Special School Board Meeting - February 19, 2026

001with the roll call. uh so that each and every uh board member or cabinet member or uh support person who is here with us um can uh introduce themselves and you can just get a feel for their voice if you're joining us online. >> Uh I'm Rosyn Schmidt, chief operating officer. >> Claire Curry, Western album student representative. >> Kate Akov, Jack Jew. >> Bob Beard, Samuel Miller district. Ellen Osborne, Scottsville district. >> Rebecca Berlin, Whiteall district. Allison Spilman at large representative. >> Jim Dylan, Rio district. >> Judy Lee Ravana district. >> Matthew Hall, superintendent. Josiah Black, chief legal officer. >> Chandra Hayes, assistant superintendent of instruction. >> Christine Thompson, clerk of the board, >> and Patrick Mclofflin, assistant superintendent. >> Thank you so much. And thank you to our police officers who who serve us

002every day and are here today um to also keep us and the public safe. Um and I'd also like to thank you again. Um we have Clear Curry um here as our um student representative. And as many of you have seen, we talked about this a bit last week. Um the student representatives from uh Montichello, Western, AHS, and Community Lab will rotate. Um so that we will have a different board member each time. Um, we will now stand for the pledge of >> 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. >> We will now pause for a moment of silence. Thank you. The next piece of our uh agenda today is the actual approval

003of our agenda. Do I have a motion to approve tonight's agenda? >> I move we approve tonight's agenda. >> Moved by Miss Lee. Do I have a second for that? >> Seconded by Mr. Dillanbach. All those in favor? I >> I >> our agenda for tonight is approved. So we are now moving into our budget work session. Um this is budget work session one and uh Miss Mayakumawi, our director of budget and planning um and budget guru behind this amazing budget book um is here um to introduce us to the budget book and to talk us through um tonight's agenda. >> Thank you. I have two mics. >> Fancy. Yeah. Um, I'm Maya Kumazawa, director of budget and planning, and I'm here to facilitate tonight's work session. I will also be joined by Brooke Conover,

004senior budget analyst and Chandra Hayes, assistant superintendent. So um so as we mentioned we want to introduce um especially the new board members to our budget document that does everyone have one or anyone okay um the budget book is broken out into sections with letters A through G. The first section, section A, is an overview for the whole budget. And then the last section, section G, those are all of the um the variables and inputs that are used to develop all the budgets. And the budgets you will see are in sections B through F. Section B is a detailed overview of revenues. Sections C, D, and E are detailed expenditure budgets, and section F is special revenue funds. This evening we will focus mostly on the school fund expenditures. So that's sections C, D, and

005E. And then next week we'll um look at revenues which is sections B and F. There will be a lot of flipping through the book because while B through F are sort of the budget outputs, the assumptions that are used to determine those budget amounts are all in section G. And then the kind of qualitative overview of well what does this all mean is all in section A. And so that's why we're kind of flipping everywhere. But it does make sense if you wanted to start out with an qual a qualitative overview of what's changing seeing all the budgets and then in the end what's supplemental is what's driving those decisions. This will make more sense as we go through it. Um as our budget process aligns with our strategic plan learning for all. It

006is in direct alignment with our third goal which is equitable and transformative resources. So our budget aims to do that is to provide equitable and transformative resources to all of our schools and communities. Separately from the strategic plan, we have budget goals. Um these were adopted several years ago and these um are pretty much the scaffold by which we build up the budget. To summarize, um, fiscal responsibility. We align resources with our mission to support student success. Community engagement, families, staff, business, and nonprofit partners, and community members help shape and inform our work. To attract and retain a strong workforce, we prioritize competitive compensation through market aligned salaries and benefits. And we also focus on sustainable operations using best practices to manage facilities, transportation, and operational services efficiently. Every proposal that we bring forward tonight,

007including this evening, um is aligned with our strategic plan and schoolboard priorities and decisions are informed by data using performance measures and logic models to guide investments and to ensure that funds are used effectively. So this is an overview of our expenditures. Um this is the same um these three part these three pie charts show the same expenditures of $311 million that's proposed in the FY27 draft funding requests. We'll start first with the uh purple one by expense type. This can be found on page C13. Um, and I forgot to mention every slide has yellow highlighted page numbers and so um you can look at the slide and then you can reference the budget book just to see how everything is connected. So we'll start on page C13 and that page shows um what the

008money is actually going towards. What is it paying for? So the way we categorize them is by salaries, benefits, other wages, operations and transfers. The second way you can um slice the data is by state reporting category or function or sometimes called program. What is the actual program that those expenses are going towards and those categories are defined by the state and that's this is how we report our expenditures so that the state receives data from other school divisions and they're comparable. So they're um pretty set for every school division and those um functions are instruction, administration, attendance and health, technology, building services, transportation, and transfers. And then the third way you might look at our expenditure budget is whether a budget is schoolbased or department based. A school-based expenditure is when you can tie

009an expense directly to a physical location like a school building. Um, this would be the case for our teachers, our principles, our nurses, our custodians, u most of the staff who travel to and from a physical location every day. Department-based is a different type of budget and that's um for budgets where the staff and the operating expenses serve the division as one unit and you can't break down um somebody's job between schools. So the best example of this are um bus drivers and they serve multiple schools and so we budget them as a divisionwide expense and we don't break down exactly what portion of their FTE is serving which school. Um that lets us be more um flexible in how we staff our routes and it's also more indicative of this is a division expense.

010It is not linked to any school. So, all three of these pie charts um have a total dollar value of $311 million, which is the expenditures that we'll be reviewing this evening. In section A, uh we outline in detail exactly what is changing from the FY26 adopted budget to the FY27 draft request. So, it is a budget-to-budget change. And the reason why we're looking at budget to budget is because we're still in the current budget year and we don't have actuals yet. So most comparisons that we talk about will be from one budget to the next. Um once we finish out this year, we'll start showing actuals and that will differ from the budget, but the best comparison point is the adopted budget to the draft funding request. The FY26 adopted budget was $284 million.

011And then the middle column shows exactly what changes are being applied to get to that draft funding request number that we've been looking at. These categories include a baseline adjustment, non-discretionary changes, new schools, workforce investments, service reductions, and new proposals. Another way we can look at expenditures is by um per pupil. This essentially means if you took the whole budget and you divided it by the number of students that the budget is serving, how much is each pupil costing us in terms of expenditures? And so you can do this for any budget year, but as an example, um if you look at the FY26 adopted budget, as we sh I I showed on the previous slide was $284 million. Then that middle column showed the changes which is $27 million. And then the third column

012is what the proposed funding request is. The per people expenditures those are if you look at other divisions those are calculated differently. Um there's no set exact set way of exactly how it should be calculated. In most cases though capital expenses are not included because as you can imagine capital expenses will vary significantly from year to year. Are you building a new school? Are you not? And it would just skew the data. So typically um capital and debt service is not included. As you know, there is a one-time transfer to capital included in that $311 million. So I've provided an adjusted number that's $37 million if you take out the onetime transfer to capital. So that's the that's the numerator. The denominator is the number of pupils. That also um could vary depending on how

013you wanted to calculate it. For our K12 population, we have about 13,800 students. That was the projection for the current year and it's the projection for next year is also around that. So the number of students K12 is not planned to significantly change from one year to the next. So that's not driving changes in the per pupil amount. Another number you could use is prek to 12 students. So including preschool as part of the student count. Um, normally we don't do that because the state ADM or the state average daily membership, the number that they use to determine how much money they give us doesn't include preschool. But in reality, we are serving hundreds of preschool kids and they cost money. And so that is it would be a more realistic way to look at

014well, how much is each child costing rather than dividing it by number just because it's used in other formulas. But that is the K12 number is typically what you'll see throughout the budget book. And so if you use preK to2 students, which is our actual number of enrolled students, and you divide by the budgets, that's the per pupil amount. So in the FY26 adopted budget is $20,000 per per pupil, the change was $1,900. And then um if you add in if you put update the numerator with the draft funding request and divide it by the prek to 12, you can see a range of $21,000 to $22,000 depending on what you use. The 9.5% increase that you see that is the same as the total expenditure increase and that's because the um the number of

015students is staying the same. um if the number of students were increasing, you would see an an increase that might be a little bit less. This is just a chart I pulled um using available public data from the VDOE about what per pupils look like. Um this is a list of all Virginia cities and counties with a local composite index of greater than 0.5. Our local composite index is 64 and that just is an indication of how our budget is structured. Um a majority of of our budget, threequarters of it is funded locally and then one quarter of it is funded by the state. And so a lot of these counties have similar structures where the locality is paying more than the state because of the LCI. The LCI is capped at 08, which is

