001I will be presiding over this meeting um we will start with the prej allegiance I will like um our Juvenile Court Clerk LEL Matthews lead us in the Pledge of Allegiance our pledge of Al of the United States of America the repu for which it stands one nation indivisible with liberty and justice for all all we're going to start with Awards and recognitions so you me call okay I'll turn over to Dr B our director of schools yeah um thank you um Miss player and good evening board members and everyone who's joined us this evening I'm I'm excited I'm excited about recognizing several team mmps members and Community Partners who contribute in their very own special way to making sure that every mmps student is known first up is um Mark North our High School
002athletics director Mark if you can come on up and um let me talk about you for a minute while you stand in front of the crowd Mark um was actually honored by the ten Secondary School athletics Association or twaa last week with the AF Bridges sportsmanship award as a 2022 23 school system administrator of the year so this award recognizes Mark's commitment to ethics Integrity citizenship and sportsmanship in other words to doing things the right right way and helping set the standard for High School athletics across the entire State and we know that setting that example at the top trickles down to what we see on the field and Court each week Mark we'd like to take an opportunity to tell you congratulations on this well-deserved honor and thank you for everything you do to
003support and promote student athletes and all of our coaches and all of our school communities everyone please um join me and I'm acknowledging Mark North and congratulations and please come up for a photo after we do we're so fortunate to have mark leading our secondary Athletics programs for mmps so next is myON Franklin the principal of Johnson Alternative Learning Center principal Franklin was elected last month to be the Region 3 director for naea the national alternative Education Association Region Three covers Six States Tennessee Kentucky West Virginia Ohio Indiana and Michigan let's give our first round of applause stay there this position on the naea board puts principal Franklin at the center of learning and sharing about the best practices in alternative education across the country and gives mmps a great opportunity to share and receive
004ideas that can help our at risk youth principal Franklin congratulations on your election and thank you so much for stepping up to lead at the regional and National levels please join me again in congratulating principal Minon Franklin principal Franklin please join us up front for a photo all right next up I'd like to recognize our human resources team after mmps won the redefining American Healthcare award from the health care Leadership Council a few weeks ago this award is for the groundbreaking my weight loss Health bundle program which helps employees tackle weight loss in a holistic accessible affordable way in fact we made this program available at no outof pocket cost for our mmps employees thanks to this proactive approach our employees have lost more than 7,000 pounds and health concerns like diabetes are now less
005prevalent for our team mmps members y that's a big deal um our chair um richin aod remarked at the award ceremony in our mmps Wellness Center a few weeks ago this also means improved quality of life greater well-being and enhanced productivity for our teachers and our support staff Michael Freeman Executive Vice President of the healthc Care Leadership Council put it well in a press release about the ward when he said and I quote it is a shining example of what Coordinated Care should be assisting patients with care navigation it is enhancing Health Equity by making these Services easy to access and at no cost to employees and we believe that other organizations can replicate what you've done here and when they see the success metrics should definitely do so congratulations and thank you to everyone
006from mmps human resources and our partners at vendor Bill Health employer solutions for all of the great work you've done to make this program possible for our employees let's get you all up here for a great photo and an opportunity for us to congratulate you on your great work and your award so come on up team congratulations to you thank you for your leadership your hard work please join me in giving them a round of applause as they come forward all Maybe I will all right our next group to recognize is a coalition of Community Partners who have supported our students through the books Brothers initiative which shows men of color reading books to our students we're going to show a couple of videos about this wonderful project we'll start with a story about My
007Brother's Keeper Nashville which has spearheaded this work under the leadership of our o very own Ashford Hughes MPS executive officer for diversity equity and inclusion as well as Davidson County Juvenile Court Clerk LEL Matthews Jr and then we'll see an example of books books Brothers in action please um turn your attention to the monitors Black History Month a new initiative hopes to give local youth a chance to achieve more in life it's called My Brother's Keeper Nashville Alliance and News Channel 5's Kelsey Gibbs tells us what it could mean for young men across the community mentoring there a lot of things we need in life it's telling me that I have to be a leader for each and everybody that's here today it's a lesson which will take these young men far beyond the classroom
