I'll turn it over to the Dream Team 15% increase in elementary students identified for student as as students with disabilities
019from last year to this year 15% uh 133% increase in the students identified as having a speech language impairment 8% increase in students identified as having an other health impairment again that can be a health condition ADHD mental health challenges 16% increase in students having autism autism is on the rise and it's because we understand it better 46 % increase in students with vision impairment and all other disability categories have maintained uh pretty steady so now please hear from others and we will continue to work hard every day regardless of what what comes of our presentation but we need you to know what we're asking for thank you all right so as a number of students with disabilities have increased in Rockingham County and the needs of those students have continued to evolve it's important
020that we be thinking about the ways that we can best meet those needs as a special education leadership team we've developed a three-year road map that will allow for high quality outcomes for students while providing needed support for our teachers as this has been a focus for Rockingham County it has also been a focus for special education at the state level as well here you can see the special education road map from the Virginia Department of Education while this road map is a continual Loop we recognize that all aspects of this map are vital to the outcomes of students I'd like to start at the center or the heart of the road map with parental engagement when a parent comes to one of our school buildings with concerns regarding their child we begin to build
021a relationship that will continue through this child's life until they exit School Services it is important that we build a firm foundation high quality instruction it is essential for a student to be able to develop skills to access the curriculum as designed and participate in their least restrictive environment inclusion it allows students to participate with their peers for Meaningful instruction to provide learning improve learning outcomes monitoring the purpose of monitoring are the checks and balances of the state and federal regulations our department oversees this for all special education students and we report directly to the Department of Education postsecondary transition within our department Sarah Folly is instrumental in supporting students parents and staff regarding transitional needs for students she works closely with families and a variety of community agencies finally recruiting and retaining qualified staff
022to support our students continues to be at the Forefront for rcps we continue working to grow our teachers knowledge through professional development mentorship collaboration with grow your own initiatives and universities next Ashley's going to come speak about our current Staffing and data related to how we compare to other divisions within the state this is a visual representation of our division special education leadership whereby we still have Chris as a director and this is just kind of a reminder of what he's everyone he's introduced myself Sarah wymer and Carrie Wilburn are their supervisors for pupil Personnel Services Eastside schools and Westside schools Jen Baker new to our team is a facilitator for PPS and Sarah fol for transition Services we are the division leaders for all things special education school health and Student Records this is
023a four District comparison of similar siiz division with total enrollment Andor total identified special education enrollment using the December 1 count for the 2024 25 data available from vdoe each division's leadership staff is listed alongside Rockingham County for comparison as well the summarized number of leadership positions is noted at the bottom all of this information is presented to demonstrate the need for additional support in the field to assist our increasing population of students being identified students with disabilities right now Carrie and Sarah are serving multiple roles as supervisors mentors and instructional coaches the needs of our students are vast and more extensive than ever before the needs of Staff also require our attention as we're fortunate to have individuals fill the role of a special education teacher but not all of these teachers are coming
024into our classroom adequately prepared and have experience working with students with special needs there we are charged with equipping them with knowledge skills and resources to educate our students all of this is to say we have reason to expand our department offer our teachers and students the opportunities that they need and deserve as you can see there's some noticeable differences between rockamp County's division special education leaders and similar siiz divisions it is our goal to enhance our department and add staff to our schools that can address the diversity of needs and strengthen the quality of our education ators this is a little more aesthetically pleasing visual um it represents the division's leadership teams Rockingham is vastly smaller with fewer boots on the ground than our comparable divisions according to austa County officials next year they
025have already budgeted for two more facilitators to already expand on their team our goal in three years is to have support comparable to these similar size divisions all of our efforts are to ensure we are providing the most appropriate education to our students with disabilities Carrie will now introduce our programmatic needs and our comprehensive plan for special education staff Rockingham currently has six School psychologists on staff comparing the previous divisions we mentioned Bedford County has eight York has 10 and Augusta has six National Association of school psychologists recommends ratio of one school psychologist to 5 to 700 students our school psychologist ratio is currently 1 to 2,240 students there are currently four universities in Virginia that offer School Psychology programs JMU UVA William M Mary and George Mason and all divisions are competing to get