016why it doesn't go all the way up to one. I'll pause there um and see if you all have any questions before I turn it over for discussion for just this section and throughout the presentation we've built in pauses like this so that you don't have to save everything for the end and we can have more focus discussion >> and and help us because I know a number of us have put questions forward and my gut is if you kind of look the probably the most common one is and we you know that we both have as well as that we get from constituents all the time is, you know, what what is included in or and or why the increase over the last five years um in per pupil. So, I don't know if

017you want to talk a little bit about that now or if that's something you want to come back to as you kind of go through the questions. >> Nope, I think that's a good question. Um, so as I said, because the enrollment number budgetto budget is fairly flat, what's driving the increase in the per pupil is just the increase in expenditures. And so that's what's shown here. And we will be covering each of these categories in more detail through the rest of the conver the um evening. Um, and we are working on um some more analyses about prior years. This is an example for what how you might look at it. But this information exists in every budget book for a long time. We have a section A and we have all the changes in

018section A of what is changing in terms of the expenditures. >> Thank you. >> Other questions from my colleagues >> Or discussion. Anything you want to touch on at this point? Okay. Okay, I'll move forward then. Um, this slide you'll see is a repeat from what you saw last week. It the purpose of it is to show how much of our budget is already set. If we maintain the service level that we have now and we move that forward one year and we keep all the same people and we update costs, that's what that purple area is showing. And then the um the gray and the green and the orange, those are the new costs that we're adding or what new program changes or things that will look different next year and the things that

019have monetary value attached to them. The first step in developing this baseline budget, which is in purple, is um by building up a baseline budget. We start from what we call a zerobased budget. So we start with nothing. We start at zero and then we build up from there. We build up every single FTE, every single allocation to the school, use um all the salary and benefit information that we have um in the fall and we build up a budget from scratch um to build up the purple section. And then we add in okay well if we want to maintain the current services if we want to maintain our contracts if we want to maintain for example our partnership with KEK how much would that cost in terms of cost increases even though we're not

020changing partnerships or contracts cost increases are included as well. Um and then after that, after we've added the non-discretionary contractual costs, then we say, "Okay, well, what's changing next year?" We're adding two new schools, um three if you think about it in a different way. We have, um workforce investments, including compensation, working conditions, and benefits. And then what we have left is $6.9 million, or about 2% of the budget. that's really at the discretion of the school board to say, "Okay, well, we have this much money allocated based on the formula from the state and local government. What's the best way to use that?" Um, in order to build the baseline budget, um, there are several inputs. So, you'll see some reference to section G. We, um, use a projected enrollment number by school and

021grade. We have adopted staffing standards that determine the level of service. We have updated benefit rates. And then we have inflationary and contractual changes. And I'll go through each of those. We'll start first with enrollment. Um since the pandemic, we have grown very slowly but steadily. We're projecting 14,174 students next year when including preschool. Um, in this chart, K12 growth, K12 growth is about 4%. But what's interesting is preschool growth is much more significant, a 77% increase. The orange column to the right is what the funding request is based on and what we apply the staffing standards to. Another metric we use is economically disadvantaged student rates. Um, there are four specific metrics that we look at. So you can see each school has four columns. So I'll go through each of those. The first

022column, which is in light blue, is the direct certification rate for K12 students. So this is um in the fall of 2025, we looked at how many students are directly certified by for government services. Um this would be like food stamps or other federal um identifiers. and we take the number of students who are qualified for that and then we divide it by the number of students in the school. That gets you the rate for what we call direct certification. The second column in the dark blue is the 2025 free and reduced lunch rate. In order to get this, we take the number of students and families who have applied for free and reduced lunch. We divide that by the total number of students in the school and that gets you a percentage of the

023free and reduced lunch rate. Um, knowing that we have um nine schools that are um in the community eligibility program or C, that program provides free and reduced lunch without the need for an application. Um, and because we have that program in place at most of our schools, that free and reduced lunch number is not quite accurate at those C schools because you're not applying for it. So, it's bad data. In order to um normalize for that, what we've done is looked historically at well, what's the difference between the direct certification rate, which that methodology hasn't changed, and the difference between free and reduced lunch rates before they were designated as C. and we look at trends and we extrapolate, well, what is probably the true free and reduced lunch rate if they weren't C.

024That's what the um orange column is showing. That's sort of our the number that we use for C schools knowing that the free and reduced lunch rate is not accurate. For nonC schools, we stick with the free and reduced lunch application rates. Finally, the fourth column is a um is a metric we've started in this budget process is what I'm calling the economically disadvantaged rate. This is a different rate that we have been using for um applications for federal title funds. And in this methodology, it takes the direct certified number of students, applies a 60% premium or multiplies it by 1.6 six and says, "Okay, well, this is a a better general, more conservative estimate of how many students are actually economically disadvantaged because of the flaws you see in free and reduced lunch. There

025might be stigma tied to applying for it, and there are other reasons that it might not be a true indicator. Whereas a direct certification number is a more solid number, but you know, it's not fully representative. So, by applying a premium factor, you're getting a better sense of the needs of the school. Um so that is um throughout the budget document we're calling that the economically disadvantaged rate. The orange column the the used free and reduced the adjusted free and reduce rate that one is used for um t developing target class sizes and other differentiated staffing like reading specialists. Um but then we use we have shifted towards using using the economically disadvantaged rates in other areas like providing school operational funding or providing staffing like um APS and clerical. And the reason for that

026is you're we're kind of because it would be a a significant cost increase to change our methodology all at once. We're slowly trying to bring that in in areas where there isn't a huge financial impact um knowing that it is probably a better metric to use. This is the same chart but for uh middle and high schools as well. The next piece of data we use um that drives um increases in our budget is the number of special education students. While um our general student population has grown fairly slowly, the special education population has seen a 13% increase um in the years in this chart. Special education students require greater level of service and that's seen in the staffing ratios that we provide. Um and those staffing ratios are um on page G16. They're very

027detailed. You can see exactly we take the number of special education students and apply a ratio to them and that's how the staffing is determined and you can see those those ratios are studentto staff ratios are fairly small. Also while special education student enrollment is increasing the severity of disabilities have also increased at an even higher rate. Um the more severe the disability the more resources are required to ensure that students receive the services needed to learn. Right. So, um I've been I've mentioned the staffing standards a few times now. Um but this is um several pages in section G5 to G18 where we outline all of the school staff based at each school and we determine a way to ensure that resources are allocated fairly. So what's shown on this slide, they these positions

028do make up a majority of FTE budgets, but these are classroom teachers in the purple table for kindergarten through third grade, we have a target class size of 20.3 students per teacher. And then as the free and reduced lunch, again, we're using the adjusted free and reduced lunch rates. As those rates go up, the ratios get smaller. So um more teachers are provided for a lower number of students. For fourth and fifth grade, our base target class size is 22.5. And then you can see how those ratios go down with different demographics. For 6th through 12th grade, the base um target class size is 23.75 students. And then you can see again the different thresholds for free and reduced lunch. Great. So um this may be the first time that returning board members have seen

029a table in this way. Um we have worked over the last year to simplify these standards to make them more transparent and accessible to decipher. Um previously we did not have established target class sizes. Instead we provided base teacher staffing and then additional fractional FTEES depending on every free and reduced lunch student. Um this was done very incrementally. So schools would go up or down by fractions of FTEES each year. Um, and there was not a clear goal of what the class size should be. So this change has led to some shifts. Some schools gained FTE and some schools lost FTE. Overall, we maintained a net zero financial impact throughout the division by making this change. The green table on the right is another staffing standard that we recently revised to promote again a simple

030and transparent standard that wouldn't fluctuate so widely from year to year. So there is stability and kind of an expectation of a staffing level. So for for example, we have reading specialists on here. They're provided for one reading specialist per 100 to 250 free and reduced lunch students depending on the level. Other tiered services, these are often used for math and reading interventionists and specialists. They're assigned based on academic performance and size kind of in these broader bands. All right. Um I would also like to mention that these uh the staffing at a school, they make up on average 93% of a school's budget. The other 7% of a school budget goes to operations. So it's a very small percentage of the total budget and you can see what those are. We have uh we

031provide general allocations. This is calculated by a base budget level and then additional money provided by PU per pupil. Um and this funding is used for supplies, materials, contract services, copers and just day-to-day office supplies. Program allocations are allocated to schools that have or host those certain programs. They include preschool, special education, classrooms, interpretation, um, career and technical education supplies and athletics. And then the third bucket we call supplemental pay. This is the largest part of the operating portion. And this is provided to schools based on enrollment and staffing levels and used for tutoring, substitute pay, stipen pay, overtime, and temporary wages. And the um this is this is uh laid out line by line in section G. You can see exactly every school and how much they're getting for every one of these items.