008it starts by walking in someone else's shoes they aren't just my team they're family to be the first day of Black History Month the My Brothers Keeper Alliance launched right here in Nashville formed in 2014 by President Barack Obama the goal is to hit on a series of Milestones like graduating high school and college with the help from Men in the community My Brother's Keeper is we need more people that keeps us somewhere that we can hold it's a mentorship for young men of color by giving them the beat to write the lyrics to their own song and their own truth while druming up the courage to do what is right by choice I chose to separate myself from what I'm used to seeing even with the negativity from the people that I used to
009hang with let's celebrate that man with help from organizations like the real program at the Oasis Center reaching Excellence as leaders and assistance for many others it will go from Boys to Men and I feel like being a leader having the platform that I have to to reach back and influence the younger generation is very important to me former professional football player Chris hope says it's about extending the same help once offered to him there's no person that has ever become successful in this world that didn't have somebody that mentored them or influence them in a positive way uhhuh providing these young men with a sense of purpose and pride we are something in life we can be something in life Kelsey Gibbs News Channel 5 My Brother's Keeper will start out focusing on three
010Milestones reading at grade level by third grade graduating from high school ready for college in a career and reducing violence and providing Second Chance opportunities Black History Month a new initiative hopes to give [Music] local [Music] I'm state representative Harold love Jr and I'm here to read you a book today entitled who will you be I want to thank United Way and the Nashville Public Library for the chance to read to you today who will you be by Andrea pippens my child my little one who will you be when you are grown there's loving kindness in your eyes like your daddy and boldness in your heart like your grandma will you be like them your cousin Kina is loud and joyful will you be like her your brother watches the changing clouds will he do
011that with you when you blow me a kiss you are loving me like your grandpa and your cousin's gig who gives big hugs your big dark eyes take in the world will you be curious like your own Uncle find beauty in all that you see like Miss Jess and be bound for adventure like your auntie Amina makes cakes and pies will you do that too will you be compassionate like Alexandra and little one will you be grateful oh so grateful like me my wish is that you will be all these things and more you will be your own self for no one in the world has ever been like you and this I know my child whoever you will be I will love you forever it has been my pleasure to read to you today
012who will you be by Andrea pippens and I hope as you continue to grow that you indeed discover who you will be and know that whatever decision you make whoever you decide to be you'll indeed be loved thank you [Music] again [Music] we are so excited about this partnership books Brothers is an exciting literacy resource for students in grades prek through three in fact we're where the books align to our curriculum our elementary literacy team place these resources right into our very own scope and sequence this is a part parnership between My Brother's Keeper Nashville Public Library Ingram charities Nashville soccer club and United Way of Greater Nashville several of our excellent Partners books Brothers brings together talented men of color from across the Nashville Community to read books on camera so everyone can see
013and hear them it is important that all young students can see talented men of color reading and showing commitment to our City's youth it is especially critical for our young students of color to see and hear voices like theirs sharing their time talent and Care the talent is superb the video and audio quality are amazing and together they provide a rich engaging experience for our young leaders all videos are freely and widely available on YouTube so let me say a big thank you to to My Brother's Keeper Nashville Public Library United with greater Nashville Ingram Charities and Nashville soccer club for everything you have done and will continue to do to promote reading literacy and Equity to our students across the city I'd like to invite you all up for a photo including councilman preit
014who has joined us so that we can celebrate this great partnership and continue to reach more and more of our Nashville youth come on up and everyone please join me and giving them a round of applause for their commitment see all we got all right before I turn it back over to Vice chair player again I think um all of the individuals and the organ organizations we have recognized tonight um are just doing excellent work we are so grateful for your leadership for your partnership embracing every student known and being on this journey with us of being the premier large school district in Tennessee and Beyond so again we are forever I'm grateful for your leadership and your partnership with that Vice chair I'll turn you excuse me U chair um player you mind if
015I call for a point of privilege for just a moment yes the voice of goddess that came through like who's the voice of God thank so much I just really wanted to say thank you to all those Partners also during my time at United Way I had the awesome pleasure of working with these men of color with these different partners to bring this to fruition during the pandemic just truly proof that adults in our community wanted to do something better for children they wanted to lend their support their time their talent or their treasure and I'm just I'm so grateful to see this and to know that it's still flourishing it's on YouTube so please check it out I'm just I'm just so excited I hate I couldn't be there with you all but congratulations
