School Board Meeting - October 13, 2022

001the themed kind of space uh game where you're just there's like going to be a couple different like asteroids coming at you and you shoot the correct answer and get points and hopefully will be a little bit more uh worked through but that's the this idea of it [Music] did you look at any other games for inspiration I'm a parent of two Elementary School boys and they really I can't remember their name but there's a math game that they loved where they like are fighting you like basically are fighting people but you have to do a math problem to like get your hit across so anyway their games or other things what kind of research did you do uh yeah when talking to the students we talk to them I think you're talking about a

002prodigy math yes um yeah we talked to them about Prodigy Math which they all loved they had a lot of comments about that and that they really enjoyed we also talked to them about a ST Math which was the other end of the spectrum we had a lot of negative feedback about that game it was another favorite but uh just taking both of those into account trying to make sure that I get those positive aspects down and make sure to improve on the negative ones I'm going to jump in again real quick and say what are your future aspirations I think we all sat through a training probably at this point like four years ago where they were saying one of the biggest growing career Fields is actually is game development so what have you

003thought about uh I'm looking to study game design at uh George Mason University um so I'd hopefully like to get into that field use the university to further my skills and hopefully get internships awesome and a question for both of you is uh where do you see the next step of implementation of this you see it through all the elementary schools you see it as a project that you're working on and to just focus on Stone Robinson where do you see this going I can see it Go several different ways uh yeah well that's kind of the beauty of the idea I have here is I should be able to publish it just on public domains so anyone who has the URL to this website can just type it in immediately get access with no

004payments no signups no nothing just totally free anyone with an internet connection or laptop whether it be on the other side of the world or in the US it's great thank you Josh yes of course thank you start just adding in the pay a dollar to get the next thing pay a dollar Next Level yeah that's the problem with some math games is the advertisements and the paid piece that's something Josh and I discussed earlier we didn't want to go that route okay so it doesn't have any things like that in it no there will be no advertisements no payments there's nothing as long as you have that URL you can jump to it and immediately start playing are you going to keep track of how many users you have or uh yeah the analytics

005of it will be definitely a very important part because when you get to like small numbers 10 20 kids maybe using it a day or a week it's pretty easy to manage but if it ever grew more there would definitely be a other concerns with it with maybe getting a server for them to use or various things like that so yeah the analytics will definitely be something to keep track of in the months after it's uh initial like full release okay you might have answered this before but um before you move to the step that you've just described will the other County schools be able to use this also will you expand it to the other County elementary schools uh yeah um once the actual like game is fully made and have had gone back

006to the stone Robinson students and had them tested again um it'll just be on that URL that'll be the first place it's published so even if it's just student Stone Robinson students who know about it that's where they'll find it and it'll just be uh telling other people about it to use it okay thank you so much yeah of course great work thank you just one more question have you done focus groups with teachers about it um we don't have like one dedicated focus group with teachers but I've talked to some of the teachers who were there at Stone Robinson to try and also get their feedback and it's really used it firmly even for the teachers uh yeah okay all right thank you so much yeah of course no we could I guess all

007right um thank you now you'll move to announcements Dr Haas so I do have just a few announcements thank you I did want to acknowledge that we continue to ask our school principals to come out to board meetings so they could be part of that and tonight we do have Ashby Johnson from Journey middle schools here tonight as well as you just saw Jeff from Center one Jason Crutchfield from Brownsville Elementary School Stacy England from Crozet Elementary School Jen Sublette from Western Albemarle High School as well as Chad Ratliff from the community lab school I don't think I missed anybody did I all right so we're really pleased to have you all tonight thank you for coming out I know to your have a busy schedule right now miss Carter from K-Tech did you did

008you oh Stephanie's here oh hey Stephanie so Stephanie Carter from K-Tech thank you thank you um I do want to uh just take a moment to acknowledge uh that the Holly Mead Elementary School staff I did have a really great visit there on Monday to walk about the school with the assistant principal Stephanie provines and also our Ravenna District representative Judy Lee joined me on the visit and she spent time with the principal Joe McCauley I was able to visit Becky Brown second grade Lily Haas kindergarten and and Lancaster's seabase class and a really high quality instruction and really engaged students in those classes and really enjoyed the visit and I want to thank the Holly Mead staff for having me on Monday last week I got out to um Monticello High School and our

009chair Graham page and our Scottsville District representative Ellen Osborne visited the school with me and they were again they went out for a tour with Beth Costa and I went walk-in classrooms with Wendell green and it was a really great visit a lot of teamwork at the school highly engaged staff and I want to thank them for that visit next Monday I'll be visiting Scottsville in the morning and um Kate a cuff from the Jack Jewett district and Ellen again from Scottsville we'll be visiting with me and also the County Administrator Jeff Richardson will be will be joining us for that visit so I'm really looking forward to that I did want to announce that our graduation rates have been put out there on the school quality profiles and our on-time graduation rate for the

010class of 2022 is 94.3 percent and it's above the state average and for the last 14 out of 15 years since they began publishing the state on-time graduation rates we have been above the state average this year Virginia's graduation rate was 92.1 percent not only were we above the state average overall but in every single enrollment group we were either above the state average or at the state average another key academic indicator that we have there's two tiers of diplomas there's a standard diploma Advanced Studies diploma that requires more math World languages 64 percent of our students earned that diploma as opposed to 53 percent Statewide um all of our demographic groups did well in comparison to their peers across Virginia among Hispanic students students with disabilities students from economically disadvantaged homes English Learners on-time

011graduation rates in the division were higher in each group than the average rates across Virginia among black students the division's on-time graduation rate matched the Statewide average at 90.3 percent in terms of individual school highlights Monticello highs 93.3 percent on time graduation rate for black students Western out malls rate of 92.9 percent for Hispanic students and 95.1 percent on time graduation rate for students with disabilities at Albemarle High School we also had a lower dropout rate than Virginia's average for all School divisions we our overall rate was 3.9 percent and considering that you know coming out of a year of returning back from online learning and the depths of the pandemic that's extremely low especially when you consider when I came first came downtown our dropout rate was more than 15 percent so back in

0122010 we had a 15 dropout rate let's see one other point uh talk a little bit about the SAT scores um the we outscored Virginia and the nation all across the board on the SAT but they also have a new indicator that's called a college readiness indicator and it's based on where the students land with their math and their their reading scores and um let's see 85 percent of our seniors 8 out of ten better than eight out of ten met the College Board Benchmark and this is for when we report our s our SAT scores it's only the for the students that report back to the school many many of our students go out and take the SATs and they don't report it back to the school they they get their scores and then

013they decide where they're going to send send the results so I would dare say it's higher than that Virginia's average was 83 percent so we were better than the rest of Virginia and it was 68 across the country I also want to make note and you'll hear more about it tonight that next year we're going to expand our career Readiness program offerings to all students in grades 10 through 12. we're going to be providing open admission to any sophomore junior or senior in career learning communities each career Learning Community represents professional areas with the highest potential for high quality job opportunities both locally and nationally they're based upon State research and division surveys of middle school students over the past four years currently we as you know we have four academies one for math engineering

014and science one data dedicated to Health and Medical Services one that focuses on Environmental Studies and one for information and Communications technology each will now become a career learning community and they'll be joined by concentrated student project-based studies and architecture Urban Design and building construction the Arts education and human development entrepreneurship business and innovation geospatial technology analytics Logistics Transportation Global Leadership law and social justice and Hospitality eateries amusement and Recreation and tourism on one final note for next year uh for the third consecutive year we'll be offering free of charge uh sat tests for all Juniors we began doing that two years ago because of the the big gaps we had in participation among our demographic groups so we offer it on a school day and we offer it for free and we've seen improvements

015in our participation and Dr McLaughlin I'll have more about that when we do the state of the division report and we continue to offer the PSAT to our sophomores so that they can practice and get ready you know they can qualify for National Merit Scholarship so I know that was a lot to read but especially with so many of our staff members here tonight I just want to thank you for all the outstanding work you do whether you are a high school you know a lot of times we look at the graduation rate SATs things like that it's we're thinking high school but that work especially for students who come to our schools behind really starts in pre-kindergarten kindergarten all the way through elementary middle and high school so every one of you whether you

016are working at the school teaching or driving the students to school safely or feeding students or taking care of their health needs you're the ones that make that happen so thank you thank you thank you guys in addition to visiting Monticello about 10 days ago or last Monday I visited out mile high school when they initiated a program called reforming the narrative and that program at that mile is being led by Miss criminal early this Dr Mary and some other staff members at the school and the program is designed to try to close the achievement Gap at out model in addition to trying to make the students more aware of school resources and Community Resources that they might be able to use I think this group is going to try to meet once per nine

017weeks and it was really an inspiring moment for that first meeting on last Tuesday to see how many people were there so it was really good to see this initiative at out Mile and I congratulate all of those people who were in sort of responsible for starting this program head out now do any other board members have any announcements I'll do a quick one I know I wasn't at the board meeting you guys appreciate I was able to attend an event that was thrown by I call him Eric and I'm worried I'm not going to pronounce this but last name wrong doctor Irizarry who is um our director of Engagement it was the K-Tech partner Community partner kickoff and it was one of the most well attended events that I have been to of Community

018Partners and potential leads for how we can get our students involved and into careers that work for them so I just wanted to say thank you for that invitation and I'm really excited about the work that is coming up um I also attended a K-Tech sort of event and I don't know I think maybe I saw you leaving that A2 I was able to uh go take to katex technical technical eats food bus I enjoyed a chili dog and had that Jack and Diane song like on a loop in my head ever since then Children of the 80s will get that but it was a it was really nice to see uh the students and staffers out there making food and a big bus so I enjoyed that I also had the best peach milkshake

019I've ever had in my life and it was all Peach and a little bit of milk and it was just great the whole event was wonderful okay I had a very sad Miss on the Crozet Washington okay thank you that was fun I thought it would be unkind to show up and like give high fives to children when I have a fever so my wife DJ stoble dressed as a giant chicken uh and I just want to congratulate not only my wife but all of the students who walked at Crozet uh it was a huge event apparently uh and uh I think it's just a great example to the community thank you Miss Dover and I think uh Miss Lee and Mr Carol has made us all hungry about telling us about the chili dog

020and the peach milkshake so thank you all is there any other school board or superintendent business at this time right if not moving to public comment Miss Carlson [Music] reading the summary of the public comment guidelines that is a that is available on the electronic School Board because I imagine that's what people look at when they're signing up for public comment and I know that ours are kind of in need of an upgrade um so I'm going to go ahead and read that one because it's a little more detailed we invite and actively seek The public's input and the matters relevant to school board governance and provide for time in our business meetings to hear from our residents and community members during public comment we expect respectful and on topic comments disruptive behavior from speakers

021or for members of the public in attendance is not going to be tolerated anyone who willfully disrupts this meeting in a manner that prevents or interferes with the ability of others to provide comments may be ejected by the chair um public testimony guidelines are as follows speakers should adhere to the following protocol state your name and address are just your magisterial district is fine please address comments to the school board as a whole limit comments to those matters that are relevant to school board governance our School Division operations you can give written statements our material in support of your comments to the school board Clerk and it will be disseminated to all of us or you can always email it as well or you can mail it snail mail if you'd like to do that

022um if they're we don't we have nine speakers today so I don't need to go over what happens if we have 10 speakers every speaker will have three minutes to speak there is a light system up here that is green yellow red the yellow comes on when you have one minute left and the red is when your time is done um in order to maintain respect for All Points of views the school board requests no clapping booing or other audible form of support you can raise your hands or speak or hold up posters which I think some people might have in the back but just so that we can hear comments and I believe that covers everything that would apply so with that I have nine speakers I am going to go ahead and just

023lift list off the order so you know when you're coming up and you're not wondering I have Susan Carter first followed by Marcella brightson then Mary biller Sarah Harris Randy zacherson Becca Saxon Jordan Barr Vernon lechte and Nancy Moore so with that Miss Carter if you are in the audience good evening my name is Susan Carter my address is 1277 branchlands Drive I'm an employee in the transportation department for almost 30 years tonight I will share my story with you not to Garner sympathy but to offer you a glimpse into how so many of us in the transportation department are not afforded the decency and respect that all deserve after our son was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in November of 2021 his partner also accounting employee and I discussed the best options for his caretaking

024with the needs of the county and the students weighing heavily on us we have worked diligently and we believe successfully to minimize the disruptions that our absences would cause the school system we have managed this through his many chemotherapy and radiation treatments his Whipple surgery hospitalizations and the aggressive chemotherapy he is receiving now on September 28th I submitted a leave request for September 29 afternoon high and middle routes only one hour and 15 minutes covered by the FMLA as our son required my assistance my first absence is school year I was advised by veronda wendelton ATS that I needed to send my route coverage to dispatch eventually I was able to arrange coverage for the open route that I have been voluntarily covering all year I advise dispatch and wendelton at the lead driver at

025AHS should find coverage for my AHS and journey run the next day September 29th at 6 A.M I received an email from Fannie Smith stating that wendelton had advised her of my request and I needed to work with another lead driver to get coverage I contacted HR for clarification on coverage expectations receiving a response from Ms Miller on September 29th which read in part FML or emergency leave would be the exceptions to requiring a driver to find coverage on October 3rd William shifflett sent an email which obviously contradicts that statement one hour and 15 minutes needed off from work by a 30-year veteran employee to care for her child that has cancer My Hope Is that after hearing me the many employees that have stories to be told will now have the courage to do

026so perhaps then you will accept that money is not the driving force behind drivers leaving and they are leaving as they are no longer willing to be treated so inhumanely thank you thank you for speaking up Miss Gordon you're welcome the next speaker will be Miss brightson [Music] foreign [Music] hello it's good to see you all again I'm sure that you have missed me but the start of the school year was intense and I'm just now beginning to get my head above water I'm here today to talk to you about the employee voice and action committee Evac as one of the people who worked through the whole process over the summer read up on best practices talk to many co-workers and struggled with the transparency of it all I'm standing here today to tell you

027this is not what you think it is and it is not going to work the way you want it to I can count on one hand the number of employees who know about the Evac committee outside of the people participating or those who directly know someone who is and that number is two this is not going to be representative of the employees in Albemarle County and the process was set up to fail from the start the invitations were sent out late they were not specific about compensation or time commitment which is a barrier for many and it came at the tail end of a year that sent many employees running for different jobs or at least the summer during the process valid points such as what can we actually change with this committee that isn't

028handed down policy were deflected and questions like how do we make a word accountable dback and we were told that would be figured out later and later and later even now in the Evac process document it says nothing about quantifiable accountability no requirement of anyone to follow through on suggestions or answer questions and even the agenda and summaries are submitted to the consent agenda which is rarely if ever openly discussed during meetings all of this process and no guarantee of a meaningful outcome eventually I watched as one by one people with genuine ideas years of experience sexual conflict resolution training mediation skills and the passion to improve things in Albemarle County dropped out um what are we left with we are left with a shell of an impact I know that all of you joined

029the school board to make an impact to make things better than they were and to work to lead Albemarle County into a safer more inclusive future now is your chance to make a lasting impact but you are being told by people whom Evac does not represent that is an Avenue for Meaningful change for employees but if none of us know about it it's happening or have very much input in it and there's no legal or systemic obligation towards it how is it going to represent and protect us I've heard you all say time and time again that the students are the most important thing about acps and I agree but we do not show them that when we believe that we believe that when we refuse to take action against future threats such as impending

030anti-trans and gender expansive legislation and book Banning or work to actively support and Empower teachers with the legal tools to defend them listen to those in the field over 70 percent of the County's employees said that they believed in the aea and in collective bargaining as the best thing for the future it gives leverage to the people who care the most the people in the trenches the teachers and students thank you thank you for those comments Miss brightson the next speaker is Mary Miller I believe is walking up good evening my name is Mary Miller this fall I was placed At Greer Elementary School as a student teacher on Wednesday September 28th I wore the shirt I'm wearing right now to Greer it says protect trans kids over a rainbow of the trans Pride colors