032Great. So I'll pause for questions. I have two questions. Um the first, and I briefly brought this up um in our call this week, but when we're looking at the baseline, the 287, what cuts were considered prior to adding on um additional services? And you may not have those answers right in front of you, but I think that's something that's really important for us to look at if we're increasing our budget. What um what did we look at that's not working well that we cut? I noticed the ED staff was reduced significantly. Um, but where else did we analyze? And and the reason I'm bringing this up is last year when we made the difficult decision to get rid of flesh, even though it was a program I loved, you supported with a lot of

033data that showed that it wasn't working and it was a cut that um was not money previously. It was not money well spent. I would like to see if there's other areas in our budget that there are things that money is not being effectively or efficiently spent. um when we got to that baseline um because I don't think any of us could say that, you know, if we just maintained everything that everything's perfect. There's got to be things that aren't going smoothly. Um so I don't know if you want to pause there if you had anything to say or if you want to come back to that at another that was a big question. I know >> I would just make a general comment is that we scrubbed and scrubbed in the last two years.

034We sort of made those reductions where we knew we had evaluated and knew it was possible, right? >> I think going into this budget process was a little bit different because we didn't >> we kind of exhausted the list. I don't know if you want to. >> So we we do have on ongoing uh logic model reviews and program evaluations. Like for example, this year we did a program evaluation on our AVID program and found that it had a strong return on investment. So we would continue that. But honestly, I don't through the process that we've gone through, if you look in the budget notebook, there are some programs that are in yellow, and that means that they are um they are in in the process of improving, but not as strong as they could

035be, and we have our eye on them. Uh but almost everything that this board has invested in over the last several years is working and is um having the results that it's intended to have. But we keep we keep reviewing them and we meet monthly to to do those reviews. >> Okay. Can Yes. Just as a followup, I just I don't but I I think on that I think and I think this is one of the questions that I submit is I do think we would like to look at those things in yellow and just understand the basic of those decision and then what I always say is then what is the mark to say okay if not improvement by X >> what is the like what is the next step so apologies for that

036>> agree yeah >> thank you um and then my other question had to do with sped Um, as you said, we've seen a consistent growth, especially postcoid, of um, students um, needing specialized services. Um, and I guess my bigger concern, and I would like some more information on this is, you know, one of the three things that we talk that is talked about as um, and what do you call them? Um, your key priorities. One of them is strengthening targeted supports um for sped, but unless I'm looking at it wrong, the overall sped budget is decreasing. Um so while we're putting $300,000 into these specialized positions, the overall amount spent on sped uh for the next fiscal year is actually going down. And so I would like to learn a little bit more about that.

037>> Would you be willing to share? I I'd like to look into it, but I don't know. >> Yeah. Okay. Um, and I can send an email and we can follow up, but that just sparked my memory when you said that. I want to get some comparison on that. So, I will follow up with an email and get some information. Yeah, thank you. >> Got a question about enrollment projections. I know we've chatted a little bit about this and the growth in certain areas and how do we plan for that? I noticed that from last year to this year enrollment was down slightly and the projection is that it will be up slightly for next year. Can you speak to how those estimates are made? >> Sure. Um, so every year we we do a

03810-year projection, but the 10-year projection is updated each year based on the latest year's data that gets folded in to the past 10 years of data. So, we look at the past 10 years of data, whatever is most recent, and we look at the trends of cohort progression. How are students moving from one grade to the next? >> And there's definitely patterns with that. Um recently we've seen um an increasing rate of students coming in in first grade for example and not at all the schools but at some of the schools we have patterns where at some schools students will not stay for sixth grade and then come back in the ninth grade and so we have 10 years of data by school and grade level that looks at that and we kind of we

039build a regression to say okay well what might next year look like based on past trends >> um for areas that are growing faster than others that have development we use a more aggressive assumption. >> So it's it's all based on historical data, but the assumptions you can use. Do you look back three years, six years or nine years? Those can be changed by growth area to grow um schools at different rates. So that's the that's the gist of it. For kindergarten, we look at birth rates five years prior. >> Gotcha. Yeah. Thank you. >> Other questions from my colleagues? continue. >> We'll keep moving through to our um inflationary and contractual changes. Um so this was shown as a non-discretionary item of 1.2 million. That 1.2 million doesn't really tell the full story because

040there are ups and downs. On A31, these are outlined in even more detail. But on this slide I'm showing um the general increases that contribute to this category. So the first is um an increase in technology operations and technology replacement. Um the second is an increase in building services operations. The third is an increase in voluntary early retirement incentive program or VRIP for short. Um we also have an increase to our healthc care rates. This is the anticipated change when we build in the plan year 27 rates which is a projection. This 1.8 million doesn't capture the entire healthcare fiscal to fiscal year increase. It is the impact of plan year 2027 on fiscal year 2027 and then other changes of $.2 million. So these total up to much more than $1.2 million but we

041actually um are seeing a windfall with the VRS rates. um those are going down for the next two years um by a significant amount. And so we're seeing $3.2 million in school fund savings um for our the contribution we put for the employer portion of VRS is going down by more than $3 million. That combined with the increases at the top of the slide um result in the net increase of $1.2 million of non-discretionary. So, I'll spend a little bit more time on health insurance because while it's not a huge change in this budget process, it has been a huge change in previous budget processes. Um, so I just wanted to provide a little bit more background on that. Um, ACPS and Albam Marl County have a self-funded health plan. Um and this means that

042instead of um an insurance company um instead of when a traditional model an employer purchase coverage purchases coverage for their employees through a company and that company offers um access to a provider network. They create the plan design and they set the rates that the group pays for the coverage. the insurance company also takes on the risk for insuring that group. In our self-funded model, um instead of us paying an insurance company to take on that risk, the premiums that the employees and the and we pay go into the healthcare fund. Those are the revenues that go into a fund and then claims are paid out directly from this fund. um claims, administrative costs, a stop-loss reinsure, stop-loss insurance, a wellness amount, and then a reserve balance. That reserve balance is there because we assume

043the risk of um claims. And so it's a required reserve that we have to maintain and it's a a a budgeted um balanced it's a balanced budget, revenues on the left and expenditures on the right. and it's all contained within the healthcare fund. We in recent years have been dipping below the required reserve levels that are needed to maintain stability in the fund. So rates have been increasing um at a significant rate to keep up with the number of claims that are being paid out. Um in this chart uh we're seeing a 108% increase um in terms of how much ACPS is contributing to the healthcare fund. So that's in 2022 23 we were a little less than $20 million and in this proposed budget we're approaching $40 million in um premiums that we're paying

044towards health insurance coverage. Great. Another non-discretionary cost um is the new school cost. These uh the construction of Mountain View Upper Elementary School is ongoing and has been approved by the board. Um with the opening of Mountain View Upper, we are opening also a new school called Mountain View Primary in the current building location. And so the way that these um budget costs are presented is that we first start with kind of a pro-forma. What is the projected Mountain View Elementary School for next year? H if they were one school, if they were status quo in terms of their operations given the new costs and um new enrollment numbers, this is the comprehensive cost of the elementary school. So that's kind of our starting point. Then we budgeted, well, what does a Mountain View Primary

045School budget cost? That's um on page D29. And then we developed a budget for Mountain View Upper Elementary School on D31. And so the increase in cost between a status quo proforma Mountain View Elementary School and then the increase cost in the two new schools combined, that change is um what's being defined as part of the $2.2 $2 million in new school costs for Mountain View Primary and Mountain View Upper Elementary School. It was a fairly similar methodology for ACE Academy um at Lamb's Lane. I thought it was simpler to look at it this way to start with, well, what's the budget for Ace Academy Lambs Lane? You can see it on page D71. But we can subtract out the costs for students and teachers shifting from their base schools to Ace Academy Lambs Lane.

