OCPS | 2025-05-20 School Board Work Session

001Good morning and welcome to the Orange County School Board's work session which has been scheduled today, Tuesday, May 20th, 2025 for the purpose of discussing board budget priorities. The public will not have an opportunity to participate in this work session to provide public comment because this is not a regularly scheduled board school board meeting. No action will be taken and there will be no open public comment in which the public normally addresses the school board on relevant topics that are related to the work of the board. Thank you so much for being here with us this morning. Chair Jacobs is not in attendance today. Member Salamanca is not in attendance today, but we have member Ferrant, member Douglas, member Vanos, member Gallo, and member Felder here. and I'm vice chair Bird filling in for the

002chair. As a reminder, board members will not be engaging in outside electronic or digital communication during the meeting so that we can focus on the matters immediately before us. To my fellow board members and district staff when speaking, please make sure that your microphone is turned on and speak directly into it so that our YouTube and Orange TV viewers can hear you clearly. And again, thank you for participating or attending in today's meeting. We're going to start with a moment of silence and then the pledge of allegiance. Now for the pledge. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Thank you. And I'm going to turn it over to Dr. Vasquez. good

003morning. today we bring you the board budget priorities work session which will look different from previous years on several counts. Our CFO Dorian Conalino will review with you the limited and I'm going to underscore limited budgetary information that is currently available and then we will share with you three years of categorical spending. This session remains a valuable opportunity as we prepare for our upcoming budget for board members to share your priorities and how best to allocate limited resources. after the presentation, we'll be happy to take any questions and discussions, but we are looking to identify what the board's top priorities are so that when we are looking at the final dollars, we're able to determine how to achieve those priorities. whether it's shifting of dollars, whether it's looking at additional cuts to programs to be

004able to meet the goals of the budget from our board. So Dorene, take it away. Thank you, Superintendent. Good morning, Vice Chair Bird, Superintendent Vasquez, and board members. Due to the delay in the legislature finalizing the state budget, the board budget priorities work session will look a bit different this year than in prior years. Still, your priorities will determine where we allocate our resources and the path forward for Orange County Public Schools. The slide's not advancing on the screen. There we go. Okay. The state legislaturator's failure to adopt a budget has delayed funding amounts to school districts. The extended legislative session will result in a state budget that directly impacts K12 public schools. At this time, we do not know if there will be a reduction to sales taxes, property taxes, or a combination of

005both. All of which will have an impact on state revenue affecting school funding and tax revenues. Our goal is to ensure that we allocate resources effectively to support our students and staff. As presented to board members at a recent planning session, one of the pressing issues we face is declining enrollment in our traditional schools coupled with underutilized facilities in many areas around the county. This trend has significant implications for funding and resource allocation. We will need to explore innovative solutions to attract and retain students in our traditional schools while also exploring cost-saving measures including school consolidations. Unfunded mandates continue to burden public schools. When these mandates are not adequately funded, whether through categorical funds or the base student allocation, the district is forced to utilize general operating dollars to cover the shortfall. It is crucial

006that we carefully examine our expenditures and find ways to cut costs without sacrificing the quality of education. This will include a review of three years of spending practices. By distinguishing between essential and non-essential expenditures, we can make more informed decisions that benefit our entire school community. Maintaining a sufficient contingency fund balance is more important than in any time in our most recent history. These funds are vital to help mitigate unforeseen circumstances and emergencies. Ensuring that we have a sufficient contingency fund balance will provide some measure of financial stability and will and allow us to respond effectively to unexpected challenges. Lastly, we look forward to hearing the board's priorities for where we will concentrate our limited resources. This is where I would typically provide an overview of the budgetary landscape as well as forecasted full-time equivalent

007or FTE information. In the absence of budget information, this slide reflects the projected fiscal year 2026 FTE. FTE is projected at 231,969 or an increase of 4,362 FTE over the third calculation of the previous year. This significant increase in FTE is attributed to the continued impact of school choice and family empowerment scholarships. Traditional schools are projected to decline by an estimated 3,000 FTE over the prior year. No matter where the base student allocation and the Florida Education Finance Program or FEFP per student funding ultimately land, traditional schools will experience a decrease in overall funding. The decline in traditional school enrollment is a concern and we will adjust our budget to account for this reality. There are several funding variances reflected in the preliminary House and Senate budgets. This is a high-level overview from the preliminary

008budgets and will undoubtedly change. Both the Safe Schools appropriation and mental health assistance dollars reflect level funding in both the House and Senate budgets with no increase to the appropriation. Although flat, safe schools and mental health assistance funding may actually decrease as a portion of the appropriation is tied to our number of FTE which we know is declining. While at the same time, charter schools proportionate share of funding is increasing in line with their enrollment. The educational enrichment allocation currently reflects an increase in the House version of the budget, yet a decrease in the Senate version of the budget. There is a nominal increase in transportation funding in both the House and the Senate. Although the categorical funding for teacher salary increase allocation has been rolled into the base student allocation, specific requirements remain for

009allocating dollars for teacher salaries for fiscal year 2026. Currently, there are differing dollar amounts appropriated for salary increases for full-time instructional personnel. The House is proposing 0.53% of the district's base funding for teacher salary increases and the Senate is proposing 1.49% of the district's base funding for teacher salary increases. Neither version of the budget will remain as it currently stands and it seems unlikely that budgetary information will be finalized prior to the operating and capital work session previously scheduled for June 10th. There are other financial obligations to be folded into the fiscal year 202526 operating budget. Changes to employer paid FRS rates are anticipated to cost the district between $4.9 million to $5.2 million to all funds. The proposed increase in the BSA from both the House and the Senate do not cover the costs

010that the district is required to spend on FRS and teacher salary increases. This is significant because to comply with these requirements, the district will need to make budget adjustments. Also on this slide is reference to pending litigation between Walt Disney World and the Orange County Property Appraiser that will potentially affect revenues tied to the district's property valuation. Current projections estimate an impact ranging from 6.5 million to $13 million per year. However, final numbers will not be determined until the case is concluded and the property valuation is adjusted accordingly. In the meantime, we will continue to set aside dollars to address any corresponding refunds. At the closing of 2025 fiscal year, there will be approximately $119 million set aside for repayment. This includes the this includes the charter schools share proportionate share of the rep of

011the repayment, excuse me. The district will work with our charter schools on a repayment plan once amounts have been finalized. As a reminder, the Florida Education Finance Program or FEFP is equalized, meaning any reduction to local dollars is offset by an increase in state funding. This equalization does not apply to the additional voted millage or to capital funds. We are grateful for the community support in overwhelmingly approving the renewal of the half penny sales tax in November of 2024 to support the capital budget. This renewed program begins on January 1st of next year. As a reminder, these funds will now be shared with charter schools based on their FTE proportionate share. And lastly, as noted earlier, there are legislative changes being introduced this year that could potentially affect property taxes. Currently, the district le levies

0121.5 mills for capital uses. If this legislation passes, there could be an impact to our revenues from property taxes levied for capital purposes. This slide provides a snapshot of the handout you received and highlights areas where categorical funding is insufficient or where previous categorical funds have been incorporated into the base student allocation or BSA. With the end of ESER funding and declining enrollment, underfunded mandates are being offset by general operating dollars that could otherwise be used for salary increases. While supplemental funding was available, spending in underfunded areas was intentional to provide resources and support for our students and staff. Looking forward or looking toward fiscal year 2026 and the realization of very limited funding, district staff has been diligent in prioritizing expenditures and reducing costs tied to district operations, mental health, supplemental instructional materials, textbooks,

013and summer school. All departments are implementing reductions to their operating budget of 2% or approximately $5.3 million in total. 12 vacant positions funded through mental health assistance dollars will be made obsolete, reducing expenditures by approximately 1 million. Supplemental instructional material purchases will be reduced by $3.5 million and summer school costs will be reduced by an estimated $7.5 million. There is a savings of approximately $20 million in state adopted textbook materials in fiscal year 2026 due to the delay in implementing the ELA adoption. However, we are anticipating a large increase in the funds needed for instructional materials in 2027. Funds will be set aside accordingly. We now find ourselves in a very different environment where the cost to operate schools, especially smaller, underutilized schools, as well as the cost of salaries, health care, goods, and services

014continues to rise. At the same time, declining enrollment, which translates into less funding, is our new reality. By reducing non-essential expenditures, we can allocate more funds towards the board's priorities. Our team is dedicated to maintaining efficient and fiscally responsible operations. So now if you would like we can take a look at that handout. If you have any questions, let let's I'll just give a brief statement and then we can look at that three-year review of spending patterns for state allocated categorical funds or those that were recently inre in integrated excuse me into the base student allocation or BSA through the FEFP overhaul. That's what you are looking at. Our goal in sharing this data is to highlight the underfunding of these categoricals by state even as school districts remain obligated to comply with the strict

015spending requirements. I will say in closing that the truth in millillage or trim timeline outlines the key dates and deadlines in the annual property tax process. Although there is a delay in the release of the legislative budget act as a taxing authority, school districts, cities and counties are still held to the same timeline requirements. Our tenative budget hearing will be Tuesday, July 29th. Dr. Vasquez. thank you Dorene and thank you to the team for putting this information together. again board members, our goal today is to identify the board's priorities and then to elicit from the board members the areas that we are indicating we are overspending the allocation that has been given to us. what is the priority to keep so that we know not not to touch those dollars as we're looking to meet

016the priorities of the board. Thank you, Dr. Vasquez. we have member Gallo up first. Thank you, Madam Chair. this is always a fun meeting even even less fun this year due to the constraints and it is disappointing that we don't yet have a budget so we don't even know what we're working with as you know we kind of have an idea but FRS and some other things. We've had a look at the BSAs projected by both chambers and they're still like $4 billion apart and they're they've been going back and forth this week and it doesn't look like they're getting any closer which is disappointing. before I start asking questions I'll say that this reminds me of 2007208 when I wasn't a board member and this guy was falling and we I think that was