026those school psychologist according to Dr Michael Lions director of clinical and school psychology at the University of Virginia education faces a tremendous shortage of school psychologists in the Commonwealth and Across the Nation while we observe a significant rise in youth Mental Health Care needs we see a need to add an additional school psychologist to meet our students needs the following positions added over three years will bring Rockingham County school special education leadership to where colleagues in other counties are operating the following staff positions will be housed in school buildings not the central office positions in yellow are current positions year one positions are in red we are requesting one General special education and one adapted Elementary instructional coach one General special education and one adapted secondary instructional coach we're asking for a float nurse coordinator
027for the purpose of overseeing school health programs your two positions are in green adding another pair of Elementary and secondary General and adapted special education instructional coaches makes the total a set for each side a preschool coordinator who will oversee the Virginia preschool initiative our preschool programs and early childhood special education programs year three positions are in blue an additional set of element Elementary instructional coaches General and adapted and an Autism coach to oversee instruction and programmatic needs for our self-contained autism classrooms we view this road map as a fluid process to address Staffing and programmatic needs it is anticipated we may need to review our road map and addressed accordingly Rockingham is focused on continued Improvement and several focused areas came from last year's Virginia Department of Education special education audit I will now
028share our programmatic needs this year we've worked hard with Michelle Jud to increase four-year-old inclusion in preschool classrooms um we are excited about the possibility of K12 um adapted curriculum differential pay for staff we are excited about um the potential for a second grad class teacher um we have uh fostered a strong partnership between our special education leadership and our um English learner um director Alicia Corell Clark um we see a need to add an additional behavior um board certified behavior analyst um from the Virginia or I'm sorry the Shido Valley Regional program bringing our bcbas to five um we are excited about East Rock High School hosting um a a high school behavioral support program and then a return to the middle school program for most multiple disabilities classroom uh that's currently housed at
029cuun elementary with students grades K through 7 um an increase in speech language pathologist and an addition of a speech language Lead Teacher who will also oversee the assisted technology needs in the division um an increase in alternative education options for our U most challenging and hard to educate students um continue to provide strong professional development for our special education teachers as where as our as well as our par professionals and increase our number of school psychologists Chris will uh our fearless leader will wrap up our presentation I do want to see if there's any questions I I'm just so proud of the dream team and the work that's being done we think we're going to continue hiring folks who are less experienced career switchers uh we've had a lot of success with our pair
030of professionals getting their degrees um but the cool thing about those folks who come from another profession is they bring life's lessons they bring life experiences but they don't have our background with Ida the law so those coaches will help bridge that Gap they'll help our new talented people who may have changed careers or our peras get caught up as as Educators so uh we'll continue working hard and uh you can see we've got a strong team support our our administrators and our teachers any questions board members do you have any questions for Mr Bryant I could you get back with us on a breakdown on the on the first graph you showed there with the speech SL language and give us an idea of how many uh language would be ESL added into that
031number yes sir um also I'm guessing Miss FY is is are you part of the um grad class students okay could you kind of talk a little bit about that yes sir I think that Farah is going to be presenting nationally sometime very soon because she's doing some really cool stuff and vase is kind of the the premier special ed um uh conference and she's doing some cool things so we've got Spotswood has 18 to 21 year old group who are just getting acclimated to Life After High School uh going out doing career Readiness things Independent Living um but at once they've got the foundation at Spotswood with Haley schaw they can go to bluid and become college students at 1920 and then from there they're doing some of the same things um and they
032just helped us with procedural safeguards this week we printed new procedural safeguards on the same color paper as the last revised copy so teachers folks would be confused they helped us make sure that they were there was a big delineation that people could quickly see the new version of proced procedural safeguards um they can stay through 21 years old okay Sarah's working to get um JMU to give us a classroom spot for next year so we could be at Harrisonburg um we could be at Blue Ridge and JMU next year and have kids going through college I I just want to mention I I like the I I caught there where it said staff in schools and I do like that idea not adding more at central office but having them actually in the schools
033uh serving and helping there so thank you for mentioning that and just want to say un noted I almost want to liken it to an AED when it's needed yeah I know you don't want me coming from central office to Al midle you want the AED to be more readily available and in the building and available and that's what these coaches are and these facilitators in these additional positions they immediate support you know as it's needed and just to be clear was the on the graph near the uh last page there the first year you guys are advocating for was that in green see here yeah I see it on one red red red I'm sorry red okay I see first Year's red and and again I don't think I shared this but Dr shiff