046So the net cost of this school is what's the proposed cost of the new school minus the savings we're seeing because students and teachers will shift from Bay Schools to Ace Academy Lambs Lane. And that net cost is $2.1 million. I'll pause there. Questions from the board. >> I just not sure I understood the um increases in health insurance um how it came to the 108%. >> Yeah, >> it's the amount that we paid in 22 23 versus the amount we're proposing to pay for the next fiscal year. >> I think the 30 the percents on the right kind of confused me a little bit. I I get it now. Thanks. But I don't know where the 18 >> That's the increase. >> Oh, I see. >> From last year. >> Yeah. The orange dots

047represent the year-to-year increase. The columns represent the dollar amount and then the overall increase in those five years is the 108%. >> Are people just sicker? I mean the data the costs we are paying higher claims costs. >> Yeah, it's medical cost inflation. So the um Maya the bars is that the reserve level? >> No, the bars are our expenditures what we're paying for the fund. >> I I know that's a countywide thing I say in the county, but this screen is the schools, correct? Or is that everybody? This chart is for schools expenditures. The fund itself is everybody. >> Do you know if they're seeing similar trends with non-school people? >> That's a good question. >> It's a good question. >> I don't know. That's a good question. >> I'm I'm really curious if

048uh >> I have anecdotally heard that teachers are the healthiest employees. >> Are the healthiest? >> Yeah. >> Even with the petri dish of kids, that's amazing. >> Teachers are the heaviest. Maybe right they build up the virance. >> Yeah, obviously we um just with the number of employees we have make up the bulk of that health fund. >> We do not um bifrocate the data by employee type and this and that. So, but the county gov is experiencing exact same percentage rates because we move together, >> right? >> Yeah. I just I wonder and this has been brought up I think for the last few years. It's you know a cost that we have no control over. Um, and is there any anything that can be done to cut these health care costs that

049are, you know, 12% of our budget off the top? >> So, I I mean, we've had, as you know, conversations over the years and there's been um intentional actions to control cost, right? Plan design changes, opening the employee clinic, right? >> Um, we had a couple bad years of some high cost claimments, right? Um I I am happy to preview this current year was much better which is why you're seeing that um de who would have thought 18% seems good but better than the last two years right and so I we're seeing hopefully that more of a trend of a reset I'm looking at Dan if there's anything else dad >> is there data to show the impact of the clinics and how that's impacted our our costs >> got it >> it's coming to

050Yeah, currently our colleagues in the county government um in the department of finance and budget are doing some work around return on investment to try to capture that data. They're using data on the clinic visits, the services provided. What would that cost under our insurance plan compared to the costs of providing it at the clinic? So, we'll get that ROI data probably in a couple months. We'll get >> We're almost at a year, right, of when it opened. >> I'm I'm sorry. We're almost at a year from when it opened. >> Uh I believe it's a year in March. >> Yeah. So, it would be interesting to see what that data shows. >> Would the county save money if it did not self-fund >> and had insurance companies take on the risk? >> I That's

051a great question. Um the general rule of thumb is that by going on a fully insured plan, you do great in your catastrophic years because the insurance company pays those gigantic claims that would wipe out your reserve. The challenge is when you're fully insured, that insurance company is not going to lose money for more than one year. Your rates are going to go through the roof the next year to make up that that loss. We carry stop-loss insurance so that when we get those catastrophic claims after a certain dollar value, it is reimbursed into the health care fund. >> Thank you. >> I I know that one of the potential cost savings in opening the clinics was uh pharmacy costs. When you're getting the update on the data, I I would love to see that

052if there's a genuine savings there. Um anyway, a and you did say that I know we had two or three years of catastrophic costs that triggered our stop-loss insurance. I know at the time we talked about whether the that that limit the stop-loss limit I think it was like $300,000 per claim should be increased or decreased or so that's a question the pharmacy that and then in terms of administrative costs um I know that we had to contribute to opening of the two clinics are we still open are we also contributing to the management of those clinics is that's part of that administrative cost. >> Yes, the uh operation of the clinics, we do pay a contractor to do all of that and so all of those costs are woven in uh as part of

053that uh overall package. In terms of the stop-loss, um we have raised that stop-loss limit. Good. Just like a fully insured health insurance company, stop-loss insurance companies are going to lose money when you get those catastrophic claims, they increase their premiums for the upcoming year. So, we did see some uh raise in those premiums. And to mitigate that increase, we did increase our stop-loss limit. So, it went from 300 to, I believe, 350. And I think it's 400,000 now. Okay. So, we eat it up to 400. Okay. >> Thank you, Dan. >> Maya, you mentioned a um savings on VRS contributions from ACPS. Is that an anomaly? $3 million is significant. Yes. >> Is that unusual? >> It it is. Uh we have seen fluctuations in the past. This is probably one of the more

054significant fluctuations. This is determined by the VRS board. Um, and that's just based on the the value of their investments and how they're changing. So, it's across the board for the state. >> Um, I have one question on the new school costs. Were those anticipated costs or unforeseen additional costs as we planned out the new schools? >> Um, I there were not. They were anticipated. Okay. >> Other questions? >> Uh, so I have two questions. Um, back to the first slide just on the technology. I just wanted to make sure I understood what went into that number and that increase. >> Yep. That is a question we've received. So, we're actually working on analyzing that and getting you the details. And then on the last slide on the um ACE Academy Lamb's lane opening and

055those costs, those startup costs, do we anticipate that being just this year's startup cost? Lambs that if you look at the projections for that building, it's not meant to be at full capacity for a few years. And so should the board expect additional startup costs as we staff up that building to full capacity? Um the cost that's shown is a recurring cost. It's the first year of recurring costs that will show up every year starting next year. Um we don't anticipate any additional costs on top of that as we are staffing the building as if it were full. >> Um and we don't at this point anticipate >> more new school costs. Now if there's growth in the division we would show that um the budgettobudget growth and then the cost for growth that would

056be shown separately >> but in something that's considered a startup cost. >> Yeah I think it's I think some examples I think would help. So these are not startup costs like if I think of a startup cost like making sure we have copers and um all the materials to start up. We are we are funding that from the project. Uh these are your recurring costs of an additional facility. Right. So, we have a full-time nurse at every school. Mountain View has one nurse. Now, they will have two, one at each facility, right? You'll have a principal, a lead custodian. So, those are the these are the net new school costs that are >> recurring. Okay. Not start. Okay. Because it gets your because to your point, in my mind, that's not a startup cost. >>

057The utility cost of these buildings. Um, so they're staffed like they're I wouldn't say they're staffed like they're full. They're staffed like what you would need to operate a second facility. as you get as the enrollment grows, that's when you add the teachers and that's what we get additional t additional costs in future years. >> Okay, let me think about that for a little bit. Thank you. Other any other questions before we move on? >> Thank you so much. Hi there. I'm Broo Conver, senior budget analyst. Uh, I'm going to speak a little bit about compensation, uh, which is typically one of our largest costs in any given budget. And for fiscal 27, it's about 7.8 million. Um, this year we are uh having two different percent increases for uh different groups of employees. For

058our licensed employees, >> I'm sorry. Would you just speak up just a little bit? >> Oh, sure. Appreciate. >> Uh, for our licensed employees 3.75 and for our employee support personnel uh it is 4.25. Now along with those we have uh a subset of employees that are confidential employees. These employees do not uh because of the nature of their work belong to either of the bargaining units. These employees might be uh positions such as principles, APS, directors um but sometimes they're also employees that are because of the nature of the area that they work in um are sub you know deal with confidential information and also cannot be covered by a unit. So this could also apply to an office associate that might be working in fiscal services or human resources. And so uh along

059with the prescribed increases for the bargaining groups, we also uh want to make sure that uh the non-unit employees are taken care of. Um so for employees that are payra 20 and above uh they would also be at 3.75 and for those at 19 and below 4.25. 25. We do have two different increases this year. Um, and our employee support personnel are at a higher level of uh increase and this has intentionality behind it in that the that bargaining group has some of our lowest paid employees and so there was the desire for them to receive um a larger possible increase. Um, we also have a compensation strategy that uh we've had for a while, which uh is that we have an adopted market, a competitive market, and we look at what each entity in

060this competitive market does in terms of an increase. Um the idea is not necessarily that we're right at exactly the middle of what this market basket does that we want to be above it at least a little bit. Um and so we target about 10% above the adopted market. Uh these are all school districts that are within the Commonwealth of Virginia. They tend to be school districts with similar care similar characteristics to us um including their instructional programming and uh sometimes they are simply ones that are in physical proximity to us because this is um you know we compete with our neighbors. um for 2526 this market uh adopted market uh their average salary was about 3 to 4% um and we gave 3% um and so um we don't yet know what this adopted