017about the time when we decided we need to go out for the millillage cuz we were cutting athletics. We are taking athletics out of middle schools. Like it was really bad because we were going into recession. what's disappointing to me is that the difference between now and then is there is no shortage of money in Florida. They have billions of dollars in their reserves. They have the money. They're choosing to starve public schools. They just are. they could fund this and they're not. And that is what is upsetting because we still have to offer the same services. We still have to do what we do and now we've got to make hard decisions with personnel and trying to decide what we keep and what we let go of. so I wish I wish it was

018different. I do have some questions. So in response to Disney, where are we with Disney? Are we going to come to a resolution anytime soon so that we can get those dollars off of our books because it looks like it's so inflated right now? Yes, ma'am. the last I heard from Scott Randolph through our Scott Howitt was that there's multiple litigations going on with all the Disney properties. recently four had been settled and they were hopeful that possibly by the end of this calendar year that the litigation would be settled and we would know exactly what that dollar amount is. Right now the projections that I'm providing is based on a 38% reduction but it could be as high as 50% is what we're hearing from the tax collector. and my next question, hopefully we

019can get this resolved soon. Like, this has been going on for years. This is crazy. why why are we fronting the money for charters? Why aren't we holding their proportionate share? Why are we fronting their money and then going back to them and work out? Why do they get a payment plan and we don't? That's my question. Like, I feel like we're fronting their money. My understanding, member Gallo, is that the money was distributed to the charters in advance of us knowing the litigation. So, we've put the charter schools on notice that the litigation is pending and that the expectation is that they will have to repay those funds. We have not been withholding FTE that's being distributed as sort of an insurance that they are going to pay us back but they have been

020put on notice as to the amounts that they are that they will owe and the expectation is that they pay those funds. We've indicated to them by letter and individual conversations with those charters that have reached out that we will not be fronting the money for them. But so when we did figure it out, which was several years ago, why didn't we start holding the money from charters then? Because I know our expectation is that charters will pay it back. But what is our recourse if they're like so sad, we don't have the money, we can't pay you, then what is our recourse to get our money back so that we can spend it on our teachers and staff? I understand the concern. I think this is unchartered territory because there is the potential for

021us to reach out to the legislature to ask for some sort of a reconciliation of our FTE in depending on what the resolution is of the property appraisers lawsuit that can take us back three years. It won't take us back the whole amount, but that is an option that I believe the legislative team has been considering. and we do have some buyin with the charters given that this will affect them as well. So, it's been a little difficult to withhold the funds without knowing what we're withholding and potentially causing some of these schools to go under if they don't receive the proper funding. At this point, we don't have a basis, a legal basis to withhold the money. Thank you, and I appreciate that explanation. Can someone give me a figure of how much the

022charters are going to be on the hook for for repayment? So, at at this point in time, charter schools make up 10 plus% of proportionate share. but when we're going back, they were at one time 7 8%. So, it's it's varying. It depends on the year and what their proportionate share of the total FTE was at that time. There's a lot of calculation that will go into it, but right now if you looked at that number, you could So it' be like $11 million that correct? That's a nice rate that could go towards a raise. No, no, we are setting aside nonrecurring dollars from fund balance, not recurring. Thank you for and the other the other point I did make was that the FEFP is equalized. So whatever our local share property taxes would go

023down within the FEFP then the state would compensate for that in in the equal they still do the equalization correct but not in the special mill and not in capital. Okay. And so we are expecting some hoping for not expect hoping for some reconciliation from the legislature but we can only get it for the last three years. So any money that we had to held prior to those three years, we're we're just going to lose that those dollars. There will be no refund. Correct. Correct. And we do have the other issue that there are a few charters that are no longer in business. There's a small number of them, but the issue will become those monies cannot be recouped from a charter that's that's no longer operating. So there's a lot of unknowns in terms

024of what what does this ultimately look like? So let me ask this question. What if we just paid our share and we told the tax collector, "Go to the charters. They have your other they have the other part of your money. You need to go get it from them versus us paying for it and then trying to get it from the charters." Why are we the middleman? Why can't we make the tax collector go to the charters and tell the charters, you owe us this money and if you don't get it, we're going to withhold it. like they would to us. I think right now everything is premature because we in the end we do not know how this is going to land ultimately where the pass through. So we receive the funds and we

025pass them through to the charter. I think we can certainly reach out to the property appraiser and explain the situation and see what kind of a resolution we can reach. It's just we ultimately we don't know where this is going to land. I appreciate that. And I just I support charters. They're public schools. what I don't support is supporting them at the detriment of our employees and our staff. That's that's the part that concerns me. You know, I believe in choice, but not when it directly affects the money because we're all struggling here. like charter schools are losing enrollment as we are and so I know we're all having a hard time but I just don't I don't I just don't think it's fair that they're allowed to continue to utilize money that we can't

026utilize because we have to hold it back because of Disney. And I would implore Disney and the tax collector. Can we can we get this figured out already? like this is a lot of money and this is money we can't plan for and it's making it increasingly difficult for us to do our budget and determine what monies we have reoccurring for our staff. and it's just it's just not fair. So get it together people. that's it's been it's been five years now. It's it's frustrating. I'm sorry. and then the other question I have on the budget the categoricals and I'm just looking I just I'm looking at the instructional materials and I understand that we have buyin dates like we have we have times when we adopt materials and that's kind of written in law

027by the legislature. here we have and I'm looking at 2223 and it looks like our revenue that year was 760. our total expenditures was 17.88 and we had so we're showing the categorical underfunded by28 but then we added in esser materials and then it pops up the deficit to 16.34. Can you explain? Because if I if you just took away the categoricals and looked at the total expenditures, it should still be 28. So I'm confused by the 16.34. So the total expenditures are actually the 17.88 plus the 16.06 06 because we used ESSER dollars in 2023 and in in some cases sub some sub subsequent years to purchase textbook materials, instructional materials, support materials. So the purpose the reason I reflected it this way is I wanted you all to know that we did not

028just spend $17.88 88 million in 2023. We spent that plus esser. Okay, that's what was confusing me because I it said total expenditures and it wasn't clear that we spent more of that. So that explains that and then the other questions I had regarding that. My final questions then I'll hear from the rest of the board. I know we're we're declining enrollment and I know as a district we're doing whatever we can to try to retain and recruit students. We need to we need to be very very and I know that we're aware of what's happening. But we're really gonna have to figure out a way to promote and market Orange County Public Schools or we're going to be having these decisions every you know these kind of discussions every year. federal dollars. I know

029we're really only on state dollars, but there's a lot also happened federally in the CR that was that was passed. There is no money listed for title 2. IDA isn't fully funded and I don't even know if they've landed on IDA. and I know that represents millions of dollars for us. Was there any changes in the reconciliation that the federal government is working on? Do you know like did it change? I know it didn't change for title $2, but did it change any other areas for like Medicaid? Did it did it change did it change anything away from what we're afraid is going to happen? Like with our Medicaid dollars and our title 2 dollars, our Medicaid reimbursements have been going down over the last few years. It's somewhere around$23 million now. few years ago

030we were upwards of5 to7 million dollars. So that is decreasing in terms of the reconciliation bill and what you're talking about with title. I could let Kim Gilbert come up and actually speak to that, but at this point for 2026, I don't believe we expect any any decreases or significant decreases. It's 2027 that we're concerned about. So even with the services, the Medicaid services that we bill for, we expect those to remain intact or will there be a deficit next year on what will be allowed to? Because I know not every state, every district or school districts in every state do reimbursements for Medicaid and it's not really on the radar of a lot of our congressional delegation because it doesn't go through the education budgeting process. But that's real dollars. That's in the millions

031that we stand to lose with any slight change in the way that we're reimbured for Medicaid. May I? At this point in time, we have no indication that there is going to be an impact to the federal dollars we receive for this upcoming school year. The impact that we are bracing for is the following school year. Now having said that at the state level our state has chosen not to expand the Medicaid reimbursement as other states have had. If that changes then we could actually see that we would recoup more dollars but at this point in time we don't see a change. Okay. So for at least the next year. and where are we with the IB AP? Did Did we get that worked out? I know that the Senate was putting half in the

032categorical and then the other half in the BSA, which was inflating the BSA, and then the House wasn't playing ball at all. That's I only know what you know right now regarding that. So, that could be even more future cuts. okay. Again, I'm just going to say we don't we don't have to be here. like we don't have to be here having this conversation, making difficult decisions that's going to impact the learning environment of our students. We're here because the legislature is basically starving school districts of funds and that's disappointing. I'll go over my priorities in a minute, but I want to hear the questions from other board members. Thank you. Thank you, Member Gallo. Member Ferrant. Thank you, Madam Vice Chair. this is a great conversation and I think you know, in any time

033when we're stuck between a rock and a hard place, it kind of helps us dig deep and think critically and figure out what we can do to continue to help our students receive an exceptional education. we're definitely heading in the right direction in in certain educational areas where I'm you know we're already seeing the results coming back from the testing and students are excelling right now at reading and math and many of the at least in the district three schools that I've been visiting. and so just seeing those priorities that we've put on you know helping teachers and ultimately it helps the students. So, that I'm very, very excited about. But, so, a few questions I have. can you explain again the half penny sales tax? Is that only to help with, remodeling schools or

034building? That is only for the capital building program, and we'd have to look at what was specifically in the referendum. but security upgrades device new devices and device refresh of course new schools and renovation of schools anything specific that high level that's what was in the referendum okay so as far as school safety we could use half penny money to help with school safety as long as it's capital as long as it is a capital purchase yes okay so not for operating No operating expenses. Okay, got it. No salary is what you're saying. I get it. No recurring. Yes. okay. So, in some ways, so with the overspending with the safe schools allocation, is that mainly for salary? I'm getting ahead. Yes. So, yes, but well, contracted service, right? Our SRO's are of the 21