034challenged me when I came on board and I'm honored to be the director said I I need a comprehensive plan of this department um what what is not a Band-Aid what is something that's going to be uh allinclusive and long long range so this is this is what we did and so what do you do towards the end of a three-year plan you start talking about the next one so we know this might have to wax Wayne move around as they had mentioned but we hope to stay close to the three-year plan until 2028 and then we'll be talking to you about another one but thank you all we feel supported uh thank thanks to the executive team and uh we'll keep doing the work any other board members have questions uh you mentioned the
035need for psychologists uh can we get them are they available because I mean there there have been a couple there have been several positions while I've been on the board that were like oh we need this yeah we can't get do can are they available and are we competitive with them good questions that second question is a hard one right some of these have some of these folks have better answers than I do so uh Dr painer did work and go to bat for an intern so we've got a psych psychologist intern next year she can have a case load to 30 students uh from JMU that's going to relieve us a little bit but we really need a true uh seventh school psychologist next year our pay is not as competitive with a couple
036neighboring School divisions um we like to think our climate culture is you know awesome and and a selling point but we certainly would need to do the kind of a case study of surrounding compensation to be competitive and and I'll be honest they've come to me and asked me to make sure to advocate for that very thing um I'm trying to get more staff so that makes their job a little more reasonable but they they could benefit from looking at those pay scales as well and um these people could be in private practice right and probably make more uh yeah yeah somebody talk speak to the the point yeah when you're in private practice um you evaluate and hand a report that then has to come to the school and be reviewed by the child
037study team um and so yes essentially I'm sure they have a case load that they work through but it's not as um demanding timelines aren't of the essence and yes and could we just use private practice people for this there are different credentials okay go ahead and share Car Works closely with them we do utilize them for when an independent evaluation is needed um and that's worked into Chris's budget so if a if a parent disagrees with a finding that their child is not eligible then a parent has the right to request an independent evaluation and so it's better I'm sorry go ahead it's better to have them in house because yeah I well I mean I understand it's a need to have an independent that's that's a need in any division that you have
038to Outsource it when there's um a dis um when a a parent dissents or disagrees with the finding so that won't go away but I would say the need for the um School psychologist is as you can tell we've had an increase in in students identified and so in order for that to happen they have to be evaluated and that requires numerous meetings um long reports that need to be written timelines that have to be met so yes and we can contract the drawback is that they're not invested so much in the school system they don't know the kids by name the principal by name and they may say I want to do this part of the job but not this part I'll do the reports but I don't want to come to your meetings
039and we just can't we need our own people so they'll do all parts of the uh testing and eligibility process where did car where did you say they graduate from the University um JMU UVA William Mary and I think I said George George Mason and I'm guessing we've reached out to them so currently um JMU has eight students graduating in May next year there's a cohort of 11 and um those people are not are not coming here when we when we're looking at pay what what's the what's the difference we're looking at they always tell me not to talk pay compensation but I mean at the end of the day that's I mean I think the thing is that Pap scales are public knowledge and we could do a we could do a a quick
040study on that comparison and get you that information um if you'd like um without too much effort yeah I mean psycho EDS are if they don't have enough social workers some of the school psychologists in other school divisions are doing both what's called a psycho educational and so that's more that's that's that's more work as well so um again I think we should look at compensation and really look at their their colleagues in other divisions abut and we can do that for you and just gather the data thank you Miss cave did you have any questions um those percentages that you were giving in the beginning um that had gone up autism and and other things um do we we don't have the those percentages in this packet do we I keep looking and I
041don't see them I'm just interested in having them and and were those percentages that have gone up in our school systems or was that like in the country or school system in our school system okay and those are today's numbers okay thank you why do you think they're going up well a couple are staying steady great question I don't know that since 2020 anything's been constant I mean in the last four or five years we've seen more needs and uh some of it is uh just continuing to work on our pre-referral tiered systems of support interventions to try and help students make up that make up that that loss so that they don't have to go through the whole process of being identified so that would be the first thing I would say is let's