061market will be doing for next year for working conditions and benefits. The items that are on this slide are just part of what uh was in our collective bargaining agreements. Um the ones that we've chosen to list here are ones that had uh budgetary impact. Not everything that's in the collective bargaining agreements costs money, but uh the items on here uh you know, this uh is about $4 million out of our budget which is dedicated for uh these items. Now um as I said this is just a subset and there is much more and much more detail and information that is posted on uh the collective bargaining website on under human resources but um I wanted to just call out a few of the items here. Um there is a new pay scale for um

062special education specialists and so this includes school psychologists, occupational therapists, physical therapists um and speech language pathologists. The um this scale was developed separate from the licensed uh teacher pay scale. Um the uh the rates on this scale are based on adopted market data indicating that we were low. Um and um this scale is now also a step scale and will be treated just like the teacher scale going forward. So subject to the same percent increases um same modifications. Uh I'd also like to mention that the license planning time um and specifically for elementary uh the um prior to the collective bargaining agreement, the planning time within elementary was somewhat inconsistent. And so now there is a um consistent standard where um licensed employees will uh get at least two 250 minutes a week um

063and uh with no fewer than 50 consecutive minutes of daily. Um there are of course some other parameters around this and a lot of verbiage which you can look out there. This is a big uh change and a nice way to be very very uh transparent and consistent. Um there's also uh some uh guidelines around um the number of meetings that can happen during planning time. Um secondary also gets planning time. Um there weren't really any changes to how that has been treated but uh with the collective bargaining agreement there's now consistency around that. Um, also duty-free lunches or uh duty-free meal breaks for licensed employees. They will now be provided a duty-free lunch period um for every scheduled workday. And uh for fiscal 27, this will be for at least 25 minutes. Um in

064starting in fiscal 29, then that will be increased to 30 minutes. Um so that is um a great uh quality of working conditions change for our uh ESP employees. They also will get at least um a guaranteed 30 minute unpaid duty-free meal break if they are working uh 30 or more hours in a week or at least five hours in a day. Um, if it's a shift that's way less than that, having a 30 minute guaranteed break doesn't necessarily make sense. Um, I'd also like to mention the paid parental leave. This is, um, a fairly large change. Um, and so employees who meet the eligibility standards, um, and complete the process, uh, an application process will be granted six weeks of continuous paid parental leave. This does not get deducted from any other types of

065leave that they may have accured. And um this is for um the purposes of uh parental leave for birth, adoption or placement of a child with that employee. Um and I know that uh uh you actually heard a lot of this information about a month ago. Um, but if you have any questions or discussion, any questions? >> I noticed that uh non-bargaining unit employees are also getting raises 4.25 and 3.75. Could you talk about that? >> Uh, yes. So the non-bargaining uh uh non-bargaining unit employees um and I I don't have the today's number but it's it's a little more than 200 employees. So it's not a small amount of employees. Um in any other year they would just we we would be giving an increase and people would get you know their their salaries

066increase just like the year we're in right now. But um these employees don't belong to a unit because of the nature of their job. And I mean in a leadership position you might certainly understand well that's management but um it certainly would not be keeping up with market standards to not give any increase. Um the 3.75 is for those that are payra 20 and up. That actually aligns with the broadbanded paygrades on our classified pay scale. Um for those employees that are pay grade 19 or below um we've aligned those with um the ESP rate of the 4.2 25. >> Thank you. >> Are you able to share the market comparison charts that you referenced? We know I don't need them tonight, but are is that something that you guys can share with us so

067we can see what the and do you have them for central office like comparable positions as well? >> Dan Reading, >> it's easier if I come up here than if I shout from there. Um we have some we don't uh validate every single position every year. We do kind of a smattering of positions and then we definitely look at of course teachers and then some of our high need areas, special education TAs, bus drivers, some of those areas, but we can share what we gathered over the summer and into the fall. >> That would be great. And then I'd also like to know, we talk about the 3 to 4% increase for um the employees from collective bargaining. um if the employees that aren't included in the collective bargaining agreement from principles and whatever all

068the way up through central office what those pay increase percentages are as well. Could we see that? >> So anyone who is in a position uh that is pay grade 20 or over. So that would be all our assistant principles, principles, curriculum coordinators, um everyone up to superintendent. Right now in the budget they are uh slated for 3.75 that matches the licensed. >> Okay, great. Thank you. >> Thank you so much for your presentation. >> Thank you. >> We're a little over halfway through. So, um if I'll turn it over to Dr. Berlin if you're looking for a break or just keep going. >> Up to you. >> I'm looking at my peers to see if people want to keep going or need a break. I saw from uh Miss Lee go forward. So >>

069charge ahead. >> We are going to charge forward. So thank you. >> We are charging forward. >> Um I'll turn next over to our discretionary amount. So that was that orange slice on the very edge of the dollar bill. That was $6.9 million or about 2% of the budget. that $6.9 million, if you were to break it out in terms of how much we're investing, you can see a a majority of that is proposed to be the transfer to school capital. And then smaller portions of that discretionary amount are um purposed for different instructional programs. So, consistent with our commitment to community engagement, we've engaged in um an intentional listening process in the development of the draft funding request. Starting last fall, we s we looked for input from across the ACPS community through multiple

070processes. They include advisory committees and leadership groups, a communitywide survey that generated over 1500 responses, um an ongoing schoolboard feedback through the state of the division, accountability framework reports, and mid-year reviews of division and school level data. This engagement identified shared priorities, highlighted areas of concern, and directly informed the recommendations that are reflected in the draft funding request. This is a full list of the um requests that came to the top. So we kind of had a okay there was a priority there were several levels of prioritization. This is one level of prioritization of some of the requests that were considered for the draft funding request. Um you can see this is a fairly lengthy list. We just wanted to make you aware that although we only have four new proposals to present to you

071as part of the draft funding requests due to um our financial realities. We weren't able to fund all of these, but they were considered and those these are other needs that are considered and may come forward in a different budget process. >> And these are requests that came forward internally or also as the result of the survey and the community engagement. Um, I would say it's kind of a cycle based on the community engagement. The list came forward internally based on what was heard and then we get put that back out to the community and said, "Okay, now we have the shorter list. What do you all think about this?" So, it's kind of a a cycle that repeats itself. So, so both is the answer. So with only a small portion that was available

072to us for strategic investment, we used um we have these following proposals that we will present this evening. Um, the consistent priorities that emerged were maintaining small class sizes, strengthening math instruction and the use of student learning data, expanding hands-on career-based learning opportunities for our secondary students, and ensuring access to highquality instructional materials, and increasing specialized supports for students with disabilities. As Dr. Hos mentioned last week uh we just wanted to note on class size that was the clear priority for our community but given our financial constraints further reductions were not feasible if you were to change that target class size just by one student. If you wanted to lower it by one student we estimate that cost to be about $4 million. Um the proposals that are before you are designed to maintain and

073not increase current class sizes. You may remember the last couple of years we have had to increase class sizes to balance the budget. So based on these priorities in our analysis of impact, sustainability, and fiscal feasibility, this draft funding request includes targeted strategic proposals designed to advance these priorities within the constraints that we're in. So the next several slides, Dr. Hayes will walk through each of these in a little bit more detail. Good evening uh board members. So the next few slides I will highlight um the uh makeup of each of the proposals that uh for the most part came out of the department of instruction. So the first proposal that I'll discuss is the second year of the scholars thank you second year of the scholars studio implementation and sustainability. Um last year we

074brought a proposal forward and this year is just the second step in that. Um, this proposal will support our our division's mission of preparing our students for enrollment, enlistment, and employment once they leave Alamar County Public Schools. Um, and it will also um allow them to have that specialized instruction um in our traditional uh district setting. So, this proposal will add 11 new classroom teachers as well as funds for the operating budget for field experiences, industry credentials, and um propo promotions. Um it will also maintain uh class sizes and provide specialized staffing um beyond standard high school ratios. Uh some of the CTE programs are capped at classes are capped at certain numbers. So this makes sure we can uh adhere to that. And then also this proposal allows us to um sustain support for

075our English language learners, our students with disabilities as well as our advanced learners. The next proposal is focused around our instructional resources. Um we have a budget for um our instructional resources here in the division. However, due to inflation and increased costs in materials, uh the current funding that we have in that budget line has not kept pace uh with the cost of our core instructional materials. Um, and as a result, we have had inconsistent access to materials that contribute uh to uneven learning experiences in our for our students. Um, as you all most of you all remember, we went through the uh bellweather review a few years ago and they identified some key instructional resources that we would need to leverage for improvement. And so this proposal establishes a baseline that will allow us