035I've looked specifically our SRO's though are spending more than what we were or I let me let me put it this way the cost for our contracted service with SRO is actually more than what we are u getting in our appropriation we pay the contracted service we don't pay the salary and benefit although So the fee that we are charged does go towards their salary and benefit. but there are other salary and benefits for our district police as well as our safe coordinators are paid for through the safe dollars. It's mostly salaries but that Okay, perfect. Thank you. safe coordinators that is the like in each school there's a safe coordinator. Just refreshing my memory. Okay. I got it. another question I had was the educational enrichment allocation. Can you explain what falls under that

036category? The educational enrichment allocation is very broad all services that support schools and students. previously we had the SAI, which was our supplemental academic instruction. Those dollars went away and they were transferred to the educational enrichment allocation and therefore as a district we are utilizing those dollars as we would use the supplemental AC previously used the supplemental academic instruction. Just a point of clarification, safe coordinators are only in secondary schools, not at the elementary. Got it. Okay, that's helpful. Thank you. okay. So, for the educational enrichment allocation, is that also for like teacher training or is this specifically for students? How does that work? Or any I'm not sure if we've got training in there. Maybe no we don't I don't see any training in that. Okay. So it's just Can you give me like

037an example? Sure. so summer school costs are in in there, translation services, United Arts, our social workers, our itinerant teachers. back on track. testing perfect. Okay, maybe you can just send me that or send us that list just so we can kind of see what what this is going towards. Then I guess back on track that is the that's the what we give to students who have yes go ahead. So, back on track is the program that we provide as a discipline consequence for certain offenses that students commit in lie of a suspension or in some cases a longer or a different consequence. And typically that has shown to have a very high recidism recidicism rate. And so we have actually expanded for the offenses that we have similar programs. Perfect. That was going to

038be my next question is how effective that is. okay, another question then would be with transportation. definitely overspending in that area quite a bit and like triple. Correct. just I mean I know it might people might shake in their boots at this, but if we were to reszone schools, would that be something that would potentially help in this area? May I? so it's hard to say that we would have a significant decrease in the cost of transportation. and we have not been I don't think we've ever been fully funded for transporting of students and I Mr. Bachco is in the back. part of that also deals with contracted services. So for example students that are part of the McKini Vento program and that number has greatly increased. Those are all contracted services that we are

039required to offer. And so that is an area that we have looked at. Some of the strategies our transportation team has done with relooking at routes has helped us to become more efficient. But that's not an area that we would find significant cost savings by doing a resoning. We can actually give you the breakdown if they don't already have it of how much of it is our transportation and then how much is contracted services and divide it out. You will see I don't want to say double because I don't remember the number but there is a huge increase in the amount of money that we're paying for our children that are part of the McKenna Vento program. but I think the increase may have even been double digits for from last year to this year.

040Okay, thank you. That is super helpful. I'm trying to see if this is I got one more question and then I will pass it on to my last question would be it was from slide three. you were talking about the FTE is projected at 231,969 that is a number of students correct FTE students headcount and FTE are not exactly the same FTE is by is calculated by minutes right the number of minutes that a student is in a program So, we could have a student, let's say a a prek student that is with us half of the day. That is one student, one headcount, but that's only half of an FTE. So, FTE is similar to headcount to students. It's aligned, but it's not exactly. Okay. Okay. so when we talk about a decline in

041funding because students are leaving, is that or a decline in funding, is it because students are leaving or because the state has lowered our funding? Well, it's because of declining enrollment, right? We're losing 3,000 students. That's the forecast for 2026 for our traditional for our traditional schools. We have to be careful when we talk about loss and funding. So even though the state is not funding us sufficiently and even though the small amount they're giving us then has these requirements that actually exceed the amount that they're giving us but still there will be an increase in the base student allocation whatever that amount is right it's just that the mandates that are then applied to that or the requirements that are applied to that are going to exceed whatever the funding is, but for us

042in our traditional schools, we are losing nearly $28 million just from the 3,000 down in FTE. Then we've got to consider what is the BSA, what ultimately are we going to have to pay in increased FRS costs, and what ultimately are we going to be required to pay in teacher salary increase allocation, which right now is exceeding what the whether you're looking at the house budget or the state budget, it is exceeding what it is they would be giving us in the BSA. So then ultimately you could say we are losing. Okay, I get what you're saying. All right. Thank you for that. I think you know ultimately we really need to look at just continuing to focus on what we're here for is educating students with a quality high you know academic education and

043I think there are a lot of things that have you know pushed parents away and you know there are parents in this district who are not just this district but I think all across the nation you can look around and parents are kind of fed up with a lot of the things that have been pushed that are contrary to their family's beliefs. And I think we need to as a district look and see what what is what is it we're here for. we've been assigned by parents to provide a exceptional education and that's what we should be focused on and not on promoting things that go against what parents don't want to hear about and don't want their students learning about. and so I think when we focus back on that, we'll see parents coming

044back to the sending their kids back to our schools. Thank you. Thank you. okay. Okay, I'm queued in next and I have I have a lot of questions that I want to ask that are going to educate a little, right? There's a lot of information here and I think that we really have to work on communicating what all of this means to the public. So, I'm going to ask some questions to try to clarify some things. So, on the handout that you gave us that you had in the presentation, you had those those areas that were rolled into the base student allocation over the last three years. And for from what I saw from 2022 23 it was 16.34 million plus the 3.61 million and then the next year there was 12.49 million and then

045this past year 18.31 million. And those that was the instructional materials that were folded into the BSA, right? Those first three things in that category. So what was folded into the BSA is the revenue in 2223, the revenue of 17.6 million as well as the reading revenue of 12.13 million. Those were rolled into the base student allocation. Got it. And then and then the following year and then also the 27.06 06 right so the 27.06 06 since we had no appropriation right because it's blended into the BSA and there is no transparency there so we cannot determine if we are being funded at the rate that we were being funded which wasn't sufficient then we were we were we were having to spend more than than the revenue in order to provide or purchase the

046adoption ions and the supporting materials. So that being said, when you look at the revenue from 2223 the 17.6 six and the 12 uh13 you take that what what we did because we have to just estimate we take the total revenue we divided it by the number of FTE in the 23 year and then used that same figure that per student figure and made an assumption that we are we continue to be funded at the same rate that we were funded in 2223 and therefore come up with what we are assuming is blended into the BSA as our revenue for instructional materials in 23 24 25 and moving forward. Okay. But that is now in the base student allocation. Correct. It's another area that we are not being funded properly, but it's in the base

047student allocation. So it's not really obvious. Not at all obvious. Right. It's not transparent. It just looks like regular operating dollars, right? but we're required to adopt all of these curriculums. Okay. So, this is not the only this is not the only area that's been folded into the BSA over recent years, right? There's been other there's been other categoricals that used to be separate categoricals that are folded into the BSA now for teach the teacher salary increase allocation is now in the BSA. and as well as the teacher classroom supply assistance dollars. Okay. And we have no indication on that for next fiscal year. Have not heard whether or not we will be required to fund that or not. Okay. And the reason I point this out is because we often hear we are we've

048increased educational funding in this state. Look at what I've done to increase educational funding over the past five years or four years. but in reality it's kind of a shell game. It's being moved over here in this bucket, but there's money coming out of that bucket. Right. So, it's not an increase to us at all. It's just moving it from one pile to another. Correct. Okay. That's important to know when you hear on the news education funding is increased. And the other thing that plays into that is the voucher, the scholarship money. that's a big area that we hear promoted that there's been so much more money invested in education in the state of Florida. $4 billion is going to scholarships of that. and again, I have to wait for the budget to drop, but

049we're looking at somewhere around $285 million for Orange County Public Schools dollars that will be going to family empowerment scholarships, right? And so, it's important for the public to know when they hear on the news from Tallahassee, we are investing so much more money in education in the state of Florida. 4 point whatever a billion dollars more and we put in the education budget. It's not money they are putting towards their public schools. Correct. Thank you. Okay. so there are several areas of our budget that we are required to that we are required as public schools in the state of Florida to fund such as the superintendent just mentioned the McKenna Vento transportation that for people that don't know is for students that are experiencing homelessness. we are required to provide transportation to them to

050be able to go to their home school even if they're living you know across the district sometimes out of district. I know I had a student that was living in Oyola County, but was attending their home school in Apakka and we have to provide transportation to go out to Ocola County to pick up this student and drive them to their home school in Apakka so that they can continue. And it's a worthy cause. I'm not I'm not saying it's not, but it's super expensive, right, to do this. So that's one area that we have to do. Do private schools have to do that? If a child experiences homelessness, would a private school have to? No. Okay. Would a charter school? Do you Does anyone know are charter schools? No. I'm seeing shaking heads and no

051in the back. Okay. F FRS, you're talking about the increase in the Florida retirement system. We are required to contribute to that for our employees. Correct. Are private schools required to contribute to retirement system? Florida retirement system. I don't believe they believe Florida retirement. Are charter schools charter schools are though, right? No. It depends if they participate in FRS or not. It depends. And of course, the other area of the student scholarships are homeschoolers. Homeschoolers of course don't contribute to their retirement, the teachers, the parents. nor do they have to provide transportation obviously. what are some other areas that well SRO's or school safety? We have to in public schools have either a guardian or a school resource officer in all of our schools. We're required. So are charters. Many of them choose to do

052guardians because it's cheaper for them. private schools are not required do not have that requirement. And I know that because I have a family member who's an administrator in a private school and they're not required and they don't have an SRO in their school. So, but they take voucher money. So, my point to all of these questions is that when we talk about our public tax dollars following students, this is the argument I hear about people all the time that are proponents of the scholarship money. And I'm going to preface I'm going to preface this by saying that I too feel that it is important for parents to have choice. I agree 100% with that. But the funding has to match for us if you're going to require public schools to provide that transportation to