042beef up our respon to intervention and programs before um autism's On The Rise nationally we know more about it it's an awesome uh large disability that we need to continue to support and so it's going to grow everywhere right now um speech growing did I hear you say that um autism is just being identified more it's not that more people have autism just that we're getting better at identifying it yes yes both both there's no known cause of for autism once you've seen someone with autism you've seen one person with autism it's 100 miles wide you know so but yeah it's on the rise we've got some great Educators teaching autism but it's hard to keep them you'll hear some possibilities of needing to fill some of those positions as well but we need good
043people but it's on basically special education students are on the r the numbers are on the rise everywhere not just people moving into our area it's not just because our student body is growing it's because that population is growing for unknown reason it's all over it's been five years now some of the kids from the p i mean we're getting we're still getting Fallout from that in every School Division across the country is so it's it's going to continue until we get I don't know through a complete graduating class of a pandemic I mean and I don't know it's just going to continue to grow for now is what we see the trend being thank you Mr Bryant and your fabulous team I appreciate you coming this evening to present this information to us um
044just a note for for the public for anyone who's listening for your team um we're working on this I think a number of these items if not all of the items you've requested are in our budget and we are am I right Dr shifflet I think I think we've got the four curriculum coaches the floater nurse um and a number of these of course like a number of these other um program needs that you've identified a lot of those are priorities for us in this budget and so we they remain y things that we're working on and of course um it's always hard to balance the needs of the division but this this one remains a priority so thank you for all that you all do and thank you for coming this evening to present
045to us thank you okay next on our list um Becky tanel is coming our supervisor of attendance compliance en Title 9 to um submit a couple of policy revisions for us to review and consider yes nice to see you all it's been a little while um chair horse Dr shevet members of the board um you do have some policies that have been revised um there are four that are current revisions of Rockingham County policies and then there's one that um was a vsba policy that's been revised and so it's now been changed over to a Rockingham County policy um I'm happy to answer any questions and several of the supervisors that put these policies up for revision or here this evening if you have questions or I'm happy to answer them between now and the
046next board meeting board members do you have any questions for tonight I have one question and that's on policy let me make sure I get the right set of letters g CBB a um that is the policy on adjustments in annual contract salaries for teachers when additional academic work is completed um I noticed we've crossed out some things tell me um can you help me understand are we saying we're no longer going to be paying for half completion of Masters and Doctorate Degrees or that's the way I see it I'll ask Dr payner you got to have it in full that that's what we're saying like we won't pay for havies we're only paying for the full completion okay there's only we only currently do half for Masters okay okay would that would be effective
047for the next contract we're right it we wouldn't all of a sudden start not paying this year for half CE I see I see for for those of you that maybe didn't hear that I guess I miss read that cuz I looked at Masters plus 15 what you're saying is you if you're teaching in Rockham County you've got a Bachelor's that's Baseline um but we do give uh supplemental pay for having 15 credit hours or half of your masters that stays um and then of course the supplemental contract for master's degrees what we're doing is we're ending the ones that are like Master's plus got it thank you for clarifying but my question was if they have half their masters right now and we pass this will they they won't see the pay decrease if
048you will until next until July or will that go in effect immediately it seems to me like if you've got your bachelors and you're halfway to your Masters you're still keeping that supplement it would be your master 15 if you're used to receiving reing it my question is if you're receiving it currently whatever it is that we're eliminating that's is it is it in your monthly pay oh well there you go then okay yeah okay okay thank you good then thank you thank you for clarifying board members any other questions thank you okay thanks that concludes our information items um next on our agenda item number seven committee reports um board members are there any committees that have a report they'd like to give I do thank you Miss cave um so I attended the
049um on February 26th I think it was I attended the mass Regional Governor school meeting as the RC CPS representative um have sat on that committee since we came on the board and so it's been a lot of information but it's good um and it's always good to be able to travel up there and see what our students are doing but um there were a few changes this year that I wanted to bring back to you um this is not a change but just something that I learned that I did not know um that I did know that we follow um for governor School shanida County's calendar um but it was mentioned this year at the meeting that we follow that calendar um for the purposes of them having school while there's an SRO in
050the building and so I was really appreciative of that me I thought that was thoughtful and of course they would think of that but it's just something that maybe the public didn't know so I wanted to bring that back to you all um they did reduced tuition to localities um that was basically to decrease the fund balance I think the um what from what I understood they they never meant for that fund balance to be high and so to decrease that and sort of level it out um they cut the tuition for each student I think it was like $79 per student so it brings it to 4250 um that's $4,250 per student um and the way that they did that I think previously the formula uh for figuring tuition was um used or was