031less than two hours after arriving at Greer the assistant principal pulled me into her office evidently a Greer staff member had complained about my shirt she informed me that following the guidance of the County Attorney she had deemed my shirt to be espousing a quote non-neutral political Viewpoint end quote that was in violation of the County's code of conduct it is the job of Educators she said to remain neutral the principal affirmed the decision of his assistant principal I am a queer woman with a trans and non-binary partner who uses they them pronouns I had chosen not to be open with my students at Greer about my family despite observing straight teachers at Greer share about their spouses and families despite the fact that I was asking second grade students to share about and write

032about their families with me but when I was told I could not wear a shirt that expresses expresses support for Trans kids I decided that I no longer wanted to hide myself and my family so I asked the principal can I speak openly with my students about my family using my partner's correct pronouns and acknowledging their gender their gender identity he answered that his recommendation for all staff was quote we share in general terms and we don't initiate initiate these conversations end quote trans and gender expansive kids need like all kids to be valued and safe at school as a particularly vulnerable group they deserve to know that their teachers openly support them not just as kids but as trans kids they deserve to see themselves represented when they look at their teachers to have

033role models who are proud and authentically themselves in age-appropriate ways they deserve to see queer and trans adults living normal joyful lives as is clear from this school board's own policy protecting transgender and gender expansive students as well as your commendable public statement last week objecting to propose State policy that would reduce protections for those students the school board is not neutral when it comes to protecting trans kids for good reason supporting trans youth is often tragically a matter of life and death if this division allows its schools to prevent Educators from expressing their support for Trans kids from speaking openly about their own trans loved ones much less their own gender identities our trans and gender expansive expansive students will receive that message loud and clear and to them that message will not be

034neutral it may be the difference between a child who was able to exist as their authentic self and a child who suffers in silence and shame between a child who lives and a child who does not if you could please wrap up yes I just have one question can I please read it um I just ask you how are you going to ensure that we can support trans students in every classroom and school in this County thank you thank you my apologies I didn't see when it be bred and it wasn't still red so then I was like what is um sorry um thank you for those comments Miss Miller the next speaker is Sarah Harris who I see walking up thank you Miss Harris hi can you hear me yes my name is Sarah

035Harris I'm from the Whitehall District good evening members of the school board Mr Holden earlier this week we recognized National Coming Out day this is a day in which we celebrate the folks who are free and safe to live an authentic life of self-expression identity and love and recognize those who aren't in the year 2022 in the United States of America too many people cannot safely come out they are forced to hide their true selves from families communities and workplaces in which they fear they will be rejected many of these folks are kids according to the 2022 Trevor Project youth mental health survey fewer than one in three transgender and non-binary youth found their home to be gender affirming these kids reported attempting suicide at more than double the rate of those who felt High

036family support despite their difficult home situations some of these Brave kids are able to live authentically at school thanks to welcoming environments and affirming friends and School staff these kids the ones who find their schools to be safe and affirming will experience significantly lower rates of suicidal ideation and self-harm safe and affirming schools literally save lives the school board recently released a powerful statement in support of trans kids and the existing acps policy on the treatment of transgender and gender expansive students for which as an advocate for lgbtq students I'm so grateful I'm also grateful for the many visible and vocal teacher allies across our School Division these teachers who signal their allyship to queer kids through pins lanyards badges Pride Flags safe space stickers and t-shirts are letting kids know who they can trust

037to be their authentic selves with we know that a child who has even one safe grown-up has a significantly improved mental health outcome that can last throughout their lifetime protecting kids even specifically trans kids is not a political cause and creating safe spaces for kids is not woke caring for kids is literally the bare minimum that teachers and School staff commit to when entering the profession we must be mindful not to engage in the dangerous National practice of politicizing kids based on their identity we must have the courage to speak out against harmful and discriminatory policies and practices and even more importantly to back up our words with actions we must Empower teachers to create classrooms and schools in which all kids can be comfortable safe and ready to learn we must boldly loudly and

038courageously protect trans kids thank you thank you for those comments Miss Harris the next speaker is Mr zackerson [Music] so I do not see anyone standing up Mr zackerson if you're out there this is the time okay moving on uh Becca Saxon who I know is here good evening my name is Becca Saxon and my address is on file the Albemarle Education Association has received several calls and emails from Members concerned about the recent edict sent to the staff at one school regarding your attorney's interpretation of policy J GD on political activities as relevant to staff actions to create a supportive School climate for Trans and gender expansive students policy GD clearly states that's the trans policy the board recognizes that oh no the political one the board recognizes that school time and school property

039should not be used for partisan political purposes the protection of trans children is not a political issue and turning Educators actions towards support and protection into one into one is in direct policy of direct violation of policy jba the policy on the treatment of transgender and gender expansive students which says Educators play an essential role in creating a supportive School culture and advocating for the well-being of students schools must be proactive in creating a culture that respects and values all students and fosters understanding of gender identity and expression within the school community one step in creating that culture is visible in explicit displays so that lgbtq students know they are valued and included the current situation cannot be left unaddressed the timing of your press release on your commitment to the policy while your attorney

040was undermining it behind the scenes makes Educators nervous that if they teach a lesson that ends with parents getting upset they will not get the support they need to work through the controversy additionally lgbtq educators are now questioning whether they're full authentic selves are truly welcome in acps I would suggest that you Empower your Equity office to broaden the scope of the anti-racism decision-making tool piloted last year so that building level decisions and policy implementation efforts can be examined through an equity lens instead of Simply being looked at as legal reliability issues as you dig into specific decisions and how they will affect lgbtq students and Educators the vea has a fact sheet which I'll give you in a second on the trans model policies that may be useful if I can be of further

041assistance please let me know the aea and I are ready and willing to partner with you in the central office staff As you move forward thank you thank you for those comments Miss Saxon we have three speakers left next up will be oh you're bringing stuff over um the next Com or the next speaker will be Jordan Barr [Music] ie all right good evening so this is a little bit unusual but um go with it I just come before the Lord of Heaven and Earth today as your humble servant we petition you today that your will be done on Earth in an Albemarle County just as it is in heaven I come before you in your courts of Heaven asking for your Justice not man's Justice be served in Albemarle County in the public schools

042I hereby take my mantle of Spiritual Authority as a father of County students in Albemarle County Community member and I say father God I invite you back into our schools and I pray that all students all Races and you know rich or poor would come to understand their true identity in you we repent on behalf of a fatherless Nation and I stand as a repentant father and as we see the fatherlessness has caused such confusion in our youth we pray for the protection of our County Teachers our school board our parents students bus drivers you know people that work in cafeteria everybody let our schools be a place where learning and enlightenment and that our students will no longer be used as Pawns in a political battles it is now time for us adults and

043leaders to lead and guide our youth into all truth and to fight for the Eternal Souls of our children let us work together let us stop the bickering and us against them mentality and fault finding our students deserve to be listened to and not coerced into an agenda let all of us work together thank you thank you for those comments Mr Barr Mr Lucky I know you're out there [Music] good evening my name is Vernon lechte and I'm president of the alma Education Association tonight I wanted to speak regarding the High School academic schedules report that was provided to you in your consent agenda the recommendation from the authors of the report is to maintain current high school schedules and not return to a seven period plus one advisory class decision was made based on

044reports from student feedback committee work staff feedback and an impact study of class size and weighted grades the original decision to move away from the seven plus one schedule was made before I was an employee in the county numerous people have been employed with the county at that time have told me that this decision was made by the school board at the time almost 13 years ago due to financial concerns from the recession decision was made by the school board very promptly without a lot of input from the staff and community that decision had high school teachers teach an additional class of students without additional compensation it also decreased the amount of advisory and Remediation time given to students the current schedule that we have is an eight period schedule with a half a period

045of advisory per day this has shortened class time shortened intervention time and shortened High School's teachers planning time regarding the staff feedback piece of this report I will provide you with the context of how that was presented to me the last training day before school staff at my school were told that at the end of a long meeting that the county wanted feedback about the possible return to a seven plus one schedule the explanation for the possible return to a seven plus one schedule was framed to us in a way that seemed heavily favored towards a particular perspective or response from the staff I in particular was frustrated that we had seven days of professional development trainings and getting ready for school and yet this feedback survey was only given to us the day before

046school started during for many of us is the busiest time of the year and we're told the survey needed to complete it by the end of the week had at our meeting two staff members speak their thoughts about the shift but this occurred very briefly [Music] there's teachers about at my building about this prior to submitting the survey and after this current report was published many elective teachers expressed concerns that students wouldn't have the options to take electives with reduced class sizes many core level teachers that have experienced both the seven plus one and the current schedule told me that they preferred the prior schedule and believed we soon would be returning to the seven plus one schedule in the 2023-2024 school year they were in the depression that this was the plan from the

047division over the last few years My Hope tonight was just to give you this additional information about the matter and to provide the context for how this information was prevented to us I encourage the division to connect further with teachers at the high schools to truly get a better sense of what kind of schedules the acps high school teaching staff wish to have to better help with their teaching conditions and the students learning conditions I and others are also willing to help assist the division collect this information and staff feedback about the return to a seven plus one schedule thank you thank you for those comments Mr lecti the last speaker that we have is Nancy Moore good evening yes it's Nancy Muir and I'm live in the Whitehall District thank you for your time

048tonight as you are aware I'm I want of the parental right to review sexually explicit instructional material it's a Senate bill number 656. that was enacted in the 2022 Virginia assembly and it's put into law by Governor youngin so it's mandated to be implemented by January 1 2022. this law covers the materials in all classes not just Family Life Education it refers to sexually explicit books which might be selected for reading in English class or topics that might be highlighted in a history class so the law is to be implemented for all grade levels as well generally the school board will have a two-month process for implementing a new policy and since uh since we only have two months now prior to January 1. I'm asking that the school board take action immediately to develop

049a model policy that's consistent with or comprehensive more comprehensive than the model policy that was developed by the Virginia Department of Education the policies drafted should ensure Advanced parental notification of intended use of instructional materials with sexually explicit content um it should ensure parents have the ability to inspect and review instructional materials that include sexually explicit content also including online and video and print materials and it should ensure that parents have the opportunity to select for their child the option of alternative instructional materials and related academic activities that do not contain sexually explicit content parental Authority is a constitutional right under the law of Virginia we also know that from multiple studies and research parental involvement improves students academic performance and over all healthiness I will look forward to seeing an acps policy for Senate

050Bill 656 on the November school board agenda so that we will be afforded the 30 days of public comment prior to January 1. thank you for your attention to this action item thank you for those comments Miss Moore that concludes public comment thank you to everyone who took the time to be here and to express your thoughts I know I appreciate it and I believe everyone else does as well we like hearing from you so thank you thank you Miss Carlson we will now have a human resources hiring Update LED by Dr Claire casa Grande get my team up here thank you good evening board members I'm Claire Kaiser assistant superintendent tonight we have with us here members of our human resources Talent team to give an update for the hiring for the 21-22 school

051year as with everything that we do in Human Resources our strategic plan guides the work that we do I am drawn to the words in our mission working together as a team our employees are the team that is critical and crucial to the success of that mission and the ability to hire the right people is Paramount in the work that we do in our human resources department our third strategic goal focusing on Equitable and transformative resources states that we will attract and develop and retain the highest quality staff tonight you will hear about our current state in hiring probably one of the most challenging hiring years that we have had in the time that I've been doing this work with that you will also hear some plans for our future work around recruitment and retention

052to get us started I would like to turn this over to our executive director of Human Resources Dan Redding all right thank you Dr Kaiser and good evening board members I'm Dan Redding Executive Director of Human Resources we have a good bit of data and information to share with you here tonight related to our hiring for the past year and on the screen you can see our agenda do note our major goals that we keep in mind as we go out to hire for teachers and support staff excuse me Dan can you pull the microphone up a little absolutely sorry about that thank you so there are significant highlights this year we continued a number of very successful strategies from the past including our Partnerships with the African-American teaching fellows and the teachers of promise

053and we focused on early contracts as a way to bring highly qualified teachers on board we added to the variety of job fairs that we recruit at both virtual and in person the reorganization of HR and separation into being focused just on the School Division brings this wonderful Talent team to you here tonight and they're focused on recruiting and retaining Educators and support staff other highlights are the addition of school-based substitutes and a substitute coordinator which support the addressing of the substitute shortage and despite a very difficult hiring environment we successfully filled a number of leadership positions this year but it did remain a difficult hiring environment and will share data with you around that there are significant impacts on our ability to hire special ed teachers and bus drivers that persist late resignations and

054leaves of absence in August led to higher than typical turnover and difficulty filling positions while the pool was really at its smallest and daily subs remain a challenge and have wide-ranging impacts as teachers and support staff fill in to ensure continuity of instruction for students when there's not enough Subs we have two charts that we want to share with you that illustrate some of the challenges in our current recruiting pool one related to undergraduate and graduate students earning degrees in education across the country you can see a decline over the past 10 to 12 years the other is related to the demographics of the pool of people graduating with education degrees you can see that the demographic makeup of that pool does not reflect our student body and our community so from a smaller pool

055we are looking to recruit a diverse and representative teaching Force out of a pool that is not representative to give you a lot of that data around our hiring I'd like to bring up Dr Jason Sears good evening this slide is an overview and comparison of new teacher hires this season I'd like to highlight just a few points we'll see we hired 207 new teachers 32 of those were teachers of color 53 of our new hires were beginning their career in education 10 of which were teachers of color I would also like to draw your attention to the fact that our teaching Force continues to be highly qualified as well as Highly Educated with 68 percent of our new teaching staff holding Masters or Doctorate Degrees finally I would like to point out I would

056like to point your attention to the increase in our gender diversity in our new teacher hires we have continued to pay close attention to diversifying our teaching force in almost every year since 2017-2018 we have seen a positive change in the total percentage of teachers of color in the past hiring year 11.32 percent of our teaching staff were teachers of color we have demonstrated a cumulative increase of 1.28 percent percent since we began tracking this statistic this cumulative change over time does show continued growth and represents positive movement during this difficult hiring Market diversifying our teaching force will continue to be a focal point and we will continue to develop new strategies build new relationships and Institute new initiatives in addition to improving hiring practices we will also have a deliberate and intentional focus on

057retaining our current teaching staff our retention strategies will be highlighted a little later in this presentation we have continued to hire high quality teachers administrators and support staff including increases in teachers of color focus on hiring is evidenced by our total overall teacher vacancy rate of less than two percent which compares favorably to other jurisdictions even in these the most challenging of hiring times partnering our HR department with administrators and hiring managers reinforces our ability to continue to attract secure and retain high quality diverse staff and we believe our hiring initiatives will continue our forward movement conversations with applicants and new hires lead us to understand our District's focus on anti-racism and Equity as well as our commitment to competitive pay are significant points of interest as mentioned before our total school-based teaching vacancy rate

058is under two percent however small we are committed to becoming fully staffed on this slide you will see our school-based teaching vacancies not identified here are also unfortunately six vacancies for school-based substitute teachers and several long-term substitute positions as well we are committed to filling these positions with qualified candidates as soon as possible as part of our human resources reorganization we have a dedicated staff member that will focus part of that will impart focus on recruiting and retaining substitute teachers like many divisions across the state we are seeing declining numbers of applicants while many positions are still drawing healthy numbers of candidates we had many jobs posted this year that have very small applicant pools here are some examples we received four applicants for a high school World Language teacher and one applicant for a

059middle school World Language teacher a middle school English position yielded only four applicants and finally an elementary school Esau teacher positioned only garnered two applicants of our eight current special education vacancies we have a total of six applicants across these pools to note those six applicants are not Unique Individuals and may represent applicants that have not been screened for licensure which could further narrow an already shallow pool in comparison if we look back over the last two to three years each of those pools would have been much more robust across our support staff areas we have been able to hire a number of individuals as well that said the examples shown here demonstrate that the challenges of hiring extended Beyond classroom teachers as we continue to actively recruit to fill all vacancies the hiring update

060for our school's support staff demonstrates a high percentage of diverse employees hired for this school year in addition to being a racially diverse our school support staff is also a culturally diverse demonstrating a growing need for additional language and translation support internal promotions and transfers supported our retention of qualified School leaders our commitment to diversity extends to our leadership team external hires reflect our commitment to diversity as 50 percent of our externally hired principals 100 of our externally hired assistant principals and 40 percent of our central office and support departments were are individuals of color I've just shared our current state before we share our future work I'd like to pause for any questions I I had a few comments I guess or were we just taking questions I guess I would like to uh