053to give to FRS to have those safety officers to state adopted textbooks state adopted textbooks and curriculum then it has to be more than just that base $8,000 that we get for every student or 9,000 or whatever it is, we h you have to account for that. And this is where we're everybody's missing the mark on this. If you give a if you're the money that's following these kids around, so you're giving that 8,000 that same amount of money to somebody to go put in towards private school or to homeschool. We have that same $8,000, but we have to stretch it in all these other areas that we're required to cover when these other areas with these other schools are not or the homeschoolers are not. And this is where it's not fair and this

054is where it needs to be adjusted. I'm all for school choice. That's great. So give everybody their $8,000 to go educate their kids however they want and then give our public if you're going to require public schools to have this this then fund this this and this above that $8,000. This is where they keep missing the mark on the school choice. And when you and this is why we're struggling with the decrease in enrollment because unless it's easy to say well if you don't have the children then you can have less what teachers I guess is this what a comment I saw today on social media. Great less less students mean less teachers. There you go. So problem solved in the budget. Literally that was a comment made that I saw this morning on social

055media. So, that doesn't work if you have to keep the schoolhouse doors open. Correct. Right. you still have to keep a school running. You still have to have guidance counsel. You still have to have administrators. So, all those expenses that we still have do not go away because 50 kids left this school or, you know, 20 left this school or, you know, you still have all those expenses and that's where we're hurting trying to make up that money. So there's so much there's so much wrong here. that I am in total agreement with member Gallow that it's so frustrating when we are we are like she said not in a recession. Knock on wood. like we were in 2007208 but here we are facing these same these same budget cuts and another thing while I'm

056on my soap box when I was watching the budget committee meetings talking about the API funding advanced studies funding and the sponsor of the bill in the house said to the students that were there to advocate for the funding. She said to them, "Go back to your school districts and ask the school districts where your funding is going, why it's not being spent on these advanced study classes, because we send them money to pay for these advanced study classes. They shouldn't be using this add-on FTE to pay for these classes." I literally was in the car listening to that and yelling at my car radio because you don't fund everything the way it should be funded. when you look at this number for our transportation being underfunded by $62 million a year. A year. I

057don't I don't know if anybody really grasps that they are giving us $32 million a year to transport all of our students that live two mile more than two miles away from our schools to the schools and it costs us $62 million to transport all those students. Where do they think that extra 30 million comes from? That's where it comes from. It comes from that base student allocation money that should be going, she's right, should be going to the programs for these kids. But instead of them going there, it's going to transportation. It's going to safe schools. It's going to all these areas that they don't give us enough money for. So, I'm going to stop right there because I have a couple more questions and then I have my prior priorities, but I want

058to hear some questions from my other board members first. So, we've got u member Vanos up next. Thank you. So, thank you so much, Member Bird. I trying to respond and kind of just add on to what some of my colleagues have shared. I think they've I think they've shared such a they've done such a great job of showing the areas in which public schools are underfunded which then require us to take additional money out of our operating expenses to sort of make up that funding. So, so it's really a case of of we're underfunded. We're having to take that money we could be using for teacher salary increases to to kind of fund these under unfunded underfunded mandates. I would also like to point out in addition to that, you know, the Senate, I

059believe, has increased public school funding this year by in in their proposal about $284 million. And in the amount of increase going to taxpayer funded vouchers is $700 million. I also wanted to double down a little bit on what member Bird was pointing out in terms of the we call them categoricals. It's sort of the areas that of of specific funding of specific allocations from the state and when they are collapsed into the base student allocation Miss Conkalino pointed out that because of the lack of transparency, it's hard for us to really know if we're getting that same amount that was in the categorical in the base student allocation. And so when we're when we're hearing lawmakers in this conversation about the add-on funding for AP and IB and dual enrollment and all this and

060they're saying things like, "Oh, don't worry. We're just going to move this funding into the base student allocation so that school districts are able to use the funds in a more flexible way." Don't be fooled by that because that funding will not be the same as if it were specifically directed towards the API IB dual enrollment. So that is that is on purpose that they are trying to move it into the BSA. the third the sort of second area I'd like to address is I'd like to I share member Gallow's absolute outrage at this Disney litigation. and the fact that Orange County Public Schools has had to withhold funding over the past several years. Funding that we could have used to increase teacher salaries, for example. We have been responsible and held the funding back

061because we knew we were going to have to pay it. And now there are charter schools that have not made that same decision. They have not been responsible in the use of the funds. They have used that money. They maybe they've been able who knows what they've done with it. I also found it really interesting that some of the charter schools have closed in the last how many years has the Disney litigation or we five years now? 10 10 years now. So interesting that during those 10 years some charter schools have closed. I'm I'm shocked to hear that. how many public schools in Orange County have closed during those 10 years? None. We've actually grown and have built quite a number of schools. H interesting. Is do we have any recourse against these charter schools

062that have closed but have taken the funding to go after them to get some of this money back? We don't even know if we'll be obligated to pay those funds back given that the schools have closed. We are the pass through entity. So, we passed it through to the charter. That charter is now closed. We're not clear as to whether we're legally on the hook for returning the money for a school that's ultimately closed. Okay. So, we might be, but we just don't know yet. Correct. Okay. But they're certainly not on the hook for anything. No, I don't know the timing of when they've closed or how long they've been closed. but at the end of the day, they're they're not in business. So, I don't see how we would have any recourse to claw

063back funds from an entity that's closed. Interesting. Okay. Definitely something to keep in mind. another question relating to the Disney litigation. again, just because this is such a huge portion of our funding that we have that we are essentially not have not been able to use. Just curious about what our settlement efforts have been with Disney. Member Vanos, I the legal department has not been privy to any settlement negotiations with Disney. I believe that the communications have been that we are relying on the property appraiser and the tax collector to reach a resolution of the litigation at which point we would pursue settlement negotiations in terms of of how we would pay back this money and can you share has the property appraiser been working diligently to settle this lawsuit? I'm not privy to that

064information. I don't believe that we are aware of it. I you know honestly a portion of the underlying lawsuit is on appeal. and that appeal remains pending. I believe that appeal is largely going to be determinative of where the case goes. There was finally a resolution as to two of the properties that were analyzed at the trial court level. the property appraiser is challenging the judge's award which was favorable to Disney. If that litigation holds up, then that is the template I believe for calculating the other properties which could lead to a resolution not only for Disney but some of the other property owners that have jumped on the bandwagon of alleged miscalculations as to their property taxes. Okay. So there's so there's there's still some possibly some settlement options out there at this time.

065I don't know to what extent there are settlement discussions regarding I believe the issue is there has to be some agreement as to what the an appropriate calculation is going to be as to the tax rate and then depending on what that is then it's recalculated for each property. Okay. Got it. Thank you so much. and then kind of I think just the last kind of overall point and then I'll come around again and and have some questions on priorities, but were you've mentioned that the declining enrollment has really impacted our funding. So yeah, correct. being down 3,000 students is approximately $28 million. And it's certainly significant and notable and going to have a big impact on our budget. I I do want to to make sure that so I I do want to make

066this point and it's it's 3,000 students that we are expecting declining enrollment out of approximately 28,000 students in our district. Right. In our traditional schools, we have currently about 183 184,000 and we're expecting around 180. Okay. So that's I don't know about 2%. A little more. 2%. Yeah. Okay. We I'm not two and three. Yeah. A little more. So I just I think I just want to underscore the point that we are losing significant funding, but it's not as though there's some mass exodus of children from public school, right? It's a it's a relatively small but notable part of our population. and that while we are looking at about a $27 million loss due to those 3,000 students, we're looking at how much will be diverted to taxpayer funded vouchers this year. Are we anticipating

067in Orange County? The increase? Give me a moment. I'll I'll get that for you. No. How how what is the increase in in I don't know if it's 256 million or 280 something. Are you are you talking dollars or are you talking dollars? Yeah. Okay. So we're looking at about 285 and currently we are somewhere around we're currently at about 1670. We're looking at an increase to about 280. So about 90 $95 million. So, so the total next year you said is about 2808 80 million. Yeah. Depending on which house senate there somewhere's around 280 to 285 million. Mhm. So, so just, you know, just for an overall picture, when we're looking at sort of that loss of funding, whether it's from declining students or just diversion of education funds, we're we're actually losing about

06810 times more to taxpayer funded vouchers than we are from the 3,000 students who are not enrolling. Yes. Okay. Good point. Thank you so much. Thank you, Member Vanos. That was a really good point, actually. member Douglas, it's so disording to listen to all that and to see that, actually they're not punishing us, they're punishing our kids. taking away the, you know, the competitive side of our children education. they're not hurting us as individual but our student I just wanted to say that can you please repeat again member Venus the numbers 700 millions can you please repeat that please yes it was I believe in the Senate's budget the public school category was receiving an increase of 284 million whereas the taxpayer funded voucher program is slated to receive an increase of 700 million. Wow.