051figured by using the local Composite Index and um of course every Count's LCI is different and so um in all fairness I think this is a really great idea um they sort of leveled it out across all the divisions um to bring that down so basically everybody every school is paying the same amount now so I thought that was a good thing that I wanted to bring back to you all and then the other thing was that they are um this coming fall I don't know if this is tentative or it's definitely happening we're going to start offering dual enrollment courses at um Mass Regional Governor school it will not be for the governor students Governor school students it will be for um anyone within our high schools uh well 11th and 12th grade yeah
052um so not just anyone but um this does not have to be Governor school enroles this can be any of our students and I think that one or two of the courses that they're offering there was duplicate to what we already offer in Rockingham County but then there were two or three others that will be other dual enrollment courses that our students can enroll in so um definitely if your students interested in that uh check it out the number that they threw out there for starting was 24 students um from well I want to say Rockingham but it may be in each School Division um 24 each so um but that I guess that number could change based on um planning curriculum and all of that for the upcoming year so um oh and those
053classes will be asynchronous I wanted to throw that out there too to the public and I think that's all I had Dr shifflet did you want to add anything you're much more knowledgeable about this than than I am as far as the do enrollment goes so we've shared the information with Mrs abery and Miss cman they'll be sharing with the high school counselor so they can they'll have that information as students are working on their schedules for next year to see where it may uh be a good fit for a student who who would want to add one of these dual enrollment courses to their schedule so uh they'll they'll they'll our our counselors will have this information and be able to disseminate that to our students so yes thank you for mentioning that and
054that's all I have thank you thank you Miss cave Dr shifflet you're next on the on the list for superintendent comments all righty here here we go so the way I look at it it's 13 days a spring break so it um it counts all now that's provided that we don't have any snow between now and and then so uh but as of today we're planning for spring break it actually will kick off with the teacher work day on Friday uh March 28th and then the following week March 31st to April 4th will be spring break and also we're planning to have the holiday April 18th and April 21st around the um Easter holiday as well provided again that the weather cooperates so just want to let everyone know that I'll be communicating that with
055our uh faculty and staff as well as our community just so folks understand the direction that we're currently headed um in terms of snow days also wanted to say that Friday I had the opportunity to go to the Smith house galleries for the art vision and I want to say that was uh very uh impressive they collected four pieces of artwork from all of our schools all 23 schools had artwork represented there and to to take a tour of the facility and see all of our students work displayed uh it's pretty awesome and uh the things that our students can do and I also want to add as we've talked about the musical season and attending musicals at the musicals I've had a chance to um attend they've had an art show as well before
056or during intermission and and then afterwards and again um the the things that our students can do with a pencil or crayons or paintbrush it's it's pretty impressive and it's always just nice to see their magnificent work and finally I just want to say uh best of luck to the Spotswood boys basketball team as they'll be playing for a state championship on um Saturday versus Hopewell so I hope they can bring this one home I believe the last state basketball title in the valley was 1993 it's been a while so yeah thank you Dr shifflet um next up our school board member highlights questions and comments Mr Cross we'll start with you this evening my brother Shannon was on that 199 three basketball team so and it's the last time they've won a state championship
057they've been to several state championships and um just haven't been able to get through at it I know um coach Edwards is really looking to get over that hump they had a big game uh last Friday night and beat a big opponent and I you know one thing that a lot of people may not know is that they've done um spectacular this year with um with less than what they possibly could have they had a few student athletes that didn't come out and play uh this year that was on the team last year and I'm I remember walking by coach Edward's uh classroom at the beginning of the year and he didn't look uh his chipper self that what he usually is and um talked with few other people found out kind of a little
058bit what was going on and remember having Dr schiffler go out and say see if you can go out there and see how he's doing and I'm just so happy uh that they've made it um this year as far as they have and to see what they've done this year is just just very incredible to make it to the state uh championship game and so good luck to all those on team I also congratulations to our girls uh varsity basketball team you guys had a heck of a season as well and to have uh at Spotswood High School two State Games with the uh boys basketball and girls basketball it shows you the the programs there with that we have with our girls and our boys and I'm it's the best in the state at
059Spotswood High School so um it kind of leads me a little bit into I one of the things I've been doing as a Schoolboard member over the past three years is really advocating for my district in District 3 um for for better facilities um uh we are the oldest high school um in uh the district or in the division and um it shows when you go up to Spotswood and you walk the hallways you when you visit uh the facilities I was joking around with some uh people this week and I said U if we can't fix some of the things maybe we just see if we can work with scheduling with Mr bayor and just have all home games so we don't see all the other facilities because when you go to places like