061ground for those in the audience and just so we know on the diverse why the diversity piece is so important is because it's one of the few research-backed ways that supports targeting achievement gaps is to have children actually have teachers that are representative of their own experience so I applaud or how we've gotten better male more male teachers so that our male students can have access to male teachers as they go through their career I take a little bit of issue with the um positive spin on the one percent increase over five years on our diverse hires um I understand so that's rough and so I guess my question would be um are we doing exit surveys do we understand because actually we lost three of those teachers this year so are we understanding where

062they are going or why we can't keep them yes uh the short answer is yes and actually we'll talk a little bit about that later in the uh later in the presentation so not only is that answer yes but we will continue to make that a more robust process as well okay and you'll hear a little bit more about that going along with the you know the the number 1.28 in the last five years so maybe that's that is you know very very low and that wasn't what the expectations I understand there was a pandemic but part of this is you you're uh giving us numbers for the low applicant pools and I I don't know that you can answer this right now but I sure would love to get you know some sort of

063of an explanation as to why these were so low where were these people going um if they weren't coming to us and why weren't they going and coming to us and they were attracted to go somewhere else because you know with all respect in the world 1.28 over five years isn't what you would call acceptable I agree and and hopefully I can uh spend some more time and bring that back to you and the board as well thank you [Music] I want to make sure I capture those three questions okay thank you thank you just one more question excuse me um I know that in we've been told over the past two years we've reached out more strongly to the hcbu you know campuses that what are what is the array of methods that we

064we recruit not not just diverse students I mean teachers but everybody and what is the most productive has going to the campuses yielded the results that we wanted or do we need to be doing something else or in addition to wait yeah well clearly we haven't resulted yielded the results that we have wanted but um we have um we'll talk a little bit about uh upcoming but I'll uh Mr Redding talk about current sure so I think some of the strategies that have moved us forward are the focus on early contracts and the Partnerships with African-American teaching fellows where we're hiring the vast majority of the pre-service teachers they're graduating likewise with teachers of Promise we've been able to build our Cadre of diverse teachers through those some of what is coming up in the

065presentation are the strategies that are underway now Dr Sears has been doing a lot of relationship building with hbcus in Virginia and looking at ways to leverage Partnerships with them to bring their graduates and even their pre-service teachers here and and get them interested in Albemarle and the work we're doing Dan maybe this is a quest how many people are going through and getting their degrees in education but get jobs not in education or maybe they're going to Google or something because obviously the pay difference would be significant yeah or people I know that applications are down but of those who are graduating what percentage go into education do we know that I don't know that we have data on that tonight we'd have to do some research to see what studies are out there

066that's that's possibly not the easiest data to get our hands on right right I didn't imagine we had it but yeah it made this yeah I have one other comment I really appreciate the transparency and I know it's it's hard to put bad numbers out there but I just it struck me the difference I it's great that we have an under two percent vacancy for our teaching staff that's very commendable in a very hard market right now but I find it telling that our support staff has such high vacancy rates and I think it's a board we should probably be asking ourselves what we need to do to make that a little bit more even out there's a lot of vacancies there hence the compensation study yeah coming up in 30 minutes [Music] we'll talk

067a little bit about our future State now good evening chair page board Dr Haas Mr Holden uh I am Chad Ratliff and I'm happy to talk a little bit more about some plans that we have moving forward our hcps human resources team will be focusing on grow your own cohorts that will identify and support our dedicated non-teaching staff interested in becoming classroom teachers or special education teachers programs like teachers for tomorrow and our high school career learning communities are opportunities for building a pipeline of Educators you'll hear more about career learning communities later this this evening from an instructional team we'll continue building connections directly with prospective teachers through our use of handshake which is a newly relatively newly acquired college recruiting tool widely used utilized across the country as well as direct Outreach to

068an increased social media presence and networking with universities we are in the process of planning an acps in person and virtual job fair for both classified wide and licensed staff and we will continue to build strong relationships as you've already heard with HBCU hbcus and groups like the African-American teaching fellows in order to create opportunities for diverse staff not only with regular regular contracts but also utilizing uh early contracts finally we will begin our ADP onboarding process which will make the hiring process significantly more user friendly and efficient and I'm happy to introduce you to Dr Sarah Flynn to talk a little bit more about our retention strategies foreign good evening my name is Dr Sarah Lynn and I'm the new Talent retention and Dei program manager be the national Trends towards fewer people entering

069the profession of Education it is even more critical than ever to focus on retention as part of my job I will focus on implementing stay interviews and enhancing our exit interviews we will continue to utilize the data collected from the Gallup engagement survey and combine that with the stay and exit interviews giving us specific data to move forward with this will really inform potential programming such as working on burnout prevention with existing wellness and EAP Services partnering with the Department of Professional development we will focus employee development on individual leadership alongside content and curriculum and finally we're going to work to develop manager hiring and Leadership practices that are focused through the lens of retention and Dei thank you all so much for listening and are there any further questions what are the exit surveys

070saying I'm in day 18 of the position what we really want to look at is starting to track a process of when did an individual start to begin to think about leaving and what was kind of the final straw so that we can track their process and their journey and maybe be able to see some trees and maybe I feel like I'm such a loud talker and maybe be able to see some Trends in where people are beginning to have issues so that we can be preventative so what we're going to start to collect in the exit data will hopefully allow us to then not just be reactionary but solve problems on a greater scale okay so do we have the data of the exit surveys for the teachers that have left already or is

071this new we're going to be doing it we're going to be doing it so what we're doing correct what we have now has been aligned with the state exit data and what does that convey if you want to share sure so what that shares is unfortunately only half of the teaching staff that exited filled out the surveys so it's an incomplete data set to start with what it shows is that we had a lot of relocations and then the second thing is looking at people taking individual breaks and the individual breaks could have been to care for a child a family member or themselves I'm looking forward to finding out more with enhancements me too are you going to include in the exit survey I'm over here questions about housing costs student debt and those

072types of questions which may impact what kinds of jobs people want to stay in um likely yes we haven't gotten too far into that process yet but we do want to keep it short enough that they will answer so finding the most critical information I'm happy to hear your input on what you would like to hear in that survey as well okay with the um grow your own process has that been started or have you set in place um the steps that we'd be needing for that actually uh plans are pretty well underway and there's going to be some announcements rolling out between the superintendent's advisory build bulletin next week and the compass to start letting staff know this is coming solicit interest and start planning for funding I believe funding we're looking at the

073pdrp so the professional development reimbursement program and some other potential sources that will support our classified staff who are very interested in obtaining licensure and if I could just do an add-on there one of the things that makes the grow your own program something that we can jump into pretty quickly this year is the fact that last year in the budget the board did allocate money for our classified uh the professional development funds and so the funds do exist for us to be able to get that program rolling so we thank you for that it does help us move more quickly through that Dr Kaiser if the board going into the budget process if the board wanted to fund that program fully so that paraprofessionals that are seeking to become teachers can do it for

074free is that is that an option we can definitely look at that through the funding requests any other questions while we're in this party maybe one other one I'm not sure what the name of this is but at one time I think we would you would go to job fairs and offer a contract on site those are called those are what we call our early contracts um what we typically do is not necessarily at job fairs but we we use we use job fairs and other means like the handshake that that was talked about as a means to start building relationships with people and to entice them to learn more about Alamo County and then that eventually leads them to an early contract one of the things that we always like to do with an

075early contract candidate is make sure that our administrators have had the opportunity to at least meet them and do a either a formal or informal interview to make sure that you know we see that that's a good fit that said as we um to your point that was a couple of years ago as we were going to Career Fairs and things like that and now as we are in an even more critical time when it comes to hiring I think that that is something especially in our critical shortage areas especially special education especially actually you know mathematics World languages the the positions in particular that we know that we are typically challenged to find highly qualified individuals for we will use those we will definitely do I anticipate that we will do early contracts much

076more liberally than we have in the past and with the hcbus do you go to May our adjoining states too especially in North Carolina that is something that we have looked to spread out we when we really started the Partnerships we started right in Virginia but I do think that we you know we have talked about looking up and down the entire East Coast in particular okay [Music] foreign State something that over the last few years Ms Carlson and I have kind of beat the drum on a bit and that is the the importance of having um teachers of color you know is so important obviously to to our students and where they can see you know themselves in in those positions and um the the African-Americans make up about 11 ballpark I'm just rounding

077on all these um of our students and about 5.4 5.5 of our teachers and our Hispanic population represents about 15 percent of our students in less than three percent of our Educators I'm not sure I don't have the the numbers for for Asians and dual races in front of me I I just want to really stress the importance of not um not leaving out you know the and this is not to to put anything uh bad in terms of efforts for black teachers but there are other students who need to see people too uh who who look like them and we've been kind of beating that drum for a while and it hasn't really gone anywhere so it asks you to expand and find other ways that you could reach out to to those people

078as well because it's so important absolutely yes thank you and just to offend one thing to John Elway you said which obviously I agree all with all of it but it's also very important for our white students so and I think that gets lost in this conversation as well right and that is definitely what the research shows is that all students benefit from having teachers of color any other questions all right well we appreciate your time for that and just a reminder we will be sharing the full Human Resources annual report and that's where you'll see a much uh further much further depth as far as breakdown of demographics of each of our hires as well as retention data and and other human resources related efforts for our staff so as you're closing out I

079just want to take a moment to commend the Human Resources Department I know we can look at many of these things through glass half empty however you have since July began to build your own Department you've been short staffed you started using ADP for payroll during the winter time last year you adopted Kronos for our time keeping which is a major undertaking and project and really during the time that I've worked in Albemarle County Schools since 2004 we've really back then would pay a lot of lip service to recruiting and hiring for diversity really is only within the last five or six years that we've actually started to track it and so we've all offered different perspectives but if 20 years ago we had started tracking it and grew at a rate of a half

080a percent per year you know we'd have we'd be 10 percent better now so I guess the thing that I would say is that I I mean from my perspective I didn't hear anybody celebrating I know that uh Dr Sears when he was looking at those numbers before uh didn't see any cause to celebrate I do think we should highlight though that we didn't lose ground I have colleagues all throughout Virginia that I talked to Hanover has similar demographics Albemarle County schools in 2021 they were 94 percent white now they're 96 percent White they're they are losing and they're losing to school systems like ours because we are tracking and it's one of the things I like to say is that slow change is not no change and again if this had been a point

081of emphasis if we had targets that we were working with 10 years ago 15 years ago small growth a little bit at a time accumulates over time and we're doing Legacy work right now We're Not Gonna you're not the the school board is not at any time going to open up one of these reports and see a 10 jump in any particular category and the applicants aren't applying somewhere else I think if you go back to some of the slides that you saw earlier there are no applicants when again we don't have this perspective not everybody talks to other superintendents in our region or around Virginia but there are school systems that started school this year with 12 percent of vacancies among teachers they just simply started with no teacher they they would use they're

082using auditoriums for classroom spaces so I guess I'm jumping in here at the end because I felt a lot of negativity around people that I'm the if you knew that her Herculean efforts that they go through to not to bring in any candidate let alone trying to bring in a diverse candidate to work in the school system the stories that I know of calling the same person repeatedly about you know are you still interested in Albemarle can I get you to apply for this job can I get you to apply for this job when Dr Sears applied initially to work in Albemarle County Schools he applied for two principals jobs and you know we made our way through this process processes but early on I recognized that he had worked in Petersburg as their director

083of human resources for five years and so I I said to my staff I want I want him in HR we need someone like him that's had principal experience who's had a background in working in HR a background of working in the central office so we we go out of our way to not just leave it at who applies oh we didn't get the people we want I think that if any any board members would be welcome to Shadow John mcquilkin or any of the other recruitment Specialists that work in that department and again I don't you guys were doing something but ADP payroll starting a new HR department Kronos any one of those things would have shut down the departments in in other places but they did all they've been doing all those things

084and they still started out the year with a two percent vacancy rate so I know we don't applaud people I'm not going to applaud you but I want you to know that I'm Blown Away by what you've been able to accomplish as we started this school year and we wouldn't exist as a school system without the employees that you've brought on board so thank you thank you Dr House just to add a tiny bit I mean I think you're doing a great job and I think that the fact that we have HR in-house we're actually going to get some of these questions answered and we're going to know what's you know what we should be doing and and I think that's an enormous benefit so thank you yeah thank you Dr Kaza Mr Redding Dr

085Sears and Dr Lynn for that report now moving to compensation study report led by Mr Redding again all right good evening again board members and Dr Haas and everyone um we're bringing you tonight the 2022 compensation study to provide a little bit of the background related to this I want to give a refresher of how we got here in the spring we as we prepared to establish our separate HR department that would serve only the School Division the boards set aside funds for a compensation study to review our strategy and our practices as we separated out our practices from those of the government all of our work is aligned with the Strategic plan of the school division now specifically the vision and the mission as well as the values and goals but most specifically this

086report really emphasizes the work of goal three equative and transform Equitable and transformative resources attracting developing and retaining the highest quality staff indeed strategy one calls out a compensation structure that makes us highly competitive compared to other employers so aligning our compensation practices with the market study will ensure that we're achieving the success measures outlined in the Strategic plan and you see those big ones highlighted here especially in future exit surveys that salary will not be identified as a reason for departure so an overview of our agenda for the evening we'll talk a little bit more about the purpose and set the stage here and we'll talk about actions we've taken to date we have our SQL consultant here to share a lot of data and information and some amazing graphs and tables that we'll

087walk through and interpret and then we're going to talk about some actions that may come out of or maybe recommended based on that data we're going to foreshadow the fiscal year 24 budget implications and then talk about next steps so back in the spring this money was set aside and the board retired the policy on commonality in Human Resources practices with local government that was huge as we separated our HR departments they had a structure that works very well for a local government entity and employer this study allows us to focus on a School Division employer during the hiring update we spoke about shifts in the labor market and the environment that we're currently working in a major major goal of this study was to clarify our competitive market moving away from looking at our

088immediate neighbors and comparing ourselves only to them to look at a variety of factors by which we can compare ourselves to other school divisions in Virginia to determine those we really should be seeing as our competitors for educators although we're still also competing with some of our neighbors so at this point I'd like to introduce Ms Marion oyas she's a senior consultant and engagement leader with Siegel companies and she is going to walk us through some of the data in the reports that you received as part of the agenda thank you to advance okay good evening thank you my name is Marianne oyas and I am from Siegel companies I am coming up from our rally office and spend a lot of time doing work in Virginia and have a rising I guess you would

089call her preschooler granddaughter Ivy June who will be entering the school system here in just about a year and a half foreign listening to some of the challenges you're experiencing from a recruitment and retention environment I do have to reflect quickly on my first presentation to a school board in a study like this in 1993 in Madison Wisconsin and so my career has really been oriented toward working with organizations that use public funds to achieve objectives and a lot of work in schools public schools community colleges and so forth in all those years I have never seen a set of circumstances faced by public schools from a human resources perspective as I see today these are unprecedented times it really is Siegel's honor to partner with you to provide you some data and information to

090help Drive some difficult decisions that you're faced with in that vein there's a few things that we'd like to discuss with you tonight or remind you or set expectations for the goals and scope of the study we endeavored to complete we'll talk in some detail about the new competitive market or comparison Market that's being used to look at the competitiveness of your pay and benefits and then in terms of findings we're separating them in sort of two categories the good news the bright spots and then on the other side areas for greater Focus where there are issues with your ability presently to compete in the market uh the total compensation assessment results the study itself is over 160 Pages incredibly detailed but there is sort of bottom line findings we'd like to emphasize tonight and

091then talk about our next steps in terms of Siegel's work with you but in determining your ability to be competitive to bring in and keep Talent employees staff we looked at a number of categories that are key to the operations of a School Division and the report has sections specifically for teachers other licensed professionals and so on so the results are mixed depending on the job family and the level of job your ability to compete presently it varies and so we'll talk about that the scope of the study included what we call a view of total compensation pay and some of the key benefit programs health benefits retirement paid time off all aspects of the compensation package that is is so key to hiring and retaining staff we collected the data through a custom survey