076to continue to keep pace um with the things that we determine that are needed internally. But if the Virginia Department of Instruction decides that there are things that we need to adopt or that are mandatory, very similar to the Virginia Literacy Act, um this would allow us to have the funds to do so um without having gaps in the supports that we can provide for our students. The next proposal is around uh meeting the needs for our students with uh in our special education programs. Um over the past few years, uh this the our student needs are increasing and becoming more intense um across our schools and our current staffing levels are not allowing us um to be able to uh maintain the high level of support that is expected of us here in Alamar

077County. And so this proposal has three targeted special education positions to help meet current demand. Um those positions are as followed. Um there's a learning specialist position. Currently, we have one generalist for the division that assists mostly with our elementary uh programming, whether that is letters or helping with diagnostic assessments. And this position will allow us to further support our secondary students. We also um are requesting a behavioral specialist. Um this position would allow us to be more proactive as we are co coaching our staff around supporting our students that may um be in crisis or if we need assistance with uh legal compliance. And then the third position is an extra uh position for adaptive PE or adaptive physical education. Currently we are provided services through a grant and with UVA um but that

078grant will not be continuing into next year. So this this proposal will allow us to add an additional position um to support the students we have. Currently we have approximately 65 students that receive services through adaptive PE. So this uh proposal will allow us to have more of a 1 to 30 35 student ratio versus 1 to 65. And the last um proposal I'm going to discuss is the math and data support specialist. And while our overall math achievement is beginning to improve um gaps continue to remain for our historically underserved and marginalized populations. And so this proposal um was a joint proposal between the department of instruction and strategic planning to provide um daily uh math support um for not only our administrators, our teachers uh to improve instruction um for our students. It

079uh embeds math um supports into the classroom um helping with the classroom. These math specialists would be licensed educators focused on math content and pedigogy as well as using um a protocol that we have been uh working on to implement this year um that driven by data 2.0 that focuses on um providing rigorous assessments and then using that data to analyze it and see exactly where students are struggling and then act on that to make adjustments in real time to target the specific needs for the students um in those classes. And then the that support these specialists would work with our staff to help build their capacity so that they can continue to pro provide highquality instruction to their students um throughout the the course of the year and as students continue to come through

080their their classes. And so now I'll turn it over to you all for any questions or discussion. >> I have a question related to the scholar studio. Um, I saw somewhere in G that we allocate.17 for the lead teacher on a scholar studio and I wondered if that was enough because these folks are arranging um internships and it seems like they're doing a lot and I just wondered if that was realistic. So, one of the things we've discussed is now that we have hired a principal for um the Ace Lambs Lane campus, some of that work will then be handled by the principal. So, um it may not necessarily be the case for all of our programs because we know some programs are going to stay in their current schools. For example, Tara is out

081at um Western Albamar and so they would need someone actually to go out, recruit, provide information. But for um the Ace Lambs Lane campus that may not be the case for all. So that's something that we are currently discussing to see what the needs are for each of those programs and do we need to maintain that 17 um pull it back or provide additional support. >> Right. And and because they're also very different programs, one may require a lot of that and one may not. So >> absolutely. >> I have two quick questions. Um the $800,000 for instructional materials uh for the bellweather um it's a little vague. What specifically are we purchasing with that $800,000? >> So um for example um it could be actual textbooks um that we utilize. So we have gone

082through the process of approving like an adoption process for our secondary like literacy curriculum but we are waiting to make sure we have the funds to purchase that. Um it could also be a a database um a program where if the state provided us with a free um access to a program we realized it was beneficial we want to maintain that for our students then that's something like for instance Zern was something they provided for us for math if they were to say you know get that money anymore but we notice it's making a huge impact for our students we could use some of this resource or these funds to contribute to those purchases. >> Okay. Um, and my other question has to do with the math specialists. Um, are are all of those intended

083to be working directly with students like in the classroom? Um, >> those positions are um intended more to work with the teachers. Um, they, you know, can be similar to reading specialists where they can work with students. Um, but the goal is to really provide our teachers with the, uh, skills necessary to provide high quality instruction to our students. but it can be utilized. It just depends on the needs of the individual school. We don't want to make it too broad but also too specific. Um so it can be adjusted for those schools as they as it's needed. But the data piece of it would certainly be working the the data support would be working with the teachers. >> And do you have the list of schools that those resources would be going to? >>

084Yes, those uh schools are currently um listed as Mountain View, Greer, Agner, Woodbrook, Journey, and Berley. And I can repeat that if need be. >> Okay. Thank you. Other questions? >> Um I have a couple questions. One, a couple points and a couple questions. One, I appreciate um in in A36. Um that this is the first time I've seen a sunset provision. I don't know if maybe prior to me being here um they this was included, but there's a sunset provision on um the math and data specialist that if that we fail to meet year one benchmarks and so I appreciate that and I think it's an important thing and I'd encourage um us to to when appropriate I would encourage to include those as well. Um this might be a question for Miss Schmidt.

085The materials as we open schol as we open ACE Academy Lambs Lane there are because of the type of CTE classes we will be offering there are materials over and above textbooks and things like that. Where do those sit in a budget? Are those in the would are those in the open like the the physical budget for the planning of that of that property or >> operate or is it they operation? >> Those are funded by the project itself. Um you're right there's a lot of special we have a whole task force >> on the procurement and >> planning of all the stuff that goes with that building. So yeah it's not in this operating budget. >> Okay. Um but in the future that's a way a one time in the build and then they'll

086be we'll have to be looking at that that those refresh of those types of materials which is just a different type of refresh cycle than textbooks or something else. >> Correct. And that is um part of the it's a small piece of that scholars the majority of that's classroom furniture but or classroom teachers um the rest is around knowing those programs have a higher operating cost right for field studies and credentiing and materials it's a incremental operating budget increase too. >> Okay thank you. Um and then the only other piece would be um I don't think we've seen the results from the survey and I I would like to see the the board see the results from the survey aggregated. I think the categories when we did it are community uh employee student which I'm

087missing oops and then and then family with with students. >> Yeah, we have as you know we used a new tool this uh year. So we have a lot of data um that we can aggregate in different ways and um as shared in the last one we had our greatest response rate. Yeah. As well. >> Yeah. If we could if we could see that aggregated out I think that would be helpful. >> As a followup to that do we have any sense of how many teachers and principles took part in the survey? >> We know how many staff. We don't know by staff type. I will also say we surveyed our um leadership group independently as well. So, >> okay. And just a small side note, I joined the students sen senate when we did

088um the last u meeting and joined the western students and they took that survey as part of the that day and then we had a discussion about it and um they almost overwhelmingly um discussed the need for additional instructional materials. that was up in the top three if not the top two of everyone. And they shared a number of instances where particularly around um uh English uh the kind of ELA type classes um not having enough books and not having enough materials and that being frustrating. So um I'm happy to I'm happy to see that. I just want to make sure that it's not just textbooks, but it is all the things that kind of come into a curriculum um that are being considered. Any other questions or discussion before we move on? >> Thank

089you. >> And we have water up here. So if you guys are thirsty, please just and I'll bring you some. I promise. >> I'm charging on. >> Okay. >> Um almost there. So um the other proposal that's part of the discretionary category is the one-time transfer to the school capital program. Over the past two years, we have built the capacity to make this one-time transfer through reductions and other disciplined budgeting decisions. During that time, our local composite index has returned to a more typical level and our state funding that was previously reduced has been restored for FY27. Rather than reversing all the prior cuts that we have made, u this proposal reflects a more measured and strategic approach. We're recommending a one-time investment of these restored funds into of a portion of the restored funds

090into the school capital program. This approach allows us to be flexible in future years. So rather than tying up um funding with new regular employees, a one-time commitment allows us to start with a lower baseline expenditure budget in future years. And we've heard that schools construction and renovation is a very high priority for this board. Um we will discuss this more at our revenue work session next week. Next um in FY23 to 24 um ACPS provided 15 half-time teaching assistant positions to combine with half-time ED afterchool assistant positions. These 15 full-time positions were created to increase accessibility, reduce weight lists, and mitigate hiring challenges. Um, speaking of sunset provisions, these pro positions were projected to continue through FY2728. Um, it was a temporary arrangement until the workforce returned to prepandemic levels. In addition, salary and