060Broadway there had um who's had upgrades and had additions and had things done you just see the you see the difference and I and i' I've filled those complaints with people you know the Lance uh video construction that came out last year uh it was really nice it's good to see the what we're doing with all of our high schools but people within my division see that they're like wow there's a big difference U of facilities when you look at the other schools and so um I have been advocating for the past three years with the old board and this board with a couple of things there and um I was glad that the board last year thank you for um approving the ADA compliance when it came to the football uh stadium with the
061bleachers there so a lot of people in my district this right now are very happy with what they're seeing going on there with that but we have other we have a lot of other things and to keep on telling my district well you just got to wait till 2027 2028 until we do Renovations it's it's difficult um it's a difficult task to do and um you know the concession stands in the bathrooms up at the softball field um it's not ada8 compliance because there's no bathroom up there for um handicap folks to be able to go use the restroom they have to get back in their vehicle and drive around the the the school and go into one of the bathrooms down in the school and they have Porter John's up there it looks like
0621980s still at at Spotswood with a lot of our facilties so I'm hoping that in this um budget I know we're tight you know we we we talk about things tonight with special wed and and the things that we have to fulfill uh it's important but I I will say this publicly as I've always said um Athletics and public high and Public Schools is very very important and I understand that we are number one uh academic uh and then it comes to sports but if you take Sports out of the public schools you take out a lot of good people and you take out a lot of good when I say good people good students and teachers uh so I just want to tell my district that you know that they've been that that you're
063not seeing much go on over the last couple years is not because of a lack of of me trying as your board member representative so I'm I'm hoping to be able to to work with the board and get a few things done uh for you guys in this year's budget uh one thing we did accomplish as I came on the boarders we did get the coaches raises up for the first time in ever 20 years and that was a promise that I ran on and campaigned on and I was happy to see that we've we got that accomplished um so I and I also want to say congratulations highlight uh two athletes on this past uh last week as well Christian Hearns is a senior at uh East Rockingham high school he was a state
064runner up in wrestling um and came very close he wrestled in the State uh Championship uh title in his weight class and he came up so close of winning the states he's a state runner up and so I congratulations to Christian Hearns I I coached him in I'm in Little League baseball in Elton and I'm just so proud of the young man that he's become and I'm so proud of his character and his hard work and dedication as well so congratulations Christian I know that you would have uh preferred to hold up that number one spot but you've you've made us proud in Rockham County uh second Chase Smith from Turner ashy High School uh he also was a state runner up in his weight class and so I want to tell Chase as well
065uh congratulations I know it stinks as a competitor to to to be anywhere else but at that number one uh bracket there but you both of you guys and many of you other ones who came in fourth place in in wrestling in the state tournament uh you've made Rockham County very proud and what you've done so congratulations on to those two and my last thing I'm sorry to take up so much time uh tonight but I I do feel like it's important for me to say the things that I've I've said I try not to take too much time up um the last um I I I guess I want to kind of direct uh um Dr Schiff if you um would check with Sheriff Hutcherson on um I was I was going down the
066road today we last year we put in the budget uh for four sro's and I know it's a priority for the board uh to be able to we have 13 elementary schools that are still without uh security with with our SRO and our community and I'm uh as a board we understand that that's that's a top priority when when it comes to school safety and um we got two last year out of the four and I understand there's some some reasoning behind that but I was thinking in going down the road today we have four towns uh within our uh School Division and so uh Dr shiff if you could reach out uh to sheriff Hutchinson and ask him uh if there's any way that we as the board could partner with those towns those
067towns would be grados Bridgewater um and Broadway and uh what's the other one I missing maybe it's just the three Elton sorry in Elton there's four of them uh that would give us four if if if they could hire an SRO that would give us four additional SRO at those elementary schools um they could be capable of seven sro's if we were able to work with them because they have not only elementary schools but uh middle schools that are there uh I so it would be great to find out if um we could uh partner with the towns in any way to be able to get uh at least look at those four uh sro's there I know we have John Wayan and Bridgewater and I'm South River and grados uh Elton Elementary would have
068one and uh John C Meers I believe it is uh so if you could reach out to him and if there's if that's a capability of doing I would really appreciate that and that's that's all I've got thank you Mr Cross uh Miss bero all right um so past couple weeks I have been at several schools um I went to my obviously my kids school had a multicultural night and that was a lot of fun there were a lot of games and um spe specifically there was a huge article in The Daily News Record of my my sons both of my sons their preschool teacher um her husband is from Albania and so they did all this awesome food and it was delicious um and all this just really really cool stuff so we had