092of the chosen peers and we'll talk about the chosen peers in just a moment and then supplemented the survey with a lot of interaction with other HR directors from the peer organizations reading job descriptions to see if their psychologist was really comparable to yours and so forth and so on looking at their pay scales their pay policies so an incredible amount of data to make sure that our results were valid to come back to you and say Here's the the picture of your competitiveness the final report was just issued in October the work the data were really collected during this this spring and summer of this year so as we think about your competitive market the organizations with whom you compete a realistic or practical definition is to think of it this way what organizations

093are you hiring people from what organizations what other divisions what other types of employers are you losing people to we also ask you to think about what we call an aspirational Market those are the divisions and organizations that you aspire to be more like we find that most of our employers have sort of a set of these are the people we compete with but we'd really like to be more like XYZ that's an aspirational Market sometimes you find you need to pay higher not always though it just depends on the nature of that market for a more entry-level jobs it's it's generally true that your Market is going to be more local for jobs that are mid to senior and career managers directors and so forth the market generally is brought better people are more

094willing to pick up and relocate for medium or mid-level or higher level paid jobs that's those are just kind of basic labor economics so these are some general principles now in terms of actually saying you know for the first time at least in many years Albemarle Public Schools is defining its own Market separate from the county this provided an opportunity to really look specifically at your needs in your Market there was a number there were a number of criteria that we used in this study that are fairly typical to use in studies such as this to determine comparable School divisions and so um on the on the slide you see a number of them you know proximity again especially location for jobs that that folks are willing to you know how far willing people willing

095to commute generally an hour you know for most jobs Beyond an hour we find that it's typically less critical for jobs where you're defining a local market we looked at Cost of Living cost of Labor and then a number of criteria or indices we have the years of the data that we pulled to get the most current data things such as expenditures per pupil percent of teachers with Masters Masters or doctorate AP course enrollment percentages Etc so those criteria were developed with Siegel and our project team here and then we we set a range for each of those criteria of comparability and so any division within Virginia that fell within the range of at least three of those criteria became identified as your initial comparable group so out of 108 or so Virginia school divisions

096looking at this criteria we came up with our first set of school divisions so again they met comparability on at least three of those criteria and you know and that they are in different parts of the state certainly some are closer than others and none of them are exact matches to you obviously the only division that would match you would be you so the idea is what what are reasonable comparisons right what makes sense from a recruitment standpoint the slide to the left says five and that's an air I apologize we actually then brought in eight additional School divisions that maybe didn't fall within that range of all of those criteria but from a common sense standpoint and from talking to your HR a team as to where you actually were recruiting it made sense

097to bring in Augusta County Chesterfield and so forth and some of the key key criteria we looked at for comparability are listed there again proximity certain characteristics of the community that are comparable and so forth so in the end we had 15 comparable peers comparable peers that were used for the market analysis now you don't just compete with other school divisions you've got such a wide variety of employees in the school division you also compete with other local government public sector organizations so we certainly wanted to bring in Pay data from the county city of Charlottesville and University of Virginia UVA you also compete maybe increasingly compared to years ago for some of your occupations in the private sector and so our methodology there if we were to contact three or four or ten private

098sector firms in the area or the region and ask to provide if they would provide their paid data they would basically say no why should we we don't have to so the methodology is is that we purchase a seagull as a firm a number of published surveys a large highly respected High reputation survey organizations and bring in data from those for jobs in which you are are competing in the private sector and as I said there's a number of them so Bureau of Labor Statistics comp analysts through salary.com and ERI are the three major surveys that we used to have a really full robust view of your Market from both the public sector School Division and private sector all base basices we do some adjustments to the data this is basic sound compensation methodology one

099of the adjustments we always mention is our Geographic adjustments so if you think for example about those other school divisions there's differences between you and them in terms of cost of living and also cost of Labor and we could look at either to try to do an Apples to Apples comparison this in the compensation world and salary setting we don't Focus so much on cost of living because cost of living is really about demand and supply for goods and services but its cost of Labor that we look at to uh to our comparability and so we find that some of the divisions the cost of Labor is much higher some it's much lower some it's pretty close to yours so we discuss in the report that we adjust the salary data coming in from the

100other divisions to equalize to your particular cost of Labor and then a couple examples on the slide are Alexandria and Montgomery which between them have very different cost of Labor and so there's an equalization that we do to bring the data to be comparable to your particular cost of Labor in terms of findings there were of course so many this was oops what did I do Dan I went okay such a broad study but we wanted to bring forward first some bright spots and good news we was certainly important to share that in terms of teacher starting salaries you're the highest among the surveyed School divisions so you're comparable really and competitive throughout the scale for all the lanes Bachelors Masters Etc but about mid-career you know step five six you start to lose some

101competitiveness and we think the reason is is because your step increases are 1.2 percent per year and the average in that market of 15 is 1.4 so what happens is over time you you start to lose your Competitive Edge and I'll show you a chart about that in a minute another another good news is that your pay rates for what we call the other licensed professional social workers psychologists Etc have competitive starting rates that's important your pay rates for School nurses for at least least the LPN licensed practical nurse level is very competitive daily pay rates for substitute teachers I mean these are all key jobs here right for short and long-term substitutes are competitive the salary ranges for your school administrators are generally competitive and teaching assistance key categories here especially at the entry

102rates are very competitive in the market your newly defined Market at this point in time teachers starting rates of the slide shows that there you are in terms of this is in order of starting rates lowest to highest you're all the way to the right Charlottesville is we color code them a little differently because they're right in your backyard so to speak the your position is the same in terms of being the highest for the ball for the different Lanes we showed the bachelor's and the Masters now this slide sort of shows what I was talking about where if you look at to the left the starting salaries your competitive Advantage is obvious but you see those pay lines start to come closer together as you go up the number of years of service or

103number of steps so for Mid to more senior level teachers your Competitive Edge is starting to weaken but your overall you are still competitive you cannot say that we cannot say that you're not this is just showing again in terms of a chart the competitiveness of the pay for the other licensed professionals at the starting but if you look to the high end your maximum rates for those professionals there's a leg in the market anywhere between seven to sixteen percent below market and why do we care about the maximum rates for jobs why is that important one way to look at it is that over the year years that the professional or any person is with you you're investing it's a folks people are investments right years you know over over the years you're investing

104a lot of time and dollars and so are they and certainly you you hate to think of losing an investment after many years because of pay becoming less than competitive so we always pay attention not just to starting rates but how what's the competitive picture for a job for the high end of the scales this uh chart uh is at the top it should be labeled licensed practical nurse those the first two lines and so you can see your ranges are very competitive at the start and at the end you can see though now if you look at the RNs the registered nurse at the bottom you've got an issue with your pay being definitely below Market there and Dan is going to talk to you more about that in a few minutes this is

105showing you again stacking up the rates for substitute teachers the daily pay rates Albemarle is way to the right and of course Charlottesville is sort of right there with you I bet that's not a surprise to you for teaching assistants we show again a very competitive situation what what is showing there and is is not labeled well is you've got three classification titles of teaching assistants and those are represented there so again good news now with facilities we start to look at some jobs here where there are some areas of focus opportunities for improvement in the custodial group for example your your pay for custodians and leads are consistent or competitive in the market but we see that in the supervisor group there's there's an issue where the pay is not as competitive as it

106is for the line staff so you want pay for supervisors to be competitive not just for external applicants but for internal applicants so that there's a reason to be promoted you know most people are at least some degree motivated by pay so supervisory pay is always important to look at in the food and nutrition group that pay for your food service Associates is very competitive but once again the manager pay legs the market particularly as we look at the private sector and you know that you compete with the private sector for your food and nutrition jobs and your custodians and your facilities and so forth so there's a theme Here the breadth of your of your Market a little bit more about areas of opportunity now these are the areas where there are some issues

107in the market we talked about registered nurses absolutely we talked about those maximum or higher rates for your other licensed professionals we mentioned that the pay for the school administrators is generally competitive but the rates for the elementary assistant Prince polls and High School principles are somewhat less competitive than the others sort of ranking 10th and eighth among the school divisions and since all of Memorial ranks one two and three and so many other jobs 10 10th and eight isn't the greatest result bus drivers you can't pick up a paper you can't turn on the radio and not hear a story about school divisions struggling to hire and keep bus drivers it's a national dilemma for sure in your Market your starting pay at this point for bus drivers legs the market by about nine

108percent or a dollar fifty per hour a dollar fifty may not sound like much but a nine percent leg in the market is huge in this labor market at this time it's just not sustainable ranking 12th among the 15 School divisions so there's other things that divisions are doing and I know Dan is going to also talk to you about a sort of a case study on bus drivers in a few minutes we looked at all of your other hourly jobs about 30 of them found seven jobs that we think are problematic and you notice many of them our are in your maintenance and labor trades jobs this is also issue Siegel fines all over the East Coast Southeast and really nationally in terms of being able to compete for skilled and licensed Carpenters electricians

109Foreman or four persons maintenance mechanics in the office support role there are a couple of jobs where you're lagging the market substantially executive assistance and area transportation supervisor I mentioned the food service manager before we looked at any number about 40 salaried professional and managerial positions as well and found six job jobs where the pay ranges lead the markets excuse me leg the market substantially several of those are an I.T which in today's highly technical World in a world of significant cyber security challenges facing the public sector this is probably not a great position to be in so we would have you look at web programmer analysts Technology support manager assistant director of Enterprise operations manager and assistant director of infrastructure and support and then also it's not an I.T job but your Fleet operations

110managers is a critical job of course in your Fleet operations area this chart just shows you quickly pictorially the registered nurse situation where Albemarle for so many of those other charts was way over to the right for this one you're kind of way over to the left and Charlottesville is is above you in that regard this is a chart showing you quickly uh the starting pay for the bus drivers what it looks like we talked about that Dan will talk more about that in a minute and then there are some other jobs that we just listed as being below Market that are on these next charts and graphs auto equipment mechanic parts and services supervisor area supervisor notice a lot of these charts talk about being below Market at the midpoint the midpoint in a

111salary range is the middle value we looked at if you were below the market for the entry the midpoint and the maximum but we're giving you the midpoints here when we work with you on developing new salary structures we sort of focus on making sure those midpoints are competitive and then we develop starting rates and maximum rates that are competitive as well in facilities and maintenance here are some of the jobs mentioned before some of the skilled trades where the mark the market is definitely gaining ground over you in some cases such as Carpenter quite significantly General Foreman HVAC mechanic and again we see this as an issue and many of our clients public private sector it doesn't matter it's just the stat a state of the labor economy right now here are the office

112support positions there's a variation here between about five percent below market up to 10 9 26 so again there's a variety there here are the I.T positions I think there's a couple slides of these again just sometimes a picture is worth a thousand words jobs where there is quite a variation or a leg between your pay ranges in the Market at this time now um in terms of the employee benefits picture the total compensation I mentioned there are just a few areas that we would would say you might want to focus a bit on a paid leave for 10 month employees is lower than most of your peers your personal days program or accrual rate is a two days versus three to five which is kind of the average a trend Siegel is seeing is

113that employers are moving more toward kind of freedom of choice in the benefits world so they're adding more floating holidays personal days as opposed to regimented you must take these designated holidays off paid leave offerings for 12-month employees is also less generous here than the study average ranging from one to five days per year depending on the year of service you're talking about and all the details are in the report health benefits are an expensive benefit for any employer we're talking about medical and dental plans generally that the type of plans you have we found pretty similar to those offered by the other school divisions but your costs and the cost sharing Arrangements you have with the employees are notably more favorable here than the other divisions a couple specific results your employees pay anywhere

114between thirteen hundred to thirty six hundred dollars less per year out of their pocket for family coverage than the peer divisions that's a lot of money depending on the plan chosen now from your pocketbook standpoint your costs are also lower than the survey average by between 1 000 to 2300 again depending on the type of plan and the coverage tier and type of plan means whether you're talking about the high deductible plan and versus the PPO encouraged here is if you're talking about employee only coverage employee plus spouse family that's what's referred to as tier coverage tier our division of Siegel are not benefits experts although we have a benefits expert division but we know enough to know that one potential explanation for your cost being lower is differences in what we call plan design

115so we did take a look at the deductibles and the out-of-pocket expenses incurred by your employees throughout the year and we did find that your medical plans do have higher annual deductibles than many of the other divisions that may be explain why the premiums are lower there are many factors though we mentioned that can influence plan costs the size and composition of the population the funding the provider networks available so it's a complicated picture but this difference in costs was definitely notable retirement benefits there's just not a lot to say here you're pretty consistent with the other Virginia school divisions because nearly all of them participate in vrs and nearly all of them like you offer a non-contributory meaning you're not contribute money money as an employee employer savings plan so there's just not a

116lot of variation bottom line in our view in our professional opinion the school Albemarle County Public Schools does offer Market competitive pay and benefits and we believe in general you're well positioned to continue to recruit and retain highly qualified and talented Educators administrators and staff there are opportunities as we discuss though so I don't want to paint a completely Rosy picture we do suggest you consider those jobs where the difference between your pay and the market is substantial um we do think in terms of the benefits area there are a couple things you might want to consider offering if you want to be what we call an employer of choice and that's what I heard a lot of tonight you know you're really trying to attract the best and the brightest and a diverse group

117and all those wonderful things and that's that's consistent with our our term employer of choice and that means that you have to pay competitively and the benefits need to be pretty darn good too so in that regard you might want to consider a bit of additional paid time off for 10 month and 12-month employees you might also want to look at Paid Family Leave paid family leave now notice that we said that that isn't currently offered at any of the divisions but we can tell you from our practice across the country that if if anyone asks Siegel what's going on in the benefits world the biggest Trend we're seeing is the start of Paid Family Leave it's a a huge Trend it's responding to a social Zeitgeist if you will about the importance of Paid

118Family Leave it's it's really key in the benefits world and I don't think it's going to go away now that's just that's just our review so it's something that you might want to consider again if you're wanting to be that employer of choice you might want to talk to your benefits broker about your deductibles there it may not be possible to lower them without having to increase your premium substantially I would take a look at it if I were you and then consider possible employer contributions to your supplemental retirement plan the next slide is our seagulls rewards of work model and the only reason I flash this up here is because there are so many other aspects of work that people find rewarding or not rewarding pay I've been working in pay for over 30

119years I'm not going to tell you that pain benefits aren't important but we must as and any employer look at these other areas affiliation the culture the profession professionalism possibilities and in hearing you talk about your Gallup engagement survey and your your desire to do better exit interviews and stay interviews you're looking at those other things and we commend that that is wise for sure Siegel's next steps to to conclude with the project team that we are very much enjoying working with will continue to work with them to create both teachers and classified Pace structure recommendations that's in process our analytics team is crunching the numbers now and then provide cost plan estimates for three scenarios aligned with your compensation objectives and those are to the right it generally there's really two things we want

120to make sure happen that the pay is based both on Market you know competitiveness but also aligns with your internal value work you do job evaluation you rank jobs in terms of difficulty and complexity we have to make sure that the pay ranges take care of and are respectful of both elements of value the other thing is that as we come back and bring cost estimates for implementation the expenses have to be manageable every client we have has a budget and it's it's usually a fixed amount so how do we spend that money in a way that is the most Equitable Equitable doesn't mean everybody gets the same pay increase but it means that the principles we use to make the recommendations are the same for everybody the the underlying principles if you will are

121applied equitably to to every individual in the plan so we will come back then with per employee implementation recommendations very specific in documents to assist you in transitioning to new pay schedules on whatever the planned implementation date and we're talking with Dan and the team about at what point do you want us to come back and we'll be ready when you're ready thank you so this is a good place for us to pause if there are questions or clarifying questions you saw a lot of data what's coming up next are some of the next steps but if we can clarify anything we'd like to do that [Music] let's do this hearing none trying to use my wait time from many years ago when I was a teacher we figure you're going to cover it in

122next steps you're there coming quickly I think there's a question back here yeah all right we'll go ahead um and talk about going forward so for immediate action um we just we reviewed a lot of data there's a lot of good news about the efforts that the board put into compensation over the last year and a half were competing well for many of the positions in our division but we just saw areas where we want to take action and improve our Market position the board reserved three million dollars in this year's budget for compensation adjustments during this fiscal year as we consider priorities here are some factors We Believe will guide that work that they include the percentage that a position might be below Market how much how far below a market whether there are