069That's just amazing. And parents, I just want to let you know we are not the enemy here and who the people that you have to go to are the legislator in Tallahassee and vouch and advocate for your students because that's where the money comes from. And I just wanted to make sure that you acknowledge that and it's not OCPS, the money is coming from Tallahassee and just please advocate for your students. Thank you, member Gallo. Thank you, Madam Chair. so I wanna I want to talk about my priorities. I want to go over a few things prior prior to doing so. But I want to say and we hear this from the union all the time. So I'm kind of stealing these words, but you fund what you prioritize. And clearly the legislature has decided

070to fund taxpayer funded vouchers over public education. And what's what's so alarming about that is education affects every sector of our economy. Every single sector. Without an educated populace, everything falls apart. And I am I am concerned I am concerned with the education that some students are receiving through the taxpayer funded vouchers. And we're seeing evidence of that from some of the students coming back to our schools and not knowing. We're seeing evidence of that when I talk to friends in Florida virtual school where you have 15 and 16 year olds wanting to enroll in fifth grade. or you have 14-year-olds that are reading on first grade level. that is not a highquality education. I would almost say that's harming children and it's harming children because there are no guard wells in place to ensure

071accountability and that these students are learning. And even when they do the war the norm reference test through the PEP program for homeschools, if they fail it, there's no recourse. They don't h they're not forced to a brick or mortar. They're not forced to a charter or to a different way of learning. They're just allowed to reenroll. and with the homeschoolers and most homeschoolers I want to say do a fabulous job. So this is not a dig on homeschool in general because the majority of them are doing a great job and the students are receiving a fabulous education. But to those parents that don't know no better that don't understand and you know it's so funny because I there was a quote Jeb Bush quoted and said the reason we need need this accountability these

072reforms is that every every parent thinks their child's on grade level. Every parent thinks their child's a genius, which is true. But the problem with that is in this next breath you say, well, it's the responsibility of parents to ensure that kids are learning learning. Yet, you just said yourself that parents think their kids are brilliant and they don't know that they're not learning. And so, because of that, we have to have guard rails to ensure that kids are learning and receiving the best education possible. And I don't care where it is. I don't care if it's at homeschooled. I think we still have the best product as I think we'll see in the data that's going to come out that member Front mentioned earlier within our schools. it's just unfortunate because we do need

073an educated populace. So, I'm concerned about every child out there that isn't receiving an education that is getting voucher money and that voucher dollars is for all categoricals even if they don't need that categorical dollar. So they're receiving categoricals like they're a fully funded student and they may not use all the categoricals that they need. So in essence, they're getting more funding than our just gened students in our schools would get because not every student requires services. So I wanted to point that out. and I also want to point out that there's many factors that are involved in the declining enrollment. It's not just that kids are unhappy with public education. In fact, if I think you talk to parents, the vast majority of them will tell you they love their school. They love their

074school. Now, when it gets to the granual level of the school board, maybe not so much, but they love they love love love their individual schools and they love the education that they're receiving at their public schools. But we have a cost of living that is like we've never seen before. We have major inflation. We do have a population decline. For the first time ever, Florida is losing more residents than we're gaining. That hasn't happened in years. And for the first time, more people are leaving Florida than coming into Florida. So, what does that tell you? I'm just saying. and I want to So, I already talked about the funding, the categoricals, but they don't always receive the services. So, it this it's I'm hoping that when the budget comes out that we'll be pleasantly

075surprised. I know that they've had to tighten their belts because this taxpayer funded voucher system has risen to the level of $4 billion which they didn't think that it would. I also want to point out the vast majority of those dollars are going to students that have never stepped foot in a public school ever. We are subsidizing public our private education. I mean we are we're we're subsidizing public education at the private education. Sorry, we're subsidizing public I can't even say this right. We are subsidizing private education at the expense of public education. And that's not fair. as for my priorities, you know, I'm going to say it again. I'm going to prioritize people over programs. I think people have the biggest impact in our students. I think when you look at what's happening around

076the district, especially within our middle schools because I've been to the majority of mine over the last two weeks and the data that's coming out of them is just fantastic. They did such a great job on ELA and math. I know one of my middle schools that struggles the most is still going to struggle, but they they went up eight points in proficiency. eight points in proficiency. That's fabulous. That is fabulous. But that happened in a year where we had more funding. That happened in a year when we had more people. And this upcoming year, we're going to have less people, less resources to continue to offer that great education that we offered this year. so that makes me sad. So I'm just going to my priorities because we don't have a lot of money

077for priorities. My priorities are really going to be people over programs so that we can ensure that we can staff our schools appropriately so that every student is getting a high quality education and the services that they need and they deserve. I'm also I I know it's I've mentioned it before. Scott's in the audience. I'm looking at you Scott. I think if we could take those capital dollars and truly move shift stuff in the capital that involve capital and take some of that out of operational that would be so beneficial. And I know that right now we're currently not allowed to due to law. But I don't know if there's any appetite in Tallahassee as we look at these budget crunches and more and more districts do have a half penny sales tax for their

078capital needs. If we could shift some of the burden from operational into capital where there is more funding, that would go a long way in helping us service our students and offer our teachers and our educational pair professionals the raises that they so need and deserve. Thank you, member Gallo. Member Felder. Thank you, chair. this has been a needed conversation that the board is having and always Dorene and your group, your colleagues, you do a great job in explaining for those of us that really need this learning curve about budget. And I just agree with the sentiment of my board members Gallo Vano Vanos and what member Bird has explicitly said in explanation that member Verant gave and of course member Douglas and I I think that I'm hoping that this information can be given

079or at least the public especially parents can have access. I'm glad we asked the questions that we do so you can explain so they can know exactly what we are talking about when we talk about budget and needing money. the conundrum that we're in that member Vanos and member Bird dramatically shared with us. we're laughing, but it's not because we think it's funny. We're laughing because it's a sad situation. It is a sad state of affairs. And when you talk about my priorities, I cannot eradicate and defect teachers, teachers, people. And we do, you know, I love Orange County Public Schools from when I was a student as a teacher, now a board member. We have the greatest programs. I mean, choice, I mean, we just we really have a some great programs going on.

080And as member Gallo said about looking at some of her schools and watching the eight points, I look at two of my elementary schools. I'm so excited. I don't know what to do because, you know, it they're projected to perhaps be an A, you know, and you know, our teachers and our principles, but they're working so hard with mustard seeds. And I say mustard seeds because a mustard seed is the smallest seed, but the tree that it produces, baby, the shade is beyond comprehension. And that's exactly what we're doing here in Orange County. We are skipping around and we're literally pulling blood out of a turnup, which is an impossible task to do. So, as our public and media listening and recording, I want you all to hear and really grasp what we are dealing

081with and our legislators, those that you know and those that you don't know, but those that represent you, you must be vigilant and saying to them, and I say that to the students that I represent in my school, I say go to them and say these are the things that you're interested in. And some of our parents they should have choice but many of them the choices they may make they may not have a frame of reference to draw from to make the proper choice and so the children may suffer. But I believe in choice. I believe that is the beauty of this district that we have private schools, we have public schools, we have homeschooling, we have choice, we have and public schools. But again, in my closing remarks, my priority would be teachers,

082people, and because that's what we need. And secondly, it is my hope that those who are listening that you would grasp the severity of what we are dealing with in terms of budget. This is May. We have what? Two more weeks. We don't have a budget. We have not received a budget. We haven't received a budget yet. You as a public should be outraged. the legislators that you've sent to Tallahassee to advocate for you, you should be outraged because children take children of future, they're the present, too. Right now. Right now. Right now, you should be outraged. So, I thank you for this opportunity. chair, thank you. Thank you, member Felder. member Fer, I figured out how to move you back in there, so you're next. Thank you. Well, thank you, Madame Vice Chair. so

083really when we're looking at priorities you know everything we've talked about it is it is frustrating because I think something we've talked about at you know from here we're it's really about those buckets like member Bird was talking about and you know every every school no matter you know so if the money is following the child which I think it should because we're really about students not really about making a bunch of money if you will it's about the students and providing them an exceptional education. So, if the money is following a child to homeschooling, that 8,000 can be maybe stretched farther because you're not having to pay all the categoricals like we're talking about. And the priorities that we have to that are like mandated by the state, if you will. and then you

084know with a private school they have a different priorities that they might have and so that money can be used how they would like to charter schools. I did look it up real quick. they are required to do Mckin Vento Vento services. which if that's helpful at all. but they're not required to do FRS. So there are certain things that just as far as charter schools. So there are different things that maybe you know don't really make sense for us when we're looking at what we're being given. And so the money that we're being given in our bucket, we have to put in all sorts of different buckets. So then at the end, we're we don't have enough it feels like, you know, to really provide the exceptional education that I think all of us

085are wanting to give. but with all of that said, as we're seeing in the schools, I don't know how teachers and principles and our schools are doing it, but they really are doing their very best to provide an exceptional education. and again like I said I was you know in visiting different schools in the last few weeks with testing and whatnot and it is you know this season is a little wild. and just the excitement in their faces, the excitement in our teachers faces, the students and you know principles who are just thrilled with how things are moving and I think th those are things that you know as we you know we just focus on that and we continue to advocate at the state level but we keep our eyes on on the prize

086which is helping each student really succeed. and so for for me my priorities are you know what can we do that will have the greatest return on investment teacher training is one of those when we train a teacher they you know whether for like science of reading is a huge one for me and so when we're training that teacher we're seeing a return on investment because now that child is able to read proficiently and really focus that we see better behaviorally and their emotional well-being is better. so I feel like if we can focus on things that will see a greater return on investment. So for me it would be teacher training and really focusing on making sure that our teachers have what they need to really provide a great u education dayto-day. another thing

087I think I would like to see the district do and as we're looking at, you know, trying to really stretch our dollars, I think we need to reach out to our community for help and, as you know, the day of prayer happened a few a few weeks ago and I was able to gather u nearly 200 local pastors and community leaders right here in the boardroom and each of them said, "Alicia, we are on board. Whatever you need, however we can help and support." And that is I think when we when we look at that with mental health, that's a great way to, you know, youth pastors are want to come in and help in any way that they can. If that's a way we can partner with them, they're not looking to be paid.

088They do this because this is this is what they do for a living. and so things that we can, you know, ways we can partner with community members, you know, including like the Reed Charitable Foundation, for instance, as a nonprofit. We've used them in the past where they've come in and, you know, fully trained entire schools for free and helped you know, our schools get from a D to an A. And so I think if those are ways that we can partner and continue to help our schools while stretching the funding, that is a huge priority for me. Thank you. Thank you. okay. I am queued up next and I had a couple questions but I think I'm just going to I'll follow up with those questions later and move on but to my priority.