069a blast doing that my kids were you know how kids like they feel like your their teacher is just like their own person and then when they find out that they have like a husband or a wife or kids or family or they see them in public they're like this is just such a crazy thing that this person has a life outside of school so they were so excited to meet her family uh and then they were really shy uh but we had a great time it was it was a really cool event that they hosted um I got to go to um Cub Run for read Across America um and I was I thought I was just going to read for like lower level but I got put in a fifth grade classroom so
070I was like I was a little paranoid because I didn't want to bring something that the fifth graders who I'm aware they're going to be going into sixth grade pretty soon so I really put a lot of effort into the book that I brought and I brought this um this book that my kids like that's a Choose Your Own Adventure book and by the half an hour you know we went back and tried to okay let's pick a different page and see how how the ending turns out and so they had a blast I don't think they wanted me to leave so I felt really good about that um so I didn't want to bring something they thought was a baby book or anything like that but um we went to Sarah or Miss Hurst
071and I went to Broadway and J Frank um and there is a teacher at jrank that I just fell in love with Mr Rogers who's a social studies teacher and I love that I I hopefully my kids um will have him in the next coming years but he was really cool and he had asked me you know we're trying to find a place to do an archaeological dig and I just really want to he's I think he's very outdoorsy he's like I want to get the kids outside and so it took me about 2 hours to put a call for help out there does anybody have any land up in uh the North Fork area and I had several people message me in so we got him a piece of land which I'm really excited
072about so I definitely want to come to this archaeological dig so if he's watching um I definitely want to be a part of that and then the last thing I went to um Broadway high school did an international dinner which this was my first year going I don't know if anybody else went that's here but it was so cool they had a buffet um and it was put on by the World Language Honor Society uh but there was a ton of students helping um was just kind of like they made it into a little restaurant but there were so many people there um they did a buffet of food with all these International dishes did you go Miss Laur not this year I've gone on the past but it's amazing and the food was amazing
073it was overwhelming um but the really cool thing was it was donation based and I thought you know oh this will probably just go to their organization but they ended up donating all the money to um an organization to end hunger and poverty worldwide so I thought that was really cool um and I I look forward to going to it next year they had the band there playing music like it was just it was a lot of fun so those are those are my highlights we took Vite one year so did you it is not good well the food everything I had was amazing so thank you Miss berin Miss lur thank you um of course musicals uh I I want to send a special thank you out to Spotswood High School for working with
074me so well because they had my tickets for Friday and I showed up on Sunday um but they they put me right in the front and I really appreciate that and it was awesome I love going to uh uh senior high school musicals on Sunday because you get to see all the kids their last Musical and they honor the students and it was really touching to see that um let's see this weekend I was trying to look it up we've got three musicals I know uh Hillyard Mont videoo and is it Pence it's Pence that's right um that I've got to hustle around to try figure out how to get to but I highly recommend um Everybody try to get there because they are awesome um I also was able to attend Hawks night at
075at Hillyard where I met Miss met Mr Rogers and yes yeah I want to go on the archaeological dig too that sounds like super fun uh I also want to thank uh Miss HST for setting up a retreat for the board we did that this week that was very uh informational and then um while I was out and about I happened to be at Pence when they had a dog show the the students the a department had the kids um research pick a breed pick a dog and research the dog breed learn all about the characteristics and then they made a cardboard cutout and they decorated it and then they took it through the gym and they had like a narrative that the kids had to write about like this is an Australian Shepherd her
076name is Poppy it was so much fun and kids like got to show their animals so uh that was a that was a fun time um and then finally thank you huge thank you to our our super our Dream Team back there from sped uh Chris Brandt and Dr Ashley H Hof talk I didn't say it right either they took me around to the half yes they took me around to the day programs um so I was able to tour Charter House and Elk Hill and Minik School uh and saw the the different programs and I have a little bit better understanding they took all day and I have a little bit better understanding um sped is hard sped is a lot um there's a lot to learn and and it's really our most vul
077vulnerable students so you really have to have a heart for sped and I appreciate everything they do and uh you guys are absolutely right keeping it in house is super important because uh everywhere we went Ashley was like this is our student Bob and this is our student Stephen and this is our and that's a student from Harrisonburg but I mean like she knew she knew the kids it was amazing and the level of dedication and love that our sped department has for our students is amazing and I just want to say thank you from the bottom of my heart to you guys thank you for taking me around I really enjoyed learning more and um uh I look forward to another tour very very soon but thank you thank you Miss Laura Miss cave