123vacancies in the position and what our fill rate and how long it takes to fill the position and the associated costs and how that fits into what is budgeted during this year Additionally the state allocated a one-time allocated funding for a one-time bonus for some employees and we want to add funds to provide that bonus for all employees so this these factors will help us guide our compensation strategy moving forward we do excuse me we do want to look at two case studies for consideration one case study would be bus drivers on this slide you can see our starting pay rate and that in that new market that puts us in 12th Place we currently have 117 incumbent bus drivers and we have 32 vacancies in the SQL report that showed the starting salary at

124Market at 18 dollars and two cents an hour so an annual cost to raise our bus drivers to that market and this includes benefits the employer's share of taxes all the other expenses would be a little more than four hundred fifty thousand dollars it's important to note that over the last week we heard that the city of Charlottesville has proposed raising driver pay starting pay to 21 an hour in order for us to match that for our drivers and this is just for our drivers not for some of the other Transportation positions that'll require some further analysis and work but that will cost the total cost would be just over a million dollars and that's spread over the year so that has to be factored to when during this year we would Implement such a

125change another case study would be School nurses starting rates for where we start a licensed practical nurse and a registered nurse you can see where we rank you saw that in the graphs for both 14th Place out of that market close to the bottom for an RN of our current School nurses eight carry the licensed practical nurse designation 18 are registered nurses we have two current vacant positions the starting salary at Market in the report for a licensed practical nurse twenty dollars and forty three cents an hour you saw in that for the LPNs we are within Market for the registered nurse though we're significantly below and the estimated cost on an annualized basis again including benefits employer share of taxes just under three hundred thousand some other positions that we heard about this is

126not an exhaustive list there are many more to look at but our electricians we have two incumbents and two vacant positions we saw them 21 Below Market you can see costs again annualized including the benefits General Foreman includes the carpenter our HVAC positions that is one that takes us a long time to fill when it's vacant and then some of those positions in the department of Technology are ranging from five to thirteen percent below Market so on November 10th we'll come back we want to provide this information for your consideration and your reflection our next step is to work with some employee groups get some feedback there's a lot of data to digest in there but when we come back in November we will be ready to ask the board or recommend action to the

127board to take related to immediate adjustments after that we're going to be heading into fiscal year 2024 budget development so we will focus closely on the compensation related part of that I believe is OAS shared that Siegel's providing cost estimates related to some of those Market strategies and that's going to be based on the position we want to take in the market where do we where do we see ourselves within that new adjusted market and then any other structural changes to our pay scales will bring you data related to potent those potential changes and also budget initiatives related to recruiting and retention for positions that are hard for us to fill and you can see our definition up there related to the number of applicants we're seeing time to fill and some of the trends

128out there and with that we open it for questions and discussion hey Dan can I ask you just a quick question for clarification so if you go back to the bus drivers so basically just to clarify for me because I'm sometimes don't understand but so basically the estimated cost to match Charlottesville the annual cost is a million dollars so that means that like if it started the beginning of November you would take 20 off of that because it's two months out of the Year already gone right it would be whatever percentage of the school year has passed we would remove from that okay so really it's more in the ballpark of 800k for this year and the reason you're providing annualized cost is because this the money we would be using to do this is

129money from FY 22 savings so therefore the board will have to build in the annual cost in their FY 24 Budget moving forward so it's one point of data to say if you if you do the pay increase for this year you're going to need to build a million in going into next year's budget but for this current year the one-time money that we have set aside it would be about 80 percent of this if it started at the beginning of November that that is correct so that that would be an ongoing annual budget cost that has to be planned for but it's going to be prorated based on when in the year it's implemented and Dan this is assuming full employment so this would cover the actually recruiting the 32 open spots for bus

130drivers I think it's based on I believe this is covering the 117 in combat right but if what if we recruit 32 more people that that cost will be adjusted yeah okay I'd like to see that number next time yes when is charlottesville's proposed starting pay rate or there I mean when are they going to take action on that you know don't have that date we can get to I we believe I've seen the article I would need to get back to on when it's going into effect I think reason that we would need to wait till November 1st to or November 10th to do anything November 10th gives us time to gather some of that feedback and be able to share it um that's what feedback are we looking for this was pretty scary

131I mean our intent was to move forward and share with employee groups but I would defer to the board as to the timeline for action are we primarily looking at starting salaries because we have you know some of our our pay grades that our pay ranges that are low on the high end as well is there a thought in that that's great expanding it across the different levels that's a great question I'm actually trying to get to this chart is maybe one of the better examples of how the compensation study really is comparing at the entry level midpoint and maximum so three different points in the pay range for each job so you see the full range up here this is for the other licensed professionals but we we look at those three data points

132the minimum that midpoint of the salary range and the maximum and that's what those percentage differences are based on I think that that it was said earlier that we were at 1.2 percent in some categories right around the five-year point where the the the the numbers for raises were 1.4 and I I thought about three or four years ago we changed the pay scale so it was basically an upward moving line that so that everybody who if there was a four percent increase everybody within that uh whether it's teachers or staff got the four percent so it's kind of a straight line is is what could cause uh what Miss Oilers was talking about uh to have that difference in that we might not have been giving as high a increase and that would cause

133us to fall behind yeah so if their steps have that even that incremental difference and you can see in this chart the dotted line the each step is slightly larger than our steps so you see where it crosses and we never cross back over it there are steps do pass us at a point in both or in all of uh bachelor's Masters and doctoral aims so it's yeah so it's two things one is so we did straighten out the scale so that when we did pay increases we were using four anchor points and we went to two and what you said is accurate uh Mr alcara that what we did was straighten it out so that when a teacher regardless of where they were on that scale would get the same raise because the way

134it was being applied was it was Market looking at the where we stood in the market on each one of those anchor points and said oh well we said four percent overall but you're going to get one percent because in your Market at 10 years experience you're not that far off the market so we straightened that out so everybody's the same and then the other piece that is causing this Gap is that there's a there's a step Factor factored in for each year of employment that that goes into the pay increase for a teacher and we use 1.2 percent difference for each year and apparently Charlottesville uses 1.4 percent so as as Dan said as you go along it stretches and stretches until you see the Gap develop and that's where they're getting ahead of

135us so like a strategy could be saying well we're going to go to a 1.4 in between our our steps and then you figure out the cost of that and then this is an assumption I have which is that if to say it would cost a million dollars coming back to the bus drivers that takes it does that take into account the address the adjustments up to deal with compression or is that just starting pay so that's just starting I'm looking at Rosalind it's oh that that's based on their current pay so we actually calculated that we put the formula into effect to calculate for those 117 incumbents okay so that's why it's the the price tag that it is then it's so it does factor in all the employees that are currently employed their

136their pay will also go up in addition to the starting pay correct yes okay and that's not too is that to adjust for compression then is that that's what's happening that would prevent compression among bus drivers however it's important to note that the study found other positions in transportation that we then have to go back and look at okay I have a few comments as well um one I want to commend uh Siegel for doing the compensation study I will own that I was one of the ones who was upset that we were doing another compensation study because I've seen us go through a few iterations I appreciated that uh this included a Market Basket that had aspirational comparable including geographically uh close ones that we're actually competing with in public sector so it was

137kind of nice to have all of that in one study so I wanted to say thank you for that so my big one is kind of just the process moving forward timing for the bus drivers that's a critical shortage that's affecting our students today and so when we say we're coming back November 10th with recommendations I guess I'm just I'm curious so like what um what's going to be included in the recommendations is that it could include the non-monetary what did you call them work rewards of work model like Paid Family lead it's going to include that kind of stuff is it going to be concrete like we need to give our bus drivers this amount of raise and then I second Ellen's statement which is I feel like the bus drivers which we know

138our kids are not getting um adequate bus service right now and we need to make a change there I feel like that could happen sooner like today yeah so I know damned wasn't saying it but the short answer is that you it's just our board's protocol to perceive information and next time vote but there's nothing keeping you and there's nothing stopping that and I take pause though because we are receiving this for information but the way it's kind of being read is it's information and then November 10th is going to be more information about what recommendations to do which then we're going to process and decide so I guess um I would just be curious how the board is feeling about bus drivers in particular um and where do we go with those and then

139I I this is on the um rewards for of work model um I am interested in recommendations on that because I feel like that's something that in the past I personally have struggled with some of our decision making like when we shortened our school year to boost teacher morale in the short term I feel like that is a declining return in terms of teacher satisfaction that could have been um better repeated by offering them more personal leap days so that they just know that now I get five personal leave days I can take the time as I see fit versus something that you kind of forget and then it becomes just baked in okay it's a shorter school year I don't think that's why they're making a decision where to work so I'm very curious

140about those kind of non-monetary pieces that can improve worker morale um personally being a big one that I personally am interested in and then bus drivers and and are critical shortages and Mr Floyd I see you I know nurses are important too and I do um anticipate having those discussions as well but in that I just some of them seem the bus driver seems like it needs to be now so in terms of uh a lot of what you discussed related to the rewards of work Model A little bit later tonight you're going to hear about the employee voice and action committee which is one of the ways that we can bring a lot of that related to affiliation culture professions all of those domains within the rewards of work forward we're also as we've

141brought on board the program manager for retention and Dei that is going to be a good bit of her work too as she's working with focus groups of employees around both what they love about their job and what they're struggling with or what are barriers for them and how we systematically start addressing what we're hearing from our employees so I think those leverage a lot of what's in there around the organizational culture pieces of the rewards work so what do you anticipate we could do about our bus drivers in a more expedient fashion certainly uh defer but the board can act uh maybe you should make a motion Katrina okay before there was a motion yeah are you seeing this is a rounded off figure eight hundred thousand would take us through this year bringing

142them up to where we think Charlottesville is going to be right and one million would be taking them over or what time span compared to that well you what you'd be doing is committing to one million dollars in your operating budget for fiscal year 24. right and we'd be using our three million set aside to get us through the uh this current fiscal year that's right and so you it's so you've got three you've got three million dollars you set aside to do a one thousand dollar one-time bonus that's partially funded from Virginia will cost about a million and a half so that's to do that okay I think the other are you from single too no you want to hear me talk no no no no oh okay please make a motion can we

143have comments from all of the school board members before we get there yeah okay do you want to start off so Jonah what's next no they're quite a surprise in terms of acting on it tonight I understand the needs of students I also understand that the sooner we get money the sooner we can hopefully hire hopefully hire people and the training is going to take three months you know somewhere in that in that two to three months for the new drivers that this would be impacting probably January and so um make a motion I think that I would be more inclined to do what we call Two by twos and get a little bit more information about it so that we could act on it in two weeks at the beginning of our work session

144and um so that it's not I'm not debating the numbers that are being put up here in the least but I think that if that we don't need a sudden move if we could do something as we know called two by twos and be prepared to come in and make a motion in the beginning of the meeting on the 27th 27th 27th that would be my thought okay um I had some clarifying questions um about the bus drivers and this might be Roslyn an issue a question for you so we have training is nearly complete for three new drivers a new evening training class started with an additional four trainees so does that count toward our vacancies or are we are we still sitting at 32 after that I'm sorry oh Roslyn oh 32 32

145is our current vacancies they do not factor in current trainees um but I will just while we are optimistic about our training class just one example we started with four we're down to three right and so there's not um it's not it's not the solution and also um as we've been following these Transportation updates um are these the TR so training is nearly complete for three new drivers are those the three of the four drivers who are going to start October 3rd from the past I was previously going to stop October 3rd I think the new one is October 21st but that's the same for it's down to three now okay yeah okay well I think even without emotion tonight I think there's General agreement that we're going to do something to raise salaries a

146b um we certainly need whatever uh salary increase we decided one can be made retroactively if we want to do that um uh I I think conceptually I mean I'm not dodging the transportation I'd be happy to go to it next time right at the beginning but um I I think when we ask for the the compensation report we're looking at two items we'll be looking is this the correct Market Basket I'm much happier with this Market Basket thank you Miss oils and I I think I feel better about this comparison group the other element though that we're going to talk about was the scale our own Market Basket we agreed that we would Peg our compensation in at 75 percent which I thought why are we immediately giving ourselves a d but I'm happy

147that many of the results showed our division will be you know toward the top um uh so I think right now we're talking we're not talking about what is the optimum salary we're talking about how can we just get ahead of Charlottesville and maybe that's right maybe that's at the top of the scale but this installation at least conceptually what is our Target in terms of the Market Basket because that's a two-piece dance that we've always done right um and you know I like I like the data that shows us at the top of many but I don't like the data that shows us you know in the bottom but you know bus drivers or registered nurses and a lot of our our trade professions so I I think it would be definitely thought that

148raising this hour as a bus drivers tonight would solve the bus driving problem you know I I would be 100 for that but how much should we raise it and we could just he is discussing the meeting he's uh refrain from making comments or he will be escorted from the meeting but so so that's just my two cents just conceptually how we got here and where do we want to be instead of rushing to stop Gap things well it seems to me it seems to me that we knew that we had some deficiencies which is why we had to set aside now that we have identified the deficiencies this one is really glaring and I know there are others as well and all of our employees are valuable but we've been hit really hard with

149the bus driver thing which is why I was just thinking we could go ahead and prioritize this one and then work out the others I I would just I would want to add on as well um Kate I think I'm just on the other side of the coin I also conceptually am struggling because I don't think that we're rushing into this decision I'm actually kind of come a little bit confused by the process because I feel like we identified a shortage our need we implemented a study we're here today getting information that's highlighting that it's a continued need I did not see a concrete recommendation in regards to that but that is an outstanding question I have is when we come back in a month it's a given as we all said that we plan

150on increasing the salaries I'm assuming it's going to be part of the recommendation and I guess I'm just curious why this what what is the benefit of waiting because I do think it will make a benefit there will be a benefit because whoever is applying for a bus driver to be a bus driver right now is going to be applying in Charlotte's Bill I'm always persuadable miss Carlson so if it's no if we know that it's going to be part of the recommendation that we get in a month if we know we want to approve the recommendation and boost their pay we know it's a needed component of our operational an operational need we have right now and it would it might not make a difference but it certainly is better than doing nothing at

151this point because maybe we will get more applicants um other than I would appreciate if we could get I'm presuming we know a general idea of what that recommendation is going to be and if we could just get that right now for at least those ones Mr Floyd I'm sorry that I'm looking at you because I know we've talked about nurses but for the bus drivers all the nurses here but for the bus drivers if we could act tonight um if we have the recommendation I would like to do that okay Mr oberg my concern is is you know I I hear that Katrina and I agree with you because I this issue is not going to go away and it could get worse but I also understand what workout is coming from but you

152know look let's let's see exactly what we're going to do and how we're gonna do it I don't know that two weeks is going to make a substantive difference and I hate the idea of building a plane while in playing and that kind of feels like what we're doing so I would I would I agree with John I think we should have something on the calendar for for two weeks from now that we can consider and vote on so moving up from November 10th that was the current we're going to come back November 10th with recommendations I'm sorry Katrina I couldn't hear you I'm assuming right so you were saying to have something on the docket related to this on uh October the 27th correct yes okay okay so I will just go ahead and

153make a motion because transportation is near and dear to my heart and I've seen so many parents and students struggling with it and teachers and I feel like it trickles down and has an effect on literally our whole school system and how it operates so I'll make a motion if I lose that's fine because someone who is on The Winning Side can just bring it up again [Music] um in two weeks when we discuss it uh but before I do that do we have the recommendation of what we were gonna what were you guys gonna tell us about um bus drivers do we want to match Charlottesville I move that we matched the salary of Charlottesville pending the now match the um salary of Charlottesville bus drivers second Katrina I hate to be this way

154but why would we match them and not exceed them by a small map Price is Right baby plus one no uh that's a good question um because I want to hear the recommendation if we need to raise it a little bit more we can but at the very least I want to know that when people are applying today they feel um adequate applying to either us or to Charlottesville so that's what I would like to go with um and that's my motion the motion is to get a recommendation nope motion is to match match sure let's fills bus driver salaries it's been moved by Ms Carlson second by Ms Osborne that we met Charlottesville starting or proposed bus driver's increase 21 per hour yeah 21 for that you've heard the motion we are ready for