091benefits have significantly increased since the pandemic. Um and as you know ED is a self- sustaining fund and to assume even half of the costs of full-time salary and benefits of the shared position has become cost prohibitive for the program. Lastly, the school division has many instructional priorities as you have just heard about and cannot continue to fund the portion of the shared full-time position. Additional resources though have been allocated to schools for teaching assistance related to the working conditions and benefits that were presented. Um, and this may reduce the need for the part-time TA and the responsibilities that would were previously combined with this ED position. I know that is a very complicated setup and we've received a lot of questions about it. So happy to answer more questions on that. Um, but first

092I also wanted to talk about prior reductions that have made even though they are not showing up in this budget. And this is a list of reductions that were made in the last two years and are being maintained as part of this funding request. So it wasn't just a one-time reduction that we're bringing back and increasing the baseline. This reduction is still maintained. So it is still a reduction for FY27. So, any questions on reductions um or this ED instructional assistant arrangement? And I can repeat that in another way if that was too complicated. I I like the um $4 million transfer to the CIP. I think that's wise. Is that something new this year or have we done that in recent years? >> We have done that in years prior. Um, one example was,

093um, during the pandemic, we had a lot of savings that we built up in our operating budget. Um, and we knew that was a one-time savings. So, we didn't want to use that and start hiring more people or changing class sizes. So, um, we did make a one-time contribution to the CIP then. Um, and there have been other instances or examples where we've kind of made one-time transfers as a financial strategy um to provide flexibility in the future. >> And then whenever our fund balance gets above 2% of our current budget, it we are volunttoled >> uh to share the overage >> the overage goes to CIP also per policy. >> Yeah. Do we have any projects where the $4 million is going to yet or is it too early? Um, >> as part of

094the county executive's budget next week, they will present um the CIP recommendation. >> How will the reduction in the 15 part-time TASD impact enrollment capacity? enrollment for ED, right? >> Um, that shouldn't impact the enrollment because the >> the ED portion of it will be maintained in ED >> with higher costs to families. Correct. >> Um, I believe >> that's what it looked like or at least uh for some of that. I will follow up with you on that. >> So, just to just to kind of go back over what Miss Kumazawa said earlier, the way we're offsetting the reduction to the schools in their TA staffing that was part of that initiative is they're going to have additional TA staffing added going into next year to allow for the uh consistent planning time and

095the lunch breaks for the teachers. So, it's really a different reason that it's going into the school, but that's how those were staffed before was part TA and part ED. So, it really ought to be an even swap for the most part because it was about 20 FTE, I think, to do the lunches and the planning time. Something in that ballpark. So it should be a pretty pretty even swap if if we can work you know working individually the principles on how to plan it and and get it right. This is also I will mention too just forecasts that we are working on restructuring ED uh to improve quality concentration of services and so uh you'll be seeing that coming your way but it's just part of an overall project that we're working on to

096really um make the program better uh and reinforce all the things that we value in it and make it more accessible for our for for our kids. >> I read that you're outsourcing some of that. Can you tell us a little bit about that? >> Not yet because it's in procurement. So, we're just going to hold off on that. It's not quite in procurement, but if we start talking about that, it'll >> it won't be procurement anymore. >> The lawyer for a good good question. >> Other questions on this? All right, this is the last section. Um, so now we've reviewed the baseline budget, all the changes on top of it, what makes up the $311 million. Now we're going to break that number down a little bit to show, well, what does this mean

097for schools, departments, budget managers? Um, this is a chart that shows all of our school-based budgets as outlined in detail in section D. Um, and then also G34. The columns represent the um the budgeted amounts for each school. So, elementary schools are in the blue, middle schools in orange, high schools in the purple. As you might imagine, our elementary schools are smaller, so their budgets are smaller. our high schools are much larger and their budgets tend to be much larger as well. Um this chart in the yellow um divides the number of pupils by the total school's budget. So you can get a sense of well how much are we spending per pupil by school. A note on the per pupil. These per pupil amounts average out to less than the amounts we were looking

098at earlier which were more in the 20 to $22,000 range. These amounts are lower because this only includes school-based budgets. Our total school fund budget includes both school-based and department-based budget. So, that's going to raise the per pupil amount. And the purpose of those yellow levels by school is to show that um on average, the smaller a school, the higher their per pupil spending is going to be. Um while classroom teachers, the number of classroom teachers are generally equivalent based on the number of students you have. We for example have a principal at every school. We have one at um Red Hill Elementary School and we have one at Alamar High School. So um that's the other extreme example where the smaller the school, the more it's going to cost per pupil because we have

099some fixed costs that don't change based on the enrollment of a school. Another factor that plays into the per pupil is the um differentiated staffing that we have. So when you saw the um target class sizes that were variable based on demographics, you saw reading specialists and tiered services that were based on not just enrollment but free and reduced lunch um and other factors that will also um show that the more um students more disadvantaged students a school has the higher the per pupil cost will be for that school. So it's two factors. one is the size of the school and the other is the amount of differentiated funding that that school receives. So um in the budget document uh you will see that the school budget for each of our schools is shown in

100various ways. Um the pie chart on the left is the um FTE budget and then the um the FTE budget versus the operating. So the as I said most of a school budget goes towards staffing and the determination of that is through the staffing standards that we talked about that determines how much staffing a school gets and then the small remaining sliver um in the orange is how much a school gets for things like supplies, copers, materials um and wages. On the right you can see two screenshots from your budget book. This example is from Stone Robinson as it's a fairly averagesized school. Um you can see that we show historical actuals, a FY26 adopted budget, an FY27 draft, the increase in dollar amounts, and then the increase in percentage amounts. You might remember you

101can show expenditures by expense type. So what is the expenditure going towards? Salary, other wages, benefits, and operations. And then another way to show it is by functional category. um that I talked about that the state determines and that's broken out between instruction, administration, attendance and health, technology, building services and transportation. Section E um shows all of our department budgets and these bars indicate the um the budget amount for each department. I'll note uh transportation and building services. Those are our largest operating departments. Um those costs um tend to be have higher proportions of operating costs versus staffing costs. This has to do that they're dealing with actual things that cost money. For example, building services budget contains all of the utilities costs for every school building. So that's electricity, water, sewer. All of that

102is contained within the building services department. That is the largest cost there. For transportation, we do have a lot of drivers and as I said, they're not assigned to schools. They're all assigned to a central department that's contained there. And then they also have costs. They maintain um all the buses. While the bus purchases themselves are contained in the CIP, which is not here, um the maintenance of those buses, the repairs of of other vehicles, um the fuel that's used for the buses every day, that is part of the department's budget. Some other uh departments that are less traditional that we include in the budget are the lapse factor department and the non-depart department. Um the lapse factor department is a is the projected divisionwide savings due to vacancies. And so we know we're not

103going to be 100% if we were 100% staffed then we would not have a lapse budget. But we know we're not going to be 100% staffed for the whole year. The budget that you see throughout the school and department budgets do assume that all positions are filled 100% of the time for the full fiscal year. Um, so the lapse factor kind of takes a divisionwide approach and says, "Okay, well, this is an average level of savings we've seen, so that's what we're projecting because we don't want to tie up resources if we know we're not going to spend it or we're likely to not spend it." The non-depart department um has um divisionwide expenses that include the VR program, the voluntary early retirement incentive program. That's for all of our retirees in that program. um

104more significantly includes all of our transfers that we transfer out of the school fund. So um that one-time transfer to school capital that's included in this amount. So if you you'll see a big percentage increase, it's because of this one-time transfer. Some recurring transfers that are more significant include the transfer to computer equipment replacement, the learning resources fund, which that $800,000 we talked about for instructional materials, that would show up in a transfer to the learning resources fund. It wouldn't actually show up as um an expense for textbooks. We also have a recurring transfer for the VPI, the Virginia Preschool Initiative. That's a cost sharing um fund where the state pays for part of that cost and we pay for part of that cost through a transfer. Those funds are accounted for in a special

105revenue fund. And I'll get into more detail about these special revenue funds next week. And then the last category of transfer are transfers to Albamar County. So while they fund us our operating budget, most of our operating budget, there are services that we pay to provide for them. So, for example, school resources officers, those are employees of the county um providing a service to ACPS and we pay a recurring amount for those services. And then we've got some other services that we transfer over to the county. So, uh this is the slide. We started out with our expenditure overview. Um as a review, our total expenditures in the draft funding request equal $311 million. And um that can be broken out in several different ways. Um as you have seen um this bottom pie might