089So as you said Dorine in the presentation this is kind of our new reality now. I don't think that you know the obvious it's pretty obvious that the state voucher system is not going anywhere anytime soon. and as we continue to make decisions on you know our underenrolled schools and our schools that we had those discussions about those schools. We talked about possibly doing some resonings. those are uncomfortable conversations and I understand that but I don't think I don't think we have any option at this point. you know, I think right sizing some of our schools, so that we're using our staff that we have in the most effective way is going to be vitally important in the next coming years. so I strongly encourage us to start having these conversations, figuring out where we

090can move move kids, move and make those adjustments. I understand it's painful, but this is just the way it is. We can't have a school that's, you know, severely underenrolled and supplementing that funding for that school to be able to have the administrators they need and the staff they need to run that school when there's not enough students providing that education. And so I think we really have to I want to continue those conversations and really talk about that. And then as we talk about, you know, parents that have, you know, left the district or things that are the biggest concerns of parents that I hear as a board member, I will and from students, I will tell you the biggest concern that I is them not having a teacher in their classroom. I do

091not hear any of the other concerns that people like to talk about that are concerns of parents. That's not what I'm hearing. What I hear from kids and what I hear from parents is my child did not have a qualified teacher in front of them for the entire year they took AP psychology. they had a long-term sub that didn't know the material, that didn't teach, and then the kid had to teach themselves. So, they didn't get a good education. So, guess what? When that happens, they leave and they go find a place where they can get a good education. So, my priority, my biggest priority is for us to this coming year make sure that we have teachers in the classroom teaching the kids. And if that means that we c if we can't find

092the specialized teachers that teach, you know, AP psychology, AP lit, or this is what I'm thinking of the high school ones because that's who I hear from the high school kids all the time when they complain to me about stuff. That's what they're complaining about. If that means that we can't find them, then let's be innovative and let's have kids Skype into other classrooms. I know it's not Skype, but there's like that technology we used during CO. Let's have them zoom into other classrooms where there is a qualified teacher who has been trained that knows this material that's also teaching it. And then let someone let a long-term sub sit and monitor the attendance but not but let the kids be taught by another teacher. And if that means we supplement that other teacher who's

093teaching more kids virtually as well as in front of them, then that's what we have to do. my oldest daughter is about to start a hybrid law school. She's going to be taking her law school classes at home virtually. That'll they'll be live synced classes. If they can do that with law school, we can do it with our high school classes if that's what we have to do to make sure that the kids are getting a good education. so that would that's my biggest concern. I if we have a ton of teachers that were nonreappointed, however, we can fill in these gaps in the classrooms. If we need teacher, if we need staff moving from, and I know we did this a lot already, we've moved staff from even district positions into classrooms. whatever we

094have to do, I want to stop seeing long-term subs in classrooms and kids missing education that they need. So, that's a big big priority for me. on those same lines, the other I really want us to focus on the things that are working. We have a lot of as many of my board members have said, our public schools do amazing things. We have amazing programs. We see it all the time in our boardroom when we have different programs come in and we celebrate them. We have some schools that are and some teachers, excuse me, that are doing phenomenal work, like way above and beyond what they even have to do. beyond just teaching in the classroom. I want us to invest in those programs and those teachers. if we are going to have the best

095product that parents are going to want to send their kids to and kids are going to want to attend, then we have to invest in it. And we can't have these great amazing teachers that are doing these great things and then they're not supported or their programs are not supported and then those teachers leave. this has happened many times. so I want to see us investing in the programs that work, that are doing well, whether that be capital investments, things that the program needs, resources that they need, but also investing in those teachers. we have to incentivize in some cases I think programs that the extracurricular programs the afterchool programs all the extra things that teachers that we ask teachers to do I want to make sure that we're incentivizing that our teachers could certainly

096use the income so if a teacher is putting in numerous amount of hours for a certain program at a school, I think they should be compensated for it. And I think we've got to figure out a way to do that. you know, another good example is like clubs, you know, all the clubs have to have club sponsors. when schools have extensive clubs and activities for kids to be involved in, the kids are excited to come to school and the kids want to go to those schools. We saw it when one of the schools was here presenting their their program and I can't remember which school know which school it was. It was one of the superintendents and they were showing all the different clubs and that they had and they were so excited and I

097said yes Dr. Phillips and I said they should be doing a marketing for Dr. Phillips and it should be all over Instagram and Tik Tok because if other kids saw what they all those fun things they were doing, those kids would want to go to that school. They would rather go to that school than some school down the street that doesn't have a quarter of those clubs. But the only way you can have all those activities and all those clubs is if you've got the teachers and the staff that are willing to do it. And some of that is just culture and buyin and they're excited to do it. But we can't just expect teachers to always do things because they love it. We've got to invest in it. And so I would like to

098see us invest in extracurricular sponsorships I mean for the clubs for the sponsors of the clubs and for the for the different things that the clubs need. And along those same line same lines as we've talked the superintendent and I have had discussions about equity amongst different schools with programs, extracurriculars and arts and those kinds of things. making sure that schools that don't have the same parental support can get the same funding for those programs because I'm telling you as a parent when you're looking at a school and where to send your child, you're going to be looking at if you have a child that's interested in arts, you're going to be looking at what kinds of arts programs they have in that school. And if you've got a school that just doesn't do a

099lot because they just don't get a lot of funding because they don't have a lot of parent support, you're not going to want to put your kid there. you're going to want to go to a school like university that has, you know, this amazing arts program. But all of our schools should be doing not maybe to that extent, but should be, you know, those kids should have the same opportunities at every school. So those are those are my top priorities, people, teachers, and making sure that if we're going to have the best product that we are investing in it. Next up is member Vanos. Thank you, Member Bird. as member Gallo and member Bird have both said, I also support people over programs. And I assume that when you all ask for our priorities, you

100are also asking for our priorities of what we want to cut in order to fund the things that we want to have. Well, thank you so much for bringing that up. We do need a little bit of clarity as to what you mean by people. is that related to salary increases? because as you saw in the chart, there are areas where we are overspending and it's people and so knowing that the amount of money that is coming from the state for teacher salaries is slightly between 0.9 and 1.6%. if if you're saying you want to prioritize salaries for employees and if that's what you mean by people then that list where we are looking where we are overspending what is the priority for us because that's where we're probably going to have to look to

101find the dollars for salaries if that's my interpretation of what you mean by people. Okay. Thank you so much. actually the area that I was focusing on first was teachers. and specifically what I mean by let's say teachers over programs. I did actually ask for a list of the computer types of programs that we are using in our schools. and I'm sure some of them are I'm sure that teachers like some of them. I'm sure that parents like some of them. I'm sure students like some of them. But when we are in a year where we have to decide what we are not going to continue over what we do want to prioritize, I would like to take a really hard look at that list and find I would rather a teacher or a support

102person being in that room to help students learn than putting students in front of a screen. that list that was provided to me by u Miss Kalino. So, thank you so much for providing that. I just kind of want to share some numbers. If if you remove if we sort of remove thing, if we remove Beantock, if we remove typing club the typing programs and we remove the SAT prep online, if we remove those and sort of continue those, but look at the cost of the other programs, that's over $6 million that we are paying for those other programs. if you add enginuity to it, that's almost another million dollars. So that's over $7 million we're spending on those programs, which I would prioritize looking at those to cut when we are having to make

103hard decisions. I also wanted to member Bird made a really good point about investing in our teachers who go above and beyond and I think it is worth having a conversation with our union about you know how we are you know paying our teachers and if there is some flexibility in teachers that maybe are at struggling schools or you know that you know maybe there's some flexibility in how we are paying our teachers So, I would I would like to prioritize that conversation with the CTA. and then when we look at some of these areas where we are so drastically underfunded that we're having to pull money from our operating budget to cover some of the mandates, and some of our own priorities such as mental health. I do think it is it is I

104actually I'm curious. This is a question. I'm I'm wondering what what partnerships we have with our community in terms of providing that. And I'll I'll give an example. I know for Winter Park schools, the Winter Park Health Foundation invests so much money into those schools to have mental health counselors, chill program, all of that. I'm wondering what relationships we have with Advent Health, Neores, Orlando Health. Are they also providing services or would they provide funding? I guess I would say that could could they provide funding something like the foundation does for some of our schools to cover some of those costs for for mental health. I'm sorry. I' I'd have to defer to my to our curriculum team on that response. and maybe I'll just put it out there that I would like to have

105those. We will we'll look at that. just as a note, the Winter Park F Health Foundation is an incredible partner, but they will tell you that even with what they're providing, it's not enough and they do it in conjunction with our people as well. and so we can certainly look at the partnerships that we have. I can tell you that we do not have an existing partnership with any of the hospitals or organizations like the Winter Park Health Foundation where they actually are providing a person and we can certainly look to have those conversations with them. I do know that for example at the West Lakes Early Childhood Center Advent Health has invested heavily and they provide OT, PT, speech therapy for the children that are like zero to four and I know that some

106of the hospitals have indicated they might be interested in providing that additional help, but we'll we'll do that and send that to the board so that you had the list of organizations that we're partnering with and any cost associated with it. Thank you. I think there's just when I look when I look at the mental health allocation, when I look at the amounts we're getting and I look at the needs in our schools, there's just no way we're going to have enough there. There's no way we can provide what we need. So I think that reaching out to these professional you know credentialed partners to provide mental health support I think is essential you know and even beyond that I mean I know for example in in the legal world you know lawyers are required

107to to provide proono services and if they don't they have to pay pay money into that program. So, you know, are there even private mental health providers that are willing to donate some portion of their time, an hour a week to see one student? And again, this isn't this is working with multiple people to solve a problem. You're right. You know, one one foundation that is extremely generous, you know, that's not going to solve our problem. But when we expand these partnerships to other groups, we can start to make a dent in that because there's no way we on our own can cover everything that our students need. in in the mental health area. So, that is one priority that I would have is reaching out to those partners. And I do want to make