155as there any discussion on the motion it is again that we would be raising our salary to twenty one dollars and that would be effective win Katrina tomorrow um I would yield to the recommendation of the Human Resources Department I don't feel comfortable making a decision about how quickly they can Implement a raise I would just want it to be raised to 21 an hour this is again operating on the assumption that this is literally going to be the recommendation that you're going to propose in two weeks or four weeks so um I would rather do it now I I that's not what I'm hearing I mean I don't I I maybe I'm missing that but that's not what I'm hearing that I don't have an anticipated recommendation at this time I don't maybe I've

156missed that yeah they didn't actually make you know another part of why uh I I would rather do it as as we normally do it when when we have a new topic and we wait until the next meeting because we also tend to get a lot of input uh by email and from constituents in other manners and that's the reason that we really have always done it that way and and you know I'll I'll vote no because of that and the odds are very hard but vote Yes in a couple weeks yeah I I will both know if it's voted tonight but I fully anticipate in two weeks to look at it and consider it I would vote Yes I just I I I I I I don't want to I don't want to to

157do this recklessly I want to considered the way we do it all the time okay we have a motion on the floor and if there is no other discussion actually related to the actual motion um Miss Thompson could you please call the role my apologies chair Graham do we have a second on that motion yes it was muba Ms Carlson second by Ms Osborne thank you Dr Acuff I would not know uh I understand your confusion I mean your thoughts but please no comments from the public Mr alcaro no Miss Carlson yes Miss Lee no Mr oberg no Miss Osborne yes chair page yes with a vote of four threes motion fails to carry okay so the motion does not care about a voter four to three I would like to then let the loser

158speak first um if we could officially move the recommendation up from November 10th to the next meeting I would appreciate that [Music] so is that board consensus that you would have the recommendation coming to us on October the 27th rather than November 10th for action for Action right yeah yeah okay are there any other comments questions was that the end of the presentation Mr redder yes that was the end uh we were on questions and discussion okay so any other questions about the recommendations for the other positions be made are we asking to move all of that up to the 20 to the 27th yes yes all of it so double duty Mr Redding fair enough it would be very nice to have the recommendation that we could take action sooner I know we're and

159I would like to ask my colleagues to think about you know where we want to be on that salary range you know as a general policy I think we have a ways to go and some of them I'd like a little Clarity to around the thousand dollar bonus I always um wonder when things I just want to tie that to worker morale because when I hear there's such a there's such a difference between salary so like at a thousand dollar bonus for a teaching assistant is much different than administrator and I just want to make sure we're having the most impact possible with their bonus um and how so if you could have some more clarity around that when we come back with recommendations absolutely and I think we need to look at the numbers

160for that too for the purposes of the board because doing a thousand dollars uh for 2600 people is 2.6 million dollars doing a million dollars for the bus drivers and we're six hundred thousand dollars over the money that was set aside to make adjustments and so you know we still need to talk nurses we still need to talk a lot of other things so you know I mean how no pressure here Mister Dan you know but a lot uh we're gonna need to find out a lot no pressure but lots of pressure so I just want to point out that with that one thousand dollar bonus some of that money is provided by the state but the state is covering some positions not all so we would supplement it so that all positions are covered

161those that are not included in the state's budget great okay any other discussion on the compensation study if not we'll take a 10-minute break already so we will come back to order okay our next item uh the employee voice and decision making led by Dr Kaza I know you all are familiar with who we are but for the public I'll go ahead and reintroduce ourselves again uh um good evening board members I'm Clara advisor assistant superintendent today we are here with a member of our invoice employee voice steering team to update the board on the process developed by the steering team to implement a committee that allows for employee voice in decision making [Music] our purpose tonight is really to update to update the board on the plan for implementation of what we are now

162calling the employee voice and action committee since the board's Motion in May a group of employees has worked to create a process to give staff a resident voice in the operations of Albemarle County public schools in August we had two people come and present to you Lori Beck and Derek Frazier we have Mr Frazier back with us tonight he's a Spanish teacher at Monticello High School to update you on the current plan Ms Beck was hoping to be with us as well again but she is unfortunately under the weather tonight what Mr Frazier is going to do is he's going to share with you the overarching proposal for a committee to allow for that voice the board asked that we come back with a develop plan and that's what we are hoping that you are

163will hear our hope is that by the by the time that we get through this and answer any questions that you have that you all will feel confident that we can go on and move forward and move from the steering team worked in the development to the beginning of the implementation we do recognize that as we Implement what we what we what we have put forth in this plan is something that we feel is a good starting point we also know that as you develop things and and as you live things there are always opportunities for and room for growth and Improvement but we do feel like we have a strong Foundation at this point with each of the steering team meetings we have begun with a conversation around how the Strategic plan is the

164umbrella for all of the work that we do and then in the creation of the employee voice and decision making team that all of the work of that must align with the vision mission values and goals of the School Division and we recognize that in order to meet the three strategic goals that our Workforce needs to have voice to ensure that they are able to perform at their best and in support of students you have heard tonight about the challenges of hiring and being able to retain our employ our employees also a key premise of goal three to attract develop and retain the highest quality staff begins with us hearing from our employees and working to make sure that Albemarle County Public Schools is the best possible workplace for them our steering team has worked

165over a number of months now to develop a plan that we feel is a strong first step in the implementation of the employee voice and action committee tonight you will hear about some of the highlights of the plan and I will I will be honest the steering team really wrestled with many of the topics that you'll hear about and while it may not yet be perfect we do feel we are at the point where we can move forward and move from development into implementation and with that I am going to invite up Mr Frazier to provide an overview all right uh thank you and uh hello again um and uh thank you to the members of the board for um allowing me the opportunity to share with you the work of the Searing team um

166I'm Derek Frazier and I teach at Monticello High School um since we last presented to the steering team has met uh three more times in an effort to finalize the process of taking the concept of the employee voice into an actionable plan on the next sorry about that um in the um past few weeks we've collected data over the two Zoom meetings and conducted a survey of the members involved in the steering team those who have participated in the process up to this point with our conversations and data from the survey we've come to several resolutions as this employee group continues to roll on it will operate under the direction of Human Resources we think this will accomplish a few things that will provide ownership for the employees it honors the confidentiality the the team

167is insisted on as the representatives will be selected from schools and departments there will be a level of trust among the representatives and those they would represent ultimately it would provide more flexibility for the Evac team that will be necessary for it as we move forward uh we intend to make the committee a group of diverse employees this would be covering uh different and various roles and responsibilities among the Departments and expertise it will intend to be a group that is demographically representative of our staff as a whole Additionally the aea will select two members to serve on the committee and finally it's important we feel is very important for the Evac we feel it's very important to the Evac team that the school board be well informed on the team's work and progress as

168such up to two board members will be invited to attend the meetings they will be attending but not voting members stay okay so in regards to the structure of the meetings we saw it best for a few things monthly meetings and independent moderator to be hired in between meetings employees will submit agenda items to their representatives but this process is still being discussed the steering team was fairly aligned with what the agenda should and should not be the list that you're looking at are samples of what the committee could discuss these are county-wide issues that affect the various schools and departments these topics are not individual grievances nor school specific issues rather their concerns for all the county in other words if an issue if there's an issue that would require the attention of the

169superintendent or the school board the committee would meet on it if the issue would go to the school's admin then it would not make it to the agenda um it's important for us to keep data and research in order for making decisions transparency is additionally important we'll make every effort to capture and present the efforts of the Evac team to all members of the acps community um uh with that in mind a website will be developed and utilized to capture the Evac minutes outcomes and other relevant information so now I'm going to turn it back over to Dan reading who will provide more details pertaining to the website and our next steps and then I'll be happy to take any questions that I can answer foreign so the transparency and the accountability are a theme

170throughout this the communication with the school board and the board's awareness of the topics of discussion and the feedback provided by the members of the ebac Evac is key and critical as we shared two board members are invited to each meeting to be listening in and participate in the discussion meeting summaries go on to the consent agenda so that the board is well aware of what feedback the committee is providing especially as it pertains to policy revisions and other initiatives and decisions that the board will be making those will be reviewed and considered prior to those decisions the place we'd like to get to is when a policy comes forward to the school board for revision it is also accompanied by the equity checklist we would also like to be in a place where those

171things would come with feedback from the Evac and the board would be asking the question what did the employee group say about this where is their input those recommendations if their recommendations around operational decisions those are going to the superintendent and the cabinet that information those summaries and other information about the topics and issues that the Evac is discussing will go on to a web page set up either on our new SharePoint site or something similar to division Compass when the meeting has completed and that summary is finalized notification can go out to all employees who can go to that site and see Evac met they discussed the policy on let's say student discipline and they provided the following feedback and input related to the upcoming revision so that web page will go into development

172and that site and process will go into development very quickly after the Evac establishes itself next steps communicating the Evac the process to the executive leadership team so that they're aware of their responsibility to inform employees in schools and departments about the Evac and how they can put their name forward for a place on the committee information goes out to all School Division employees through compass and through other means that we communicate with our employees to make sure they are aware of how they can come forward to be part of this team you heard a little bit about an independent moderator so we'll find that individual who will guide us through our first year of work and as the team is formed and comes together that first meeting is going to be organizational and will

173rely on some training around the process we'll use so that every voice is heard in the meeting and that we're coming to consensus to the extent possible around decisions Evac Representatives will then be selected and will launch that organizational meeting that is our proposal we're open for questions and discussion uh just one one quick question initially maybe I didn't see it uh here how many members are there going to be is it 23 or is it 35 or is it another number it's most likely going to come in somewhere around 50 members so remember there's one from each school and then one from each department where it's very important to us that the committee be representative demographically positions and responsibilities and if the people that are coming forward through the process for schools and departments

174if we see there are voices that are not on the table then are at the table I'm sorry then we want to be sure that they are having that having the opportunity to be there at the table so we will solicit additional Representatives additionally it would be the aea providing a teacher and a classified staff member so that we are estimating that will come out to about 50. thank you I guess I'm I'm questioning whether that would always meet as a committee as a whole or would it be broken up into subcommittees or I mean that's a lot of people for anybody to get a voice in I mean maybe it's not but it sounds like a lot it's like the the committee did wrestle with that issue around what is the right size major

175themes in the discussion that the steering team were around representation and ensuring we do have voices we've got to make sure there's representatives from each level representatives from our feeder patterns from our more diverse and less affluent schools as well as our most affluent schools we do see times that the group may break up into smaller working groups depending on the topic if the committee is tackling say the homework policy that's going to be extremely relevant to teachers on the committee but potentially less relevant to drivers nurses edep may want to weigh in or not depending so we'll we'll tailor some of that work depending on the topic foreign about this line that's on a different side um under School Board participation it says recommendations must be reviewed and considered prior to related decisions being

176made is that part of the meeting summaries being on the consent agenda or is it there going to be more representation of that those those would be the summaries being on the consent agenda so that the board is aware of what the the committee is providing is that all for you too to you I mean you know if you're a mid-thought um for the financial impact which I'm assuming there's going to be some because there's going to be a mod independent moderator website development um the teachers are going to be meeting during non-student time but so that I guess maybe isn't one but is that all going to be ready for the next it's going to be included in this upcoming budget we're gonna have Clarity around that we would see that coming in the

177next budget proposal and a lot of that time uh will be during employees current paid time for those who are not of course we would pay them so what is the measure of success how will we know if this is a success I think what becomes institutionalized when that importance of employee feedback coming to the board as decisions are made that it is part of the policy that comes to the board for revision the employee feedback is there with the equity checklist with other materials so that you have in front of you here's what the employees are saying about this change as we institutionalize those processes of feedback into budget development and other regular decisions that are big decisions the board is making that that is the biggest measure of success I think trickle-down measures

178that we might be able to quantify would be in our engagement survey seeing the indicator around having a voice and decisions that are made increase that would be a quantifiable measure the other thing I think I I either heard you say or I heard Dr Kaiser say it was a measure for Success will be when a board member says like during the presentation or earlier a board member says you know what did the evacc think about this so as you said it becomes institutionalized and part of the way we do things and that would apply to me too saying what did what did the evacc say about this so I'm understanding I believe we had a someone who did public comment that said there was no quantitative accountability as part of the structure so this

179page is kind of the key page here this is so if we anticipate this in a year we're gonna have a process whereby when we make a decision that affects a teacher we get a report included that's from Evac talking about what their recommendation is okay yeah I guess that's yeah because there are any other questions or discussions or board members I mean I guess piggybacking on to what you said Katrina I wonder if there would be a more active part of that if that would ever be like a recommendation that's presented to us I know that I I don't know I mean yeah that's what it's kind of missing is the the presentation of something but it's almost like they're getting more in some sense because they'd be getting to give a voice on

180all all decisions presumably that are going to affect them by having the report but it's almost like they could also but I the whole thing is I this is presented from the employee so this is what they've decided they they want I guess I'm but I kind of feels like it's missing a report out to us but I don't know I think the proof is going to be in the pudding once the recommendations are reviewed and approved and if that's done to a satisfactory level then then it can be real positive yeah if I could just jump in one of the conversations that we had was exactly how does it how does it kind of have some teeth how do we make sure that that you all really do understand where the the pick the

181topic where you know where the group stands on it after they've gotten feedback from their the their constituents and um the the reason why it was proposed that we put it on the consent agenda was because we do know that that is something that the board does read is aware of and votes on at each meeting and so there we felt that that gave it a little bit of teeth that way that said you know we we definitely can come and do presentations like this and you know we you know we we anticipate that within the one of the things that the group talked about was they um a little kind of a flattened hierarchy within the group so but that said we will also have some people that will kind of emerge to help

182with agendas and things like that and if it's the board if it is the board's desire or the group's desire very honestly to to come in and present something out if there's a a topic you know I think that we could definitely do that the the one thing that I think is really important is we we in things that we've heard from the beginning all the way through is um we want to make sure that we are um uh being proactive in things so sometimes we we hear from people when a decision has been made and they haven't been able to have input on the front end of it and so those are the things that we want to make sure that we we are really kind of going after uh so you know going

183back to what's a measure of success I think if we find that we are able to get on the front end of things obviously there are decisions that are made all the time around any number of topics and uh you know we I I do think that this is something that will gain momentum as we as the the group comes together works together uh is trained and and we kind of figure out all the nuances you know we've got in the document of the process we've got a kind of a proposed what the what a meeting would look like but that's going to morph and develop as as we get there so and I would say the same thing about the the topics that we're talking about and so you know it is something that

184I think that hearing from our employees I think is incredibly important and I think that you know if the board feels that it would be better to present what the the group's recommendations are we we can gladly do that we can do it as an and with the consent agenda as well one thing I think is important I see that two board members are invited um I think it's essential that we show up when we're invited too so absolutely and I will say from the beginning the in a couple of the things that we heard loud and clear from the employee voice committee uh from the steering team committee I'm trying to decide distinguish between the two from the steering team is the fact that the really felt important that it was important that the

185board engage in this work and in hearing them and I do think to your point I think the board members being there is a critical piece of this um and obviously uh you don't have to just be there we would hope that you would engage in the conversation as well yeah how does this so I understand it um work with the aea as well so they like the teacher has the ability I guess to we're still meeting with aea regularly so there's almost like there's two avenues for them this is more General sure there are actually a couple of different Avenues obviously uh we will continue we have our monthly aea exchange meetings we will continue to meet with them outside of this but we also obviously felt like it was very important for them

186to have very intentional representation on the committee there may be other people on the committee who are aea members but we definitely want the aea to identify a couple of people to be on the committee the other thing is we have some other avenues as well we have our teacher advisory employee classified employee advisory those types of things and so you know we've actually had the question how are they different and very honestly there are it's multiple Avenues to be heard I think that when I think about some of the teacher advisory things that we've done at least in the past we hear both proactive discussions and reactive discussions and so I actually think that we can hear things from different places and that's one of the ways that it gets also into the um

187to the into the employee voice the thing that that I think is different about the the way that the evaac is set up is that it's intended that the group will solicit feedback from all of their constituents so we have a conversation they go back they they help people learn they get feedback they we we we really want to shift from opinion based thoughts and decisions to fact-based ones and I think that's going to be a really important piece I think it's going to be a great learning opportunity and a great feedback back opportunity from across the entire division not just a small group of people that are meeting in different venues um what was the thinking around inviting to board members to each meeting instead of having two board members who serve on that