106make more sense to you now. You saw the chart of all the school-based budget expenditures by school location. If you take all those budgets, add them together with all the department-based budgets that you saw. Those are those horizontal bars coming out. And you add all those budgets together, that also equals the $311 million. So, there's a lot of ways you can look at it, which is why there are so many pages in your budget book. Um, but that's pretty much it. And I know there's a lot left remaining, but hopefully this clarifies um more for you of what's contained in our expenditures. Any questions? Questions, discussion from the board? I >> have a question about the transportation. I noticed in section G, and I have to confess section G is like my favorite section in

107the whole thing. It's like the coolest stuff in there. >> It It seems like our maximum bus times is up to an hour for elementary students and an hour and a half for middle and high school students. That seems like it's a lot higher than when my kids were in school back in the dark ages. Is that Did it just creep up to an hour, an hour and a half? That's been a general routing guideline for as long as I recall. I'm sorry. I mean, it's when you read it, it's it's um >> because I think when my kids were in school, 45 minutes was the max. >> So, it's not that's not the average, right? That but that is a guideline for the max. Um so, that's not a change. >> Yeah. It's just

108one of those issues of we're the sixth largest county by land area in the state and so we have a large geographical region and we try to be efficient with the buses and that that is that maximum has been in place for as long as I can remember too. Um, but you you go to places like Augusta, other school systems that have this vast rural region and they'll have twohour bus rides or >> in that ballpark. So, it is it's a challenge. Section G is not my favorite section, but I do have a question from there. Uh, on G20, there's mention of holdback staffing. Can you explain >> what that means? >> Yes. >> So, we have several um staffing that is not assigned to schools at the time that we publish the document. And

109so, for example, the first one on there is permanent sub school-based substitutes or permanent substitutes. Um, by staffing standards, schools are allotted a certain number of school-based substitutes, but depending and that's based on enrollment, but we also have 10 FTEEs that we wait until we see the data around fill rates, substitute fill rates, and those are assigned out um based on fill rates. And that may change from year to year. And because it's not part of an adopted staffing standard, we're holding it back in the budget, but in reality, they're distributed to schools anytime between now and the middle of the year. >> Um, it's similar with English learner staffing. So, depending on enrollment and the needs, we want to be flexible in how staff are distributed, knowing that we don't know exactly who's going

110to show up in the new school year. Special education is um similar. That accounts for growth. We talked about special education growth. We don't know exactly where those students are going to be. Um but based on patterns, we know they're going to show up. So, we hold on that until the students show up or we have registrations and we release that staffing. >> Okay. Thanks. >> Yeah. >> Other questions? The only question I have and this can be for further information. Um I it's always helpful to see the three um chart or pie chart views. Um and the the bottom one for the budget the the 72.1% of the budget is schoolbased. 27.9% is departmentbased. I tried to do the math on my own and it wasn't working. I'm curious if you wanted to come

111back to us if how that if looking back whatever is appropriate three years or five years if that has if that has been a consistent kind of uh percentage distribution or has if that has changed. >> Yeah, we could pull that. Thank you. Based on my memory, it's typically around this proportion. Any other questions on this portion of the budget? Good. Okay. >> Next steps. >> Let's look at this. >> Um, our second work session is scheduled for February 26th. Um, as I mentioned, we will focus on revenues and special revenue funds. And the discussion will also be informed by the county executive's recommended budget, which is scheduled to be presented to the board of supervisors on February 25th. >> And just for apologies to interrupt, but just for my peers, then Chair Galloway is

112in the um in the audience, so if I'm wrong, please correct me. That presentation is at noon in 241. I got a thumbs up on that. Okay. Um on the 26th our work session there will also be a public hearing as Dr. Berlin mentioned earlier which provides an important opportunities for students, family, staff and community members to share feedback directly with the board. Um and then again throughout this process board members and members of the public can visit k12albamarl.orgbudget org/budget and then hit FY27 budget development to gain access to this presentation, previous presentations, Q&A, and of course the budget document itself. >> Would you go back to that the chart before? >> Yes. >> Yeah. So, I have that the Oh, I'm looking at my phone because I'm looking at the um the board of

113supervisors that is the the March 16th is a 5:00 pm meeting. Yes. I just want to I So, if the board like I it would be helpful. I mean, we can all look at the calendar, but just to to confirm all of those times. Um because usually it's a 1 pm presentation. So, I just that's a that's a 5:00 pm and I we'll have to see where we are on the agenda, but um the board would present to the board of supervisors that's a um a 5:00 pm meeting on the 16th, which is a Monday. So, I just want to make sure that it is unusual. I just that's what I just wanted to I that's why I'm looking back and forth. I just want to make sure that we all that we have the

114right days and times to uh both for that presentation but also to be present as schedules allow for the um the uh the board of supervisors hearings. So >> 5 p.m. >> Yeah. If >> I could also make another comment about this calendar just I think um Dr. Berlin you're doing a nice job informing the wider community. Um, so the public hearing is on March 4th, but March 12th and April 23rd are also regular board meetings. So there is public comment at those meetings as well. Just want to remind people that there are multiple opportunities for uh points of input >> and the our just to clarify our public hearing is on the February 26th. The board of supervisors public hearing is on the 24th. I'm sorry is on the is on March 4th. Just

115a pitch here too that we are uh trying to work on and finalize our 2 by two schedule with schoolboard members and once we have that nailed down when you are coming to visit we're going to be asking you to invite your um counterpart for your magisterial district and I think we've just got one board member left that we're working on scheduling. So as soon as we can get everybody scheduled um then we're hoping that you'll be able to invite your your person Thank you. >> Thank you, Mara. >> Yeah. Thank you. >> Thank you so much. We appreciate um all the time from you and the staff. Um the next piece on our board uh agenda is or I'm sorry, our public our board work session agenda is other business. Do we have any

116school board superintendent or committee updates that we wanted to do tonight? >> Miss Curry, is there something you would like to share? >> Yes, I have a statement. Thank you so much. Okay. Yes. Thank you, Dr. Berlin. And good evening, school board. I am aware that during these meetings you all are often confronted with and toil with tedious and unexiting tasks. At least for tonight, I want to be the person that chooses to celebrate rather than criticize. Last time I spoke to you all, I came with complaints and concerns from within the school that were prevalent at the time. This time I want to focus on the favorable aspects of not only the work of the individual schools but of the school board as a whole. Recently in the western album community we have had

117numerous sports teams win Jefferson District and region 3C championships. Some of these notably including our swim and dive and track and field teams. Over the past few weeks, we have had the formation of new clubs and student groups that have the sole intention of creating safe and welcoming spaces for expressing pride in one's viewpoint. To briefly summarize, wonderful developments are being made every day within the community and that is an incredible feat in itself. Along with this, February is also schoolboard appreciation month and black history month. Both of which are meant to be months of recognition, thankfulness, and togetherness. The goal I gave myself when taking on this position was to be the representative that would always find a way to create an environment fueled by interconnectedness and bipartisanship. These pillars have always stood as

118the foundation of who I want to build myself into. And many of these attributes have only been amplified by the work you all partake in. It is with this that I say thank you. Thank you all so much for all of the lengthy hours, difficult deliberations, and careful consideration you put into this job. If you have not heard this already, you are doing exceptionally well. As we approach the final week of February, this is the perfect time to reflect on the meaning of unity. Though ACPS has remained well-versed in terms of what unity looks like in our schools, there will always be moves to be made. For my school in particular, our way to combat this is by taking matters into our own hands. A few years ago, with the help of the ACPS student

119senate, we created our own multicultural festival that we love to call better together. Ever since the first event in 2024, we have made it our mission for better together to be the factor that smothers negative cultural stigmas and aids in building cultural appreciation. We have begun to call this year's event always better together and we are cordially inviting all of you to come join us in celebrating all of the cultures that make our community so special. As the currently popular Bad Bunny made clear, the only thing more powerful than hate is love. Thank you. >> Thank you so much, Miss Curry. Do you happen to have the date and time of the festival to share? >> It is March 13th um from 4:30 to 6:30. And I actually happen to have a few um flyers

120that I would be welcome to pass around if you all are interested. >> Thank Thank you so much. So that's March 13th at Western from 4:30 to 6:30 and also encourage the public to take advantage of that. >> There's only a few >> any other um school board superintendent or committee updates. >> Seeing nothing in front of me, I will adjourn us at 8:20. Thank you all. um for your time uh tonight. >> Ajourned. >> Good job. >> Thank you.