078I just got exhausted sitting here listening to all the things that Rockingham has going on like good Lord um wow um but great things all all great things um I just wanted to say really quick before my highlights I know Dr shifflet we always come at you with hey let's do this and let's do that and I think that's one thing of being a new a new board um but one thing I guess I would say about is is is that we're we're going to be Innovative and I think um just going back to your idea just talking about the the town um Police Department something I hadn't really thought about before and partnering with them I mean and I will not say any names here there's a town very close to me that I
079a few years back probably two or three I met one of the officers there and I was like oh my gosh I wish we could get you as an SRO you know um so they do have capable officers there that probably that love kids and that would probably do it so I don't know what all the logistics of that are but thank you for being willing to to check that out and um Dr shifflet and I will just say you know the last words of a Dying business they say the seven last words of a Dying business is we never did it this way before so anyways um thank you for being willing to check all those all those different things out um I was able go on I think it was March 1st it
080was whatever that Saturday was to the regional spelling bee which is just one of my favorite events I love spelling bees um that was held at Skyline middle school and um the last two that it came down to were both mon video students and I was sitting right behind Miss Jackie Baker and you could just feel the excitement and I was so excited for her to have you know two of her students you know um take first and second place so that was that was really great and so congratulations to Baker and um I was able to to um do the read Across America C Ron thank you all very much for inviting us uh this is one of the best things that we get to do as board members beyond all the business and
081all the all the hard stuff is that we get invited into the schools to do those things cuz I tell you like if we didn't get to do any of that stuff and didn't get some kind of like retreat to do that kind of stuff like this this would be I don't I don't want to yeah hard maybe an impossible job to do so thank you all for inviting us into that and then um last but not least I got to go to the Elon Middle School faculty game on um Tuesday March 4th and that was they're so competitive and I just love it and it was a highly attended event I mean the gym was full and they had a really awesome halftime show that I really enjoyed so anyways great event um thank
082you Dr Holloway for that and uh that's all I have I think y thank you cave um I'll wrap up this evening's comments um mostly I think just well I I have a lot of highlights I could share um but I I want to just put out there that one of my favorite things that I have been doing is going and reading in classrooms I miss that as a former classroom teacher just reading with kids um and so if you know just as open invitation to our um staff members if you need a reader for a special event or just because you want a special reader uh send me an email I'd love to reach your class um I do want to talk just a little bit about um budget and finance we're still continuing
083to work through that process there are always more needs and requests and we can certainly justify every single one of them they are all very important um but I we have to continue to weigh them um kind of in order you know you have to prioritize what we're spending our money on because we don't have unlimited resources um for me um when I look at this budget I'm looking at a couple of things as like top priorities and and that's school safety and then academic needs and those are um I think our board is United on those things we um continue to work and weigh and measure what we can what can um get pulled off in our budget to support our teachers and our staff and um our students and so it's again I
084don't I think I'll say this probably every spring um how hard this process is it's one of the most difficult things I think that I have encountered as a school board member um with that said I would like to put in a plug for something knowing that we might not be able to get it accomplished this year um but it is something that um I felt would have been beneficial when I was in the classroom it's something that I continue to hear from our elementary teacher folks um that you know we have really great curriculum specialists at central office um but I think it would be really great um if we had Elementary curriculum Specialists um to kind of supervise these would be people who um specialize and have experience in and are certified at
085the elementary level um there's a number of there's some very major differences between Elementary and secondary and I think that it would be great to have Elementary perspective represented at central office um I advocate for that um I'll continue to do so I understand that it is really hard um to add positions um in this financial season um especially when I also feel deeply that we need more classroom teachers more to lower our class sizes we need to do something about elementary planning time to increase that for them um I would love to see literacy assistance in grades um all the way through at least third grade but in you know in perfect worlds everyone would have one at the elementary level I could go on and on and on um about all the wonderful
086things I think we could do but we do have limited resources and so it is just something that I would like um us as a school board um to kind of keep in the back of our mind see if we can figure out how we can accomplish that if not this year soon um so anyway I thank you all um for coming out tonight um I don't believe we have any further business at this time and so with that this meeting is adjourned thank you for coming