188so that that's a that's actually something that you know if the board would like to to discuss it and way in on we are open to that we did wrestle with what type of committee this should be um we know that we with uh to the what you just described is and we could really look at this as a board advisory committee um we also talked about it as a superintendent's advisory committee and because of some um conversations very honestly from and desires of the team we that's why we kind of came into the middle with kind of it being a focus group out of uh the human resources department the one of the things that we heard loud and clear from the team members was the desire for confidentiality and one of the things

189that we know is as a board Advisory Group that that is a basically a public meeting and that was some of the uh concern there that said it could be that I do you know going back to what is a measure of success I think one of the things that we will start to hear if if we see a measure of success we would hear that trust exists so that might be something that down the road may not be the the confidentiality piece may not be an issue but I think that initially it is something that was a very much a concern of the board I'm sorry not at the board of the uh of the steering team any other questions from board members um yeah and I may have missed this in part of

190this presentation but so the representation of staff and then representation from the school board and then what is the representation from like the superintendent's office like who all is yeah and I can't remember what pages is it's in the document it's about page two or three three or four it's one of the earlier sections um it's as far as the kind of the non-voting members it's the school boards invited obviously the moderator who we hire would be a non-voting member and then the superintendent or designee and the Executive Director of Human Resources is that it okay thank you Dr Kaza and Mr Redding hey thank you and Mr Frazier we will now move to the high school redesign and this will be introduced uh Mr Thomas good evening board members I know you're excited for

191our last piece of School Division business I think you're excited I'm excited uh I'd be excited if I could figure out how to get this off going whoops oh good gracious where'd it go all right thanks Patrick I just wanted Patrick to come up in front of you guys today episode okay I feel like it's a big snails yeah all right thank you all good evening Jay Thomas executive director of secondary education I'm excited to stand up here in front of you guys today and once again be able to talk about some components of high school redesign I do want to think we have five of our administrators from our high school representing our high schools here this evening with us as well so I want to thank them all for a long evening being

192with us so along with a couple of our colleagues like to present High School overview design we're going to talk specifically about freshman seminar and career learning communities and I think you'll very clearly see through the presentation that the commitment to the authentic Challenge and relevant learning experience for students and definitely getting to know each of our students just a quick reminder of the timeline we've been talking about high school redesign and several different components and several different names you can't hear me um over the the last number of years back in 2015 week called it High School 2020 to getting getting folks to gather teachers administrators central office staff talking about what schools can look like what can we do to enhance opportunities specifically for our students then in 2017 we had the fni

193study fni study they actually said let's move to a center model if you remember Atmore high school was just overcrowded and we were using actually closet to re-re-institute and have places for teachers just to go to make calls and do some work and and so we went to the the center model is what the board at the time voted on so we've implemented Center one since that time in a number of programs and these were the components of high school or are the components of high school redesign as we go through so I won't read everything on on the left to you as a reminder but facilities construction learning management system curriculum assessment instruction updates to the program of studies and the last component that we have to full we Implement is our career learning

194communities which we'll be implementing at the end of November we're really excited about that and what I put in front of you guys also is just a reminder of the logic map that we built several years ago to show what are we trying to accomplish what's short-term medium term what's our overarching outcomes that we're looking for we're excited that we're hitting many of those adjusting to the ones that we're not hitting and that the next time we present to you guys after this we will have all those components fully implemented it'll be a chance for us to come and give you an update on what's working what we need to tweak and where we are so we're really excited about that so freshman seminar is something we wanted to put back in front of you

195guys we've been doing for a couple years so I actually have a couple folks with us today I know Amber Roberts is here and I'm going to turn it over to Megan Maynard to present thank you good morning good evening actually members of the board I'm Megan Maynard I'm a lead coach for current technical education and I'm here to share with you a little bit about freshman seminar maybe if I can find the mouse there we go implementation of freshman seminar as a course is aligned to our strategic plan of affirming and empowering communities in goal two you'll hear tonight about how that supports the health and mental Wellness of our students The Freshman seminar course is aligned to the vdoe standards for social emotional learning and based on the castle framework which stands for

196collaborative for academic social and emotional learning Virginia defines social emotional learning as the process through which young people and adults acquire and apply the knowledge skills and attitude to develop healthy identities manage emotions and Achieve Personal and Collective goals feel and show empathy for others establish and maintain supportive relationships and maintain responsible and caring decisions the castle framework emphasizes the importance of a systemic approach in which an entire School Community commits to layering the social emotional learning throughout the students experience here you can see the mission of Albemarle County Public Schools seminar and specifically freshman seminar the goal is to transition into high school where students can find their voice develop positive relationships with their peers and a teacher mentor and begin to foster a sense of belonging to the school community [Music] here you

197can see a little bit about the format of the Freshman seminar which does meet for 90 minutes every other day and you can see the five components of freshman seminar which are related back to the castle framework groups of teachers began back in 2017 and 2018 to draft The Freshman seminar curriculum the year after that was piloting the curriculum and in the 1920 school year you can see that the Freshman seminar was continued to be implemented but we did transition into a hybrid check and connect with the focus on social emotional learning when we went to a virtual and hybrid learning in the high school coming back in person full time last year freshman seminar teachers further identified areas to improve the curriculum based on what they learned from the previous two years as well

198as their time in the virtual and hybrid times with students and we use that to update the curriculum over the summer we also improved a structure around academic advisory and that has been implemented this year this year is really our first our third full year of implementation as such we are planning formal feedback loops with stakeholders to include students families and of course staff for suggestions on our curriculum and programming we had invited a few of our teachers who have been instrumental to this program for many years to come and speak tonight but due to the late timing of this presentation and that they have to teach early in the morning tomorrow we ask them instead to switch and send us a brief video sharing sharing their voice so the power of their voice really

199speaks to the mission of seminar as well as our mission with Albemarle County Public Schools of thriving students thank you my name is Lori Rocco and I'm the seminar lead at Monticello High School I've been involved in the seminar program since its beginning I taught it for three years and have now been the coordinator at Monticello for two years it's an important program because social emotional learning is vital for our students we have lessons that help students understand their emotions how to manage their behaviors how to empathize with others and build relationships in their seminar community and how to mm-hmm [Music] yeah I feel like that could be a meme but make good we need better Broadband in this County voices one of my favorite parts of seminar is that we keep the sections the

200same year after year so the students travel together throughout High School this allows them to build strong bonds during their four years together when I taught freshman seminar the first thing I told them was I was going to be their go-to person I was going to help them navigate and survive high school that I'd be there for them no matter what that I was their school mom which meant yes I'd nag them about their grades for the next four years I was going to be them be there for them from freshman year until they walked across the stage at graduation and even afterward it's an amazing experience to spend four years with the same group of students to see how they evolve and mature seminar is definitely an important piece of the high school puzzle

201every single year we review the lessons and make changes where necessary in an effort to keep the lessons relevant and engaging we are constantly trying to improve the program I'd hate to see anything taken away from the program as I can feel the momentum continuing to build if anything we need to put more resources into seminars to make them a core part of every student's and teachers experience in high school hi my name is Abby Sprague and I am a freshman seminar teacher at Albemarle High School I started teaching at Albemarle in 2020 so I started all virtual that year I was given two or three freshman seminar classes and this is something that I had never heard of before but I knew that I would be good at because I love connecting with students

202and building relationships um obviously we know that this course is focused on social emotional learning study skills connecting with students community service but that year it really became a place where my students could kind of just come connect with each other connect with a teacher without having any expectations placed on them and I think that for those students and for me it was a really good place and a safe haven for them to come to and it became it became something that we hadn't planned on it being especially in that virtual setting but it truly fulfilled what the mission of freshman seminar is this is my first year teaching it in person and I am truly loving connecting with students students come all the time the more they get to know me with questions about

203other things going on at school how do I do this how do we do that um as they see that I am open to really any conversations and questions that they might have I feel kind of their walls coming down and they begin to trust not only me but their classmates that's what this is about connecting with each other connecting with their peers and adults knowing that they have people who are on their side and who are willing to help them through whatever they need in their transition to high school and Beyond so that's why I love this and that's why I'm so passionate about freshman seminar thank you hi my name is Linda fine and I've been part of the Freshman seminar program since it began five years ago as you know freshman seminar

204is about social emotional learning academic advisory or skill building it's about community service it's about relationships and if I had to choose one of those to talk about it was relationships but I can't talk about just one student because my memories of coal and helping him navigate his freshman year after being away at the Virtual School took longer than my 30 seconds and when I talked about Christo and how as a freshman he didn't know what elected to take and so everyone's signing up for one and I said well let's focus on what you want to do what your goals are and he chose photography and he's still a photographer and wants to study it next year when he goes off to college and I could go on and on about all the calls and

205all the Christos but then I'd be forgetting about the great work that we did for the United Way day of caring just a month ago where we took a hundred and 150 kids off campus to read to elementary school kids and to volunteer at the Crozet library and all the great things and how the kids got excited about their community service work or we could talk about the academic successes that our students are starting to have as they're learning the skills that they've lost because of covid and we are supplementing that in our academic advisory each week but I've already gone over my minute and a half please consider continuing with freshman seminar it's an amazing program there we go it's a little bit quicker this time my name is Laurie there all right um

206at this time we're happy to take any questions or feedback I remember when freshman seminar got started and and um in talking with teachers there were some challenges to it for them in that some of them weren't really into it some of them didn't really understand it and uh and so as a result the kids weren't getting as much out of it um you know how are you selecting teachers now because and and I want to just preface it by saying those three women were fabulous and you know and if you're building a Cadre of teachers who want to do it who get it and and can really bring it to life and all the value that it's supposed to bring that's great originally it was a rotation of teachers if I remember right you're

207all right and and so that was where I think it got into the challenges for some teachers you know and uh so are you kind of staying with the same group now and just building it out no so you're right John the original idea was as you're as you're building this out that each teacher over a span of four years would have one freshman seminar class but then they would be the mentor for that those students that small group of students sophomore junior senior year um and and yes those three people that are obviously very passionate about the Freshman seminars and others who are very passionate about it as well and others have had a little bit harder time that's why we've started the coordinator position as well so they could do some training and

208support the administrators that are here in the building and helping the the teachers understand the curriculum the power of of building those relationships with with the kids and what it looks like so that's the idea about that the reality is when the principles are scheduling sometimes as you heard like Abby say you know hey I was given two sections of seminar this year and then she did one or you heard Laurie talk I had it three years in a row and now I'm just the coordinator because then it gets harder and harder uh to follow those those kids in a small group together as you go through so the high schools because again I know kova was kind of the Sticky Wicket for everybody going through but we really turned that more into a check

209and connect during that virtual year with seminar um and it's kind of been a reset for the principals that they get back you know to uh to the normal school year and trying to re-establish those fundamentals of take a freshman year see it through your senior year next group comes in and does the same thing okay and it's not as easy as it sounds though to put together when you're building a master schedule to be quite honest yeah questions that don't need to be need to be but I will just say I do have questions about fresh freshman seminar and they weren't necessarily answered by this presentation I really liked the one we had on the Middle School advisory that we're starting where it really gets into the nitty-gritty of like the curriculum the goals

210what we're doing again just give one story which is that when I was a teacher we started an advisory and we were just given broad goals about what to do basically build relationships with your students I chose rubber duck theme and like my kids would work towards earning little rubber ducks another teacher did a whole lesson around what music you listen to and what messages you're getting and he picked the song and they picked the part the lyrics about how they're actually pretty degrading to women another teacher used that same song to do a dance routine with all his students like a coordinated dance routine so all that to say I think as a board we've heard quite a bit of feedback about freshman seminar and it's not been the positive things that we're hearing

211and so um even though I'm not saying it's not a positive experience but those are the kind of questions like I'm just that's what I'm more curious about because I believe I believe everyone who spoke today that it's it's incredibly impactful and meaningful for them but I'm more curious about just the broad level do we have an established curriculum um how do we decide on that how are the teachers trained in it and that can be later off yeah and I can we can share all that with you actually Amber's been very instrumental in helping reset and also align our our uh our standards to the vdoe SEO standards um so that that's overlay this year it's the first year we've overlaid those so you can see the correlation between us so we can send

212you that whole curriculum and as she said earlier Megan said earlier we're going to be resetting with some surveys and feedback from our staff and our parents and our teachers this year throughout our freshman seminar get some feedback on what's working as we've reestablished coming back from covet so hopefully that'll answer your questions we can get you some of that information foreign interested to know what measures of success there are like what that will look like okay I had a question hi I'm Brisa I feel like I should introduce myself student rep um okay so maybe I'm just getting the student perspective here so I feel like that's kind of what I care about like what student input did you get if any because I feel like I'm not getting the same type of energy

213that I saw in this video like here I see it as like this wonderful thing of like oh my gosh it's gonna help me throughout my four years of high school but it's like I don't think I've ever heard of a student say that like well and that's that's how right I mean so that's how it should be so then we need to figure out what do we need to do to help support our teachers to make make that happen right so social emotional skills as we we read through castle and these standards will tell you that it's best when it's Blended through all of your courses and curriculum but if we have a hard time as Educators just doing it in a set class then we've got to continue to do some professional training

214for our staff to get them there so not only can they do in freshman seminar but they can do it in their math class in their science class and their social studies class to build relationships to make make the the content that the teacher is so passionate about that that's what they got their degree in come to life for all of our kids to help close the gaps that we've been talking about tonight um in uh in all of our subject areas for all of our enrollment groups so that's where we need to be for everybody we are there in a number of areas um but we're not there with everybody so yes we have some work to do um but um that's what it should look like okay are you also working on adding

215more diversity diverse because I feel like what I saw here was like majority of white women those are those are the coordinators from the school well everybody should have it so what I mean it should be as diverse as the school is hired because everybody should have a section of it everybody okay and as freshman aren't like maybe it's just because I didn't take it personally because I am an avid student like I saw some stuff about community service like are they working with Key Club like are they working with other clubs in the school like how are they immensely with social emotional uh there are social emotional theme that would be that's why if you're taking Avid it's very intertwined to what you're doing with freshman seminar we've been a part of of I've

216started having three of the schools that I've worked in Amber's been right by my side the whole time we did it at abmart high school and so as we were building this out and we were sitting down back in was it 2018 building out the curriculum in the pilot it's so many um things that we were doing Avid just roll into exactly what seminar is so what we told the Freshman Avid classes is these are the components we feel like you're missing you need to incorporate in and then instead of making kids do the Avid and the Freshman seminar really kind of overlaid okay um I'm not sure about your Club question I don't quite understand that no okay I feel like freshman seminar like actually help the student s of the building into like

217all the like clubs that we have into all the extracurriculars that are available like yeah it's like I get the whole thing of like trying to like build community but that really feels more like a concept rather than like a specific thing I mean so that's a big part of what they do and I think you heard Lori Rocco talk about that and we had some testimonials from her kids we weren't able to get them from the other school so we didn't put those in but that's something we'll do throughout the year and get more diverse voice from their students and hear what's working what's not working and be able to share that but that is a big component of that and I think you heard her talk about the child that didn't understand what

218electives they should take and why and being able to sit down with that child and that's part of that relationship building and that's so important in freshman seminar to have that one person right um and hopefully that child has multiple people they can go through I'm sure they do but built that relationship with Miss Rocco was able to sit down and say hey help me understand what these electives are so that child knew they had somebody they can go to and then wonderful story right she says what are you passionate about he says hey I'm passionate about photography so he takes photography and now wants to actually study in college so I mean I think that's that's part of what they're doing we talk about the career learning communities and they spend time with those

219sharing all those opportunities the kids can take throughout the school tools they help with Club days at Western they talked about the United Way day of caring and getting the kids involved in community service all those kind of things so so there's a lot of components too when we share with the board we'll make sure that the the curriculum is shared with you as well and surveys student services yes I did maybe considered maybe having a focus group of just random students putting some random students together and listening to how they feel about it yeah so Alan what we did the first year is actually we embedded I spent a semester as well as Maureen and some other folks in a freshman seminar class classroom I actually went over to Monticello High School and spent

220the first semester uh once a week in the seminar classroom and learned with the kids what was working what was not working so we have have done some of that we absolutely and that's one of the things we're going to do this year is we were talking about the survey uh recircle back with the kids as we reset our curriculum what's working what's not working what do we need to adjust so good suggestion thank you I've gotten some feedback from particularly like Arts teachers in high school about uh it limiting the ability like dedicating that time sort of limits the ability for kids to take electives do we have as part of this you know what you're gathering for us do you have any information about whether elective choices or kids saying electives are down