108it clear that I personally do not support volunteer chaplain inside of our schools. I think it is wonderful that families have you know, that they may have a a strong you know, a place of worship and religious leaders that they admire. And I do hope that they seek those services outside of school. I do not support them being inside of our school. The other area that I wanted to ask about was with respect to transportation and I know you answered some questions about McKenna Vento. you know my question that I guess I would go ahead. So the information about McKenna Vento that board member Ferrron shared I don't believe is completely accurate. I am having the team research to send it to the board. However, if the child is homeless prior to entering the charter

109school, they are not McKenna Vento because charter is a choice. So, they're not eligible for any of those services. If they become homeless when they're in the charter school, then they are. But even for transportation, and this is what I'm asking them to verify, they only have to provide a bus pass. So, it they are not under the same guidance legislatively that we are as a public school. And just a follow-up question, charter schools can also pick and choose their students, right? Yes. Yes. So, they could just simply decide that if a student is too expensive to just not accept that student, right? Oh, okay. I'm not aware of the registration processes for all of our charter schools. I do know that some have specialties and so they only accept certain children. I would defer

110to delegal if they are, you know, have more information on that. I think that aside from the specialized schools, charters are not supposed to discriminate against students with special needs or based on expense. But whether that occurs, I think it happens probably depending on the school and depending on the student. Yep. Got it. Thank you. and also okay so also going back to transportation I you know question if I think that again transportation is just so underfunded. I would support just relooking at the whole system. I would like to know if we can I've brought this up before in meetings. and it also goes with just some equity concerns, but can can we just can we have hubs where we're picking up students and maybe we're not making as many stops at their homes? Maybe

111it's it's a hub that students need to get to that's, you know, less than 2 miles from their home and they need to get there in order to get transportation. do I like that? No. Do I wish that we could pick every child up at their door? Yes. but and I'm sure there are state statutes about how far away, you know, the bus stop can be from the student, but I think we have some room in there to think a little bit differently about how we organize our transportation. And I would like to at least take a look at that to see if there's a way we can save money. and I think that's it for now. Thank you. Thank you, Member Vanos. Member Gallo. Thank you, Madam Chair. I'm just going to agree with

112some of what my fellow board members have said up here. I absolutely agree with member Bird that we're going to have to look at schools that are underenrolled and potentially repurpose those schools. We need to go into the community, start having those conversations with the community. Part of our strategic plan is that we have to I we require that we offer a highquality education to all of our students. And when you dilute resources due to underenrollment, you're not providing the best and the highest quality education that we possibly can to those students. And we're just we're stretching our resources too thin. So, we are going to have to have those hard conversations and we're going to have to look at targeted reasons where pockets are underenrolled and what what can we do to even out

113the distribution of students? And again, those are going to be hard conversations to have, but we have no choice. I mean, looking at the budget, we have no choice but to have those. I agree with member Vanos. I would like to I don't know that I'm totally s sold on the hubs especially for our elementary kids cuz they don't always have the supervision in the morning that they possibly could because their parents work. I mean it's expensive to live in Orlando. but I would like to see if what that looks like and if there's cost savings involved in it. I do have a question on the chart for programming. I see where it says math su success maker and how much math success maker cost us, but I don't see reading. Did I Did I

114miss it? I didn't see reading in the programs listed. Success maker for reading. we'll ask Dr. Brown Canon to come up and respond. It was it was an email that Dorene copied all the board on. Dr. Russo had provided the information that I emailed. that's right. Right here. Good morning, board. So, for Success Maker, we're utilizing Success Maker Math. For reading, we're using Lexia with our K2 students and we use Reading Plus for our students in grades three through five. So, we don't use Success Maker ELA. No, ma'am. That is correct. Perfect. Thank you. so I guess when we're looking at things that we could take off our plate, I know that Success Maker and maybe the ROI on the success maker due to our math scores really going up this school year, maybe there's

115a correlation. So I would love to know if there's a correlation between the increase in math scores that were preliminary seen and a connection to success maker. If we can't make that correlation, then I would I'm wondering if there are other opportunities to collect the data that we need through math, like do we have other programming, SUBAs, benchmark testing, PMAs, is there other ways that we may might be able to collect that data and be able to get rid of that expense? And I would ask that for all of the programming that's listed here. if there's another way for us either to provide the services needed or look at other areas if it's a program that we use to collect data if there's other ways we could collect that data with fidelity that I would

116ask that we do that. and I would also ask and I know that we do this yearly and maybe this is coming up in the summer but I would also like to know the return on investment on the programs that we do have listed here. And I know that we're moving towards an outcomebased procurement, but are all of these outcome based? Like are all of these agreements outcome based for these programs? No. Madam chair, may I? Okay. So, no, they're not. just a point of clarification. So, the team already cut 3.5 million in interventions from last year to this year. Yes, we are required to provide interventions. So if the program is not there, then the teachers would have to develop the materials to be able to use as part of the intervention. Okay. and

117so absolutely we will look at we will look at what's left on this list, but there's a reason there's only one for each area because we've already cut that out. Yes. and they did use the data that we have for the return on investment. Dr. Border's team will be looking at each of the programs to see how outcomes correlate to the programming. But I just need for you to know that if you cut those programs, now the teachers and of course the district always would be able to provide resources through our curriculum resource materials, but they're not required to use that. So one might say or you could hear now I have more work to do because I don't have the program that's available. Thank you. I appreciate that cl clarification and that's the type

118of information that we need because we don't want in our urgency to cut dollars to create raises eliminate something that is beneficial to teachers and is helping our students. So I really appreciate that clarification. So here's what I think we should I mean I think we've got to when I say prioritized people over programs that's what I mean. I would prefer to have, if possible, a person in front of a student teaching that student. I understand that's not always possible. we've got to prioritize teacher raises. I would love, you know, when you look at things that I want to get rid of. I want to get rid of egeneuity. I've been very clear about it. I want it gone. Every teacher I talk to says that there's so much cheating that goes on. You cannot

119convince me that you have a high quality education in nine days that you can offer in a semester or a full year. I understand that might affect our graduation rates and I'm I'm okay with that. I'm okay with that if we can ensure that our children are getting the highest quality education that they deserve. so I would and testing I'd love to get rid of I hear that all the time. I know member Bird talks about having teachers in a class and I agree with that. I also hear that there's too much testing in our schools. And so once again, if you're asking me what I want to get rid of, I want to get rid of CFS. Okay. I love the support I just received from the board. And I'm sorry. I think Dr.

120Vasquez may want to respond. Yes. And onetoone devices, I'd like to get rid of those as well, especially in elementary school because those cost us a lot of money. I know we're going to lease. I still want them gone. Okay. I'm going to respond to the ones I have and I'll go back to that one. So, we just had a conversation. we had a meeting yesterday which was scheduled about a month ago after the conversation we had on egeneuity. and I'm glad that certain board members chimed in because my team was not a fan. They're still not a fan. because of the implication and it's not I want to be clear it's not just graduation rate and the conversation we had yesterday with the team which included our executive leaders for middle school high school

121members of Mary's team Dr. Brown Cannon and her team so yeah graduation is a piece and I was very clear we're not chasing points right and the conversation which Dr. arm Brewster. I felt like I was in a church as he was trying to get the lesson across that what we want is for them to have the best experience. What we also need to understand is for these students, they are not going to have an opportunity to recover a class the way they do now, which I do not agree with. I've been saying this for a long time. How do you recover a year-long class in se what equates to seven days? So then what happens? Okay, they can take it through OCVS. They can take it again in person. So now that's an impact

122to the school because and I'll use algebra. My favorite example to give although the high school division has shared with me that our algebra scores are up. I the Dr. borders team has not confirmed. They will not confirm until the very end. But now a child who did not pass algebra the following year may have to take two math classes, algebra and geometry, maybe one online, one in person. So the implication to the school is in the teachers they may need and what they're teaching. and so I will just share that we do have a plan. I've as we had a great conversation they are going back to talk to the principles just to see how aligned we are. We are going to be it's going to be a transition so that it doesn't we

123don't go cold turkey right away. We have seniors and juniors as well as maybe seventh and eighth graders. once we finalize that I'll bring it back to the board. While it will not be an immediate cost savings for this upcoming year, it will be a significant savings after the one or two year period and overall we believe our children are going to get a better experience because they're going to learn the content that Okay. We also have reached out to through our I feel I'm not sure if it was through the labor management committee or if there was a phone call made to Mr. McCracken about the CF to see, you know, if that is something that they can survey the teachers to see if they have changed their opinion about the CFES. And so

124we're we're waiting to to see what that result is. We are working we've already had a meeting on school consolidation. we are going to put out a timeline for the schools that we're going to begin to look at what does what do we mean when we have a school that has 300, another school that has 400 and there's a neighboring school that also maybe only has 300 and we can combine all three into one. And so that is going to be a process that again longterm will save us money but is going to involve a lot of community engagement so they understand the why and the services that will be available to them now in a in a facility that is to capacity. So that's also being worked on. Mr. when will work on the

125hubs. I believe that we've had a conversation and I think that the legislation doesn't allow us to do that, but we will go back and research it and come back to the board if it is feasible, what that what does that mean for OCPS and possible cost savings. and the idea of looking at some of the supplements that we are currently given certainly that's something we would bargain with CTA and additionally the idea of teachers maybe that are going above and beyond or who are getting better results or have unique programs or are in some of our more fragile schools may note to Mr. or that's something we could bring to the table as well because all of those would need to be bargained. And then one last thing and I know that we've had

126this conversation from the DES but we're really need to have a serious conversation about going out for another 1 mil. Like I think it's very clear based on this budget that the state is not going to fund us to the level that is needed to provide a highquality education and to provide salary increases for our teachers. So I think we really need to start thinking now about going back out for another 1 mill that could just be used for teacher raises because I think that's the only way we're going to be able to fund them moving forward. Thank you. Thank you, Member Gallo. member Fant. Thank you. This has been a great conversation with just even looking into the details of all of our different thesenuity typing club. I was looking at the typing club

127online. and I'm sure there's a difference between the free version and the paid version and maybe we could look back at that and just see like is it really you can maybe touch. No, we'll we'll look at it. What many are not aware is that when you're looking at a free version, it doesn't have all of the protections, the firewalls, the data that we have to save in place and that's why we are not able to always move in the direction of of free. So, we'll check that out and send it to the board as to if we can or if we can't. Perfect. Thank you. and then I also wanted to see as far as the different you know different categoricals what is required by the state and then what are we doing? so

128for instance I feel like the easiest one to look at would be mental health. So what is required is it like one mental health counselor and then are we providing more than that or maybe get a little more information on that. No they're not required at all. the board several years ago, and Mary, you may be able to help me with my timeline, made a commitment prior to the pandemic, we were seeing children that were in crisis and made a commitment. I believe we had maybe seven district mental health counselors, something around that number. Then when the pandemic hit there was additional dollars through ESSER that we were able to expand that number but there is no requirement that is something that we have continued to fund because it's been a priority of the board.