221since high school seminar has started I would be interested to know that uh trying to think off the top of my head if I have that um I don't I don't know let me let me look into that so you can get that back to you okay thank you so but I know our electives have gone up I mean so in choices and opportunities so let me just see what that looks like since we actually started seminar yeah because what what I remember seeing is your study halls going down and a lot of that being replaced there but let me let me look into that and get that too thank you thank you musician all right all right so with that we are going to actually transition to our career learning uh communities I'm going

222to invite Katina Dudley up to speak about our career learning communities good evening school board members my name is Katina Dudley I'm a lead coach for Science and you also know that I'm a lead coach for Family Life Education tonight we are highlighting one of the components of high school redesign the career learning communities we have presented this component various times as you might be familiar with the terms academies or academies of Albemarle we have now landed on Career learning communities because this identifies two critical components of this work one is skill development for careers and two is cohort learning in small communities within a larger School community through the work of this past year we've also developed a scope and sequence that we would like to share with you tonight as part of our

223strategic plan Albemarle County Public Schools will increase student engagement in their own learning one strategy for this objective will include the development of learning Pathways that are aligned to Virginia's career clusters there are 17 of those clusters put out by the vdoe this development and implementation of career learning communities are aligned to goal one objective two and goal 1 objective 3. our career learning communities are designed as purposeful groupings of the 17 career clusters around similar skill sets you can see the clcs that we plan to offer in Almar County Public Schools these names have evolved as teachers have dug into some of the research and into some of the surveys that we have gotten back from our students [Music] I wanted to take a minute to review the timeline of the scope of this

224work as Mr Thomas mentioned earlier in 2017 there was a review of high school facilities that included a planning study which led to high school redesign as a result of this study we began working towards the fall 2023 launch of career learning communities we have had several Community conversations with families students faculty and staff with additional presentations shared with principals and schools counselors that included updates along the way in this slide or the presentations and the invitations that were shared with our families faculty and staff over the past six months we have had over 40 secondary teachers I highlight secondary because we've had middle and high school teachers involved in this work ing on the development of these career learning communities this slide shared with you tonight highlights the the slide presentation shared with you

225tonight we'll highlight the teachers input and the outcomes of the work this is really exciting I feel like we've been working on this for a really long time okay as an overview of a career Learning Community teachers landed on this scope and sequence that you see here on this slide the scope and secret sequence is aligned to our vision of high school redesign developing communities with a cohort Focus including opportunities for choice and student coursework and addressing social emotional needs as you see here there are two components to each CLC the courses and the connections to the career learning community as teachers develop Pathways for coursework they included a Gateway and a Capstone course that are cohort focused and you will see that those are on both sides of the career learning community students will

226be oriented to the career learning community and the various Pathways that will be available to them in the Gateway course sequence provides an opportunity for student Choice as well students will follow that sequence first two years so we're looking at this middle sequence here students will follow this sequence for two years and during their second year they will concurrently enroll in a Capstone course the Capstone course will provide opportunities for authentic field experiences aligned to Pathways connected to Community Partners in order to achieve co-constructed learning targets within the path within the career learning community pathway plus course that you will see at the bottom will be aligned to the career learning community and will provide an additional opportunity for student choice and this particular course can be taken at any time during the three years

227of the career learning community and each CLC students will be expected to engage in at least one work-based learning opportunity one verse one work-based learning experience and this just lists the various ways students could engage in these work-based learning experiences so they could be anywhere from a mentorship to an internship job shadowing Service Learning Etc you will also see on the samples that each Learning Community provide provides opportunities for students to achieve an industry credential within that pathway and when we see these sample slides you'll see that there are various credentials that students can earn through that career Learning Community but some of those credentials will be aligned to the pathway sequence and I think that may make sense to you as you look through these earlier tonight you heard our human resources reference the

228teachers for tomorrow program so in this slide deck you'll see that there's an example for each of the career learning communities I'm just going to use the education human development as an example of how this aligns to the template that you that I just reviewed with you so this is the education in human Development Career learning community all students entering into the education and human development Learning Community will take the introduction to family and Human Services and that will be a cohort design class so every student will start that class together they will learn about the two Pathways in education and in human development students in the education and human development will take the teachers for tomorrow one and the teachers for tomorrow too and then as their Capstone all of the students will come

229together again for the psychology to application and research the students will have a choice between the education or the human development pathway and then the students will have the choice between which pathway Plus Class they would like to enroll in so for one career Learning Community students will be expected to engage in five courses at a minimum students could take more a student in the education pathway may do an internship at one of our local schools at a Child Development Center actually this particular group of teachers reached out to Java they also reached out to um several um adult centers to see what type of opportunities students might have for the human development so yes we thought about the K-12 Spectrum but these teachers also went preschool and for our adults that may need extra

230support from our students as well students in this particular career Learning Community have some options for credentials and those are listed in highlights and the ones that are underlined have a link to the credentials if you'd want to learn more about them during our gallery walk one of our teams talked about the Board of Education seal of bi-literacy and all of our groups and teachers start asking about that seal of by literacy and you will now see that as an extra credential our included in all of our career learning communities so those are all included for you to look through at another time but you'll see some of these have two Pathways some have three Pathways we tried to ask teachers to start with three because we didn't want to take on too much as

231we launched these in 2023. you will not see a sample of a three-year plan for performing or Visual Arts the fine art teachers have been working to finalize the plans and I just wanted to speak to this because they've worked just as hard as the teachers in the other career learning communities because there's a unique approach to developing skills of this discipline there has been some creativity to designing these plans of studies we presented these challenges to the high school principals and now have some next steps that we will take with these teachers so we have three meetings set up for this month and the teachers will be joining and we will be finalizing the plans for the Performing and the visual arts we slowed this work down in order not to erode programs at

232the base high schools there was a lot of concern about what about the band program at each high school what about the choir program at each high school what about the drama program at each high school and the teachers concerns are valid and so we wanted to just slow down and make sure we implemented this right so we will be working with teachers this month and I think our last meeting is the first week of November and we'll have those plans finalized finalized we'd also like to present to you the locations of the clcs and why they are located at these sites we have used multiple pieces of evidence to inform the decisions shared on these slides which include interest surveys from students in seventh grade we have about three years of Interest surveys we

233started with our current ninth graders to start collecting data on their interest and then literally last week we also had data from our current ninth graders we also looked at site capacity we also looked and considered partnership expansion for these career learning communities and we looked at building design we do not want to put a CLC that has a lot of interest into a building that cannot accommodate the enrollment request second we would like to place clcs at a site where Community Partners are accessible to students for work based learning experiences and finally we know that some of our sites are already have learning spaces that will provide learning environments to support the experiences for these students the numbers you see on the slides here so 141 for this particular data this is from our

234seventh graders their current 8th grader so this was in the spring of 2022. we allowed these students to pick as many learning communities as they would were interested we had 750 students participate and the data includes 20 2954 data points so many students chose many learning communities and then we also have we're going to keep the information communicate communication technology at Center one and then we also highlighted the student interests that we see at K-Tech as well this is the data that we just recently received from our current ninth graders and with this particular data it's not the ninth graders chose one of the career learning communities and so this highlights I think we had 701 9th graders in this particular data in conclusion we would like to highlight the expansion of clcs to include

235social sciences and the Performing and visual arts many times as we have prevent presented to families one of the things that many of us have heard over and over again is adults saying I would love to go back to high school just to experience these opportunities and that's really cool to hear from our families to think about the experiences for their students I'm also happy to answer any questions that you might have foreign thanks for staying this late Katina you're welcome um this is really pulling apart the academy model right or is it or how I wouldn't say it's pulling apart the academy model pieces four-year program to a three-year program we're really trying to maintain some of the components that the academy teachers valued and that is the cohort model they felt like that

236was really important for students the cohort model where students are together in that class and students are around other students that share the same interest we know teachers value that so we really try to make sure to ensure that we had that at the start and at the finish so students would come together for that we also wanted to also consider student interest in this too which is why you see those pathways kind of venturing a little bit differently in that junior year but I think what you'll see with those Pathways is you'll see that students will still remain as a cohort but they'll also have students that are not in the career Learning Community possibly taking those classes as well but I think those are also student choice for elective courses that they enroll

237in as well saying so many of the students chose social justice and and world affairs I don't know why I just thought that was interesting my granddaughter is going that route too so who knows oh and I will tell you the teachers really broke apart the data because you'll also notice that um Heart Hospital eateries Etc used to be hospitality and tourism and what they found was students didn't check hospitality and tourism and the data but when they looked at the survey and the programs that students were interested in there was over 200 responses for hospitality and tourism when the kids asked do you like to cook do you like to work the restaurants all these things that are now included in that title I think students might have been collect connecting hospital and tourism

238to hospitals and that's why they weren't selecting it because when you look at our newer data you'll see that culinary arts had 220 students interests or 220 selections and then you can see here that number has gone up since students have a better understanding of what that is how does this curriculum impact the teacher skills we have or I mean do we have the right faculty or I don't know what I'm asking that will so that's one of the questions the principals are asking where will career learning communities be located so that they can look at what faculty they'll need and what expertise some of those faculty will need to be able to teach some of the courses that's one of the requests from the principals that they've asked for when this moves forward so

239that they can look at that and what are the endorsements for those teachers does this model have a more I'm sorry no no you're good um does this model have a more intense um impact on transportation problems than we've had more attention example moving around to different places to get these I think our current model we have students moving around right so I'm just wondering if this is going from school to school so so one of the things we've been doing I actually met with a Charmaine I've been talking to Roslyn about what this will will look like one of the differences is as Katina said yes right now we have kids in the academy model who are going to to different schools so if I'm a Western student decide to go to Mesa I

240became an abmore high school student and they had to figure out how to get Transportation over there we already have that model set up with katech and with Center one it's now the difference for them is figuring out and and so we'll work in conjunction as we build this out over the next couple months with registration of that timeline of when Transportation needs to know because the difference now is students maintain their basical identity so no longer will a Western student have to say I'm becoming a Monticello High School student they maintain their basic identity at Western one day and they go over to Monte high school and do the ndcc program then come back to their base school now that that will be a little bit of a change for transportation so they'll just

241need those numbers so they can figure out the best way to transport back and forth so I've been working with Transportation we'll continue in fact we talked about having a monthly meeting starting in November for the remainder of the year just touching base and seeing where we are and what they need as they go through does that answer what you were asking Judy well I appreciate the communication that you're having matter numbers will matter because obviously we're having a lot of Transportation issues so I'm just curious of this so it sounds like this is a bit of a center model but the centers are the Comprehensive High Schools right that's exactly right okay so um and I don't know what percentage of our students currently are involved in an academy outside of their what would

242have been their base school so I have no idea what impact this will have on transportation and that is what I'm looking for yeah and that's why we put the numbers up there and honestly we won't know we'll start registering right at the end of November beginning of December at the high schools so we should have some pretty decent numbers by the end of January to put in front of transportation and say what works what doesn't what do you need help with we do currently run shuttles I'm out of Western Alberto Monticello daily ex so we have shuttles that currently run daily because we have a an academy at each school and with this new model we'll continue to have a shuttle that runs daily between the schools and they run to the lab school

243they run to Center one so the shuttles the shuttles so with as you know um you you just do the elementary runs and then you do the middle and high school runs and then the shuttles run so it's in it's in the it's in between I you know ideally there are one-offs there are some different things they do to try to assist students with individual needs but the the movement of the kids to go to the different schools is in between the runs to get the kids to the schools right so it doesn't put as much pressure on on those times that are critical and what happens is the the academies that we currently do as well as the the Center one and K-Tech places like that they've got they they adapt their starting to

244as the kids arrive so it's like a different kind of start because I've been over at Center one when the kids start coming in and it's not just it's not like it is where at a regular base school where all of a sudden all the buses come and the kids just get out it's you know kids coming in rolling in and then they start that way so they have to adapt to that but the goal is to try to keep those keep the movement inside the the time of the day when the when you're not running all the other routes so are they the same drivers like the home tutors it would be the same driver so you well in mostly the same drivers so you'll have a bus driver that'll take their kids to

245Albemarle High School then they wait to run a shuttle to one of the other to one of the other places I mean I guess I just I feel like we've talked we've been talking about Transportation a lot um and for months and years before that truly but um it seems like here we've created this model that uh appears to me to be quite transfusion heavy and I know that you're saying that it's not at the same time yeah but I mean still people need to drive them no matter what time of day it is so I I don't see in here um consideration of that and I'm as you're saying there is communication around that but you know in the beginning uh when it lists all the things that go into this new high school

246model it was like facilities um and I just I wish that we were thinking about transportation in more uh concrete ways because it seems like what we're buying is um something that could you know put us in our real mind in which we already are so um I I I really we need to have more information about that and one of the things Judy to add to what this year and several of the reasons we went to the 10 through 12 model versus the ninth grade is allowing kids to get to high school catch their breath start exploring some of these classes and opportunities you were talking about before so they know better what they want to try what that pulls out to help transportation is ninth graders not needing the transport to their different

247locations and obviously ninth graders as with the vast majority of 10th graders don't drive so so that has helped as well so in addition to Transportation um how about from the CIP the capital Improvement projects point of view I mean the well this need work done in the buildings uh I mean additional spaces uh in in individual schools so we've been John we've been working with uh Lindsay as well and having conversations uh for the first year in the 10th grade we don't anticipate any needs that aren't there right now okay for Capital Improvement but going going out because especially if you've got I think once you start looking at Center two and things like that um you know that would be a different conversation but as we expand out um there's nothing right now

248that's on the on that's burning that we're like we need to have this as far as a capital capital piece so uh we've invited Lindsay we've shared the presentation with her we're going to continue to work with Lindsay as well in fact she's going to be a part of that monthly conversation in case things are are coming up we'll be working with our technology department as well but right now I think we have the things in place to make this successful in our schools already hence why we actually located some of the things where we already have some of the opportunities yeah I'm so glad to hear that I would just throw out for consideration that once you start to think about it and and you could potentially see a need absolutely give the school

249board in the soups absolutely uh five years okay I mean no less than five minutes I got it absolutely I've emphasis with this yeah yeah absolutely at least yeah thank you there are other questions the discussion for board members the clock is going um just have we completely abandoned utilizing I hate to even say hybrid model but I mean some remote classes that could be built into this I I know we all still shuddering from covid um but it seems to be there there may be a place for some online classes that the students could do other than transport you know it may it may erode their cohort you know interactions but it might be useful so what is an Avenue what we have right now is what we have before our pandemic um your

250health PES personal finance so we do have some opportunities we haven't yeah yeah we have it yeah I mean those are virtual classes kids have an option to take it face to face or virtual we haven't expanded upon that I mean it's always something we can look at but those are are being offered in our schools in the summer and uh during the school year virtually other questions okay thank you so much thank you all for your time yeah I guess I'll jump in again and just tell you that this is amazing work that this started with a couple board members making a field trip and learning about the academies of Hampton and I know back then when they came back and said wow we'd really like to have that here I said I don't

251know how that's ever going to happen it started with um about a 350 000 investment from our school board to redo our transportation so we don't have the same Transportation infrastructure and it's why we know as a as a test case that we can actually pull this off because we've been doing it now uh for close to six years it's just going to be an increased volume I'm really Blown Away by the work that you've done I mean this is very concrete it's going to be to the largest extent cost neutral in terms of facilities because it doesn't depend on widgets it doesn't depend on you know big technology infrastructure changes in facilities what it's going to depend on is just having high quality teaching and learning and kids getting engaged with experiences so thank

252you very much for bringing this Vision to life and I know our families and our students are going to be very excited about it as they get engaged with it thank you yeah thank you Mr Thomas this minute and it's definitely for the presentation is there any other business from uh board members of the superintendent I just wanted to say thank you to everyone police officers staff everyone who has stayed um through this very long meeting I really appreciate it and I know it's hard and I commend you all I actually had today off from work and I am feeling exhausted so thank you yeah well I had a brisa's name to that because understanding that you have to be at that mile tomorrow morning so many things today