129I think that's another place that, you know, I just think if it's something where we could look into it more and see what is you know, what we're spending because if we don't have the funding for it, we can't really be spending money that we don't have that we don't have. and while I 100% agree that like mental health is a huge area where we're seeing I mean this is I think the greatest generation that has like the generation that has been greatest impacted by mental health with anxiety, depression, suicide, the stress. and so, you know, obviously we want to help with that, but again, I do feel like as a as the schools, we're here for education. I get it's, you know, we want to look at a holistic approach. but if we don't

130have the funding, you know, what is another way that we can provide that? Whether it's you know, maybe having resources to say to the parent, these are some resources, these are like free counseling services, these are some that are paid. and again, reaching out to I know not everybody is a fan of reaching out to our faith-based partners, but those are areas where, you know, they may you can show a family a list and say this is also some options where then the family can choose to to help their child in that in that aspect. And then if those are funds that we can then make sure that we're using utilizing to cover whatever areas we need to but I do think we need to look into that more and see you know is it

131impacting is it helping is it not just something that I think we should look into. And then I'm very thankful about the egenuity. I think that's another area that, you know, we're extremely overspending with nearly a million dollars going to that. And it's I think when students know that there's kind of like a fall back, they go, "Eh, that's true. I do. I really need to try. I can always do egeneuity." So, when that isn't there, and they go, "Oh my goodness, I might have to repeat the year. I'm going to try harder. I'm really going to focus. I'm going to pay attention. And so, you know, as as much as it's like you want to help all the students, but at this point, I feel like we're literally spoon feeding them just to get

132an a graduation rate, which I understand that's maybe not why we're doing that. but, so I'm I'm very happy to see that will be transitioned out. and then again the CFES, I've talked to so many teachers who say, "Please, please, these, I know there's some that may love them, but I mean the students know that it's like basically a joke. The teachers can kind of grade them however they want to make sure that it looks good and they pass. and so to get that out of there and the kids don't have one more thing on their plate as far as testing, I think that would be huge." and just for everybody to just dig in and see how can we as a team focus on you know saving every penny. I also love the idea.

133I know maybe one or two board members mentioned you know we have a lot of people here in the district at the in this you know the district offices if you will who are highly qualified to go back into the classroom and teach in different areas. And you know I had one high school this year that they were basically out of a teacher the entire year scraping trying to find somebody. Could there have been somebody at the, you know, in the district offices where they could have pulled them and said, "Hey, would you do this for us this year?" we had somebody from the high school office who was placed in as a as a principal and they're doing a phenomenal job. And so to get them, you know, I think even in that sense,

134if we're really stretching our finances, you know, I think we need to also look at what can we do as a team to go, okay, you know, how can I maybe we can not put more on people. I get that. But like stretch what we're doing and the people, the resources that we have to really work more efficiently. not necessarily just having a lot of people at the district level and then fewer at the schools. See how we can really like branch that out as much as we can. So those are again priorities for me. Thank you, Superintendent. Just a point of clarification, the majority of the personnel that's in the division of learning are funded through grants. Title two, title three, some from title four and title one. and so we are already planning

135that we're going to have cuts for the following year. We'll no longer have those positions. So that is not a recurring dollar amount because they're funded through grants. Thank you. I have a quick question and then I'll looks like I'll bring us in for a landing. the mental health allocation we get from the state is $12 million this year. but mental health counselors are not required. So what what is required to be used with that mental health allocation? So the dollars have to be spent on anything that has to do with mental health, right? And so th the social workers, the extra social workers are funded from that. the licensed mental health counselors are funded by those dollars as well. What is required and I am not I want to make sure I am not

136saying this is what we would ideally want to do but what is required is that every school have a licensed mental health individual that could be a guidance counselor that could be a social worker and so we would then be putting more on the guidance counselors who are already stretched pretty thin but that's an area that we would still be in compliance with what the law requires and there's a a chunk of money there. Okay. I look I'm the first person to tell you as you all know I advocate strongly for our mental health services because I'm a firm believer that when kids are under in trauma or stress or crisis they're not going to learn anyway. So I'm a firm believer in that. But I also do think that my board members have made

137good points about thinking outside of the box as much as we can, looking for our community to help. I think that this is definitely an area where we could probably find community funding even philanthropic assistance to help pay for this kind of thing. I also would like to see us be more open to allowing private providers to come in to the school. there's, you know, when we have a mental health counselor at the school that's providing services to students at the school. Some of those students are students that have private insurance that could get their own mental health services, but it is certainly much more convenient and easier to have it done at school and sometimes better for the student, especially when you've got parents that are working. Otherwise, the kid might not even get

138the services. So, I would like to see us be more open to allowing those kinds of things, allowing the private providers, doing more virtual private visits in school during the school day with providers as much as we can. Anything like that we can use these outsour outside resources to help ease up what we are providing. I think we just have to do unfortunately. I just think that's where we're at. and then real quick, the testing, you mentioned, superintendent, the that we're required, another one of our requirements is the monitoring and the testing that we have to do. So, that's why we have so many of the program programs that we have. yet another expense that we have to pay for because of something we're required to do. I would like to see us could we

139get a white paper put together that has a list of all these things we've mentioned today that public schools are required to provide that other education systems private charter homeschool are not if we could get a list of everything in one on one sheet the you know transportation the FRS all these different things we've mentioned today. that would be really helpful. I think when we go to to share with the public, when we talk to legislators, when we advocate for proper funding of public schools, I think it's really important for people to see all of the things that we have to pay for and how that takes away from the highquality education that we are that we want to provide our kids. And the fact that we are still providing a high quality education and

140have all these programs and our teachers are doing amazing things is really quite a miracle when you think about how little of that base student money we can actually use towards those things. So, I want to just thank the board members. I think that everyone put in a lot of thought to this today and I think that there's been some really good discussions. superintendent, are you do you feel good about your direction? Do you think you have enough to So, I'm gonna I see Dorene is waving her hand. So, go ahead. Yes, ma'am. I'd like to just provide a couple of clarifications. First, to board member Vanos, the forecast is 6,229 student increase in family empowerment scholarship. and the dollars are about 60 million. So it's about 24 25% increase in students, about a 27%

141increase in in funding. I believe it was board member Gallow spoke to devices. I just want to clarify for the board and for the public that devices, even the new lease program is not paid for, will not be paid for through operating dollars. that is through capital. That was part of the half penny referendum. And finally, regarding the one mill, the one mill is critical to the operation of our district. It is over $200 million. I would fully support going back out for that, but I caution that if you were to use the 1 mill for anything other than operating, then first we'd have to reduce expenses by the 200 and something million if all you wanted to do was use it for for salary increases. So, we have to be very careful with that.

142If you were to go above the 1 mil and wanted to say that was specifically for a salary increase, that would be the board's decision. but then that is not a renewal. That is a new tax. So to do it in new tax in in new tax. So the one mill though is part of our operating dollars more than 200 mil. So 200 million. So we would have to keep that. Yeah. I was talking in addition to the current, not the renewal, but an additional. Thank you. That's a great idea. I think that several board members over the last several months have actually discussed that we probably need to look at an increase. I also believe that it's something that our community would support and would go a long way in not having to go

143through the angst every year about where are we going to find the money. and I applaud several board members that have stated no one is against choice. a firm believer you as a parent or your child's first teacher, you know what's best for your child. All we are asking is that you don't fund it on the backs of public schools and that putting everything in the BSA is not transparent because when we look if if truly everything was a a equal transition, we wouldn't be having this conversation. we would not be struggling to find, you know, a million dollars here, $2 million there for salaries or increases in salaries. And so I think that's the message that I want people to understand that we can all have the choice, but it needs to be properly

144funded. And I think that's where we are asking the state to really take a hard look so that you really can have the best educational system in the country. with that I am so thankful we had a great conversation. We've got direction. now what we will do as we're monitoring what's happening at the state level is that we'll start to put together scenarios if we're looking for an additional 1% the this is where we could get it 2% this is where we could get it and then we will come back to the board share that before any final decisions are made. Okay, perfect. Thank you, Superintendent. And may I just point of privilege? So, I don't know if everybody knows, but tomorrow is board member Gallow's birthday. And so, I think if we can all

145wish her a happy birthday. Birthday. I asked her what is she doing for her birthday? And she said, I'm going to graduations. What a kind. That's funny. yes. And speaking of graduations, there's the first ones are tomorrow. Today? Oh, today you have one today. Yay. Congratulations. Congratulations, class of 2025. We're excited. All right. and with that, this meeting is adjourned. Thank you. Oh. Yeah. Heat. Heat.