016and thank y'all so much thank you thank you thank you um we will go move on to the adop adoption of the agenda um I may I will entertain a motion to move the agenda okay we been moved there a second second second um Dr seir will you do a roll call vote please approve [Music] approve I I all right the uh motion passed unanimously we will now move on to director's report we'll turn on to Dr battle thank you Vice chair player again um at this time I will turn the microphone over to um our teaching and learning and curriculum team um you will hear an update around our fall assessment tonight uh from our chief of academics and schools um Dr Mason Bellamy our executive officer Dr David Williams and our director executive
017director of research assessment and evaluation Dr Tina stensson um I will turn the mic over to you team thank you good evening thank you Dr battle good evening uh board members Vice chair thank you for this opportunity and I do this every time um one second there we go no Mouse um we are going to talk to you a little bit about um assessments tonight but before we do that I want to ground us as always in our core tenants focused outcomes and the um the signature initiatives tonight's presentation will align with the core tenants of identifying and eliminating inequities and creating supporting engaging rigorous personalized learning for all students with outcomes of literacy and numeracy and initiatives of literacy reimagined and math I don't know how to say that as it turns out math
018to the nth um to the nth power um sometimes you see things and you don't hear them and you don't know um I'm going to ground us first in some of the types of District assessments we use um distinct and separate from our state assessments the first type I'm going to talk about are our screeners those are skills-based screeners you can see an example of them up there um we use them for Universal um academic and dyslexia screening and the primary purpose is to tell us where additional support is needed the second type um growth the Adaptive measures based on standards are still part of our screening Suite so they do serve that screening purpose a reading and a math but they tell us how we are doing specifically related to um a Baseline and
019growth over the year and then the third are achievement measures these are standards-based benchmarks um following the scope in sequence and these tell us you know whether we're getting to to the end goal of proficiency for our students and Having learned and taught the standards um in a given part of the year so with that I'm going to be talking about the growth and the achievement um types of District assessments uh in this presentation so fall 2023 assessment results I won't read these out loud but uh you can see our assessment window was the 10th through the 31st um for a reading and a maath are adaptive standards based assessments we had a 98% participation rate which is phenomenal um as was the case last year and we'll talk a little bit about why this
020is um District a math median percentiles were slightly high higher than a reading percentiles in nearly every grade um and we have some good news to share about the percentages of students scoring in the lowest percent uh lowest quintiles for a maath and a reading namely that they decreased um from when I presented these same data to you last year um and correspondingly more students moved into the top two quintiles in these assessments and finally while progress is being being made um we continue to work on Gap closures so this may look familiar to you from last year these are our a reading quintiles um I know I said this last year but I do want to ground us again in what a quintile is and specifically these quintiles quintiles are based on percentiles in
021this case percentiles on a test normed in 2019 a reading a math um so nationally about 20% of students would be well exactly 20% of each student uh uh students would be in each of these student groups what you see here are the percentage of students falling into the national quintiles you can see that the pattern looks very similar to what I showed last year however um the percentage of students in that bottom quintile and that second to the bottom quintile have reduced um together by 4.1 Point um the bottom quintile showed the most movement 3% of students um compared to last year are not in that quintile this is the quintile that we would really see supports and interventions being used for students and I also want to remind us that since this is
022part of a screener for Disabilities and learning needs and tiered intervention students are being given these assessments without accommodations so um we need to know you know does a student still need read aloud for example or if they're a second grader do they need read aloud um things like that so and we moved 4.1 um% of students out of those bottom two and into the top two um with the middle quintile remaining the same from 2022 math you see a similar pattern um you will see however that we made even more Improvement in math um we lowered the bottom two quintiles or the percentage of students in each of the bottom two quintiles and we increased the top two um again we we think that Ela is a little lower simply because most of of
023those accommodations are related to reading and being English Learners and and whatnot so um that's why you you might see some of the patterns that you do see and with that I'm going to switch a little bit from quintiles to actual percentiles um these again will look familiar from last year and this is the median National percentile by student group so by definition a median uh means that half the students in the again in the country in 2019 on this on this assessment scored above the 50th percentile and about 50% below this shows us where each of our student groups did relative to that um relative to that nationally normed group um mnps median percentiles improved by three points so the all students that you see is uh 26 it was 23 last year um
024each of our student groups maintained or grew their median National percentile again these are second to 9th graders in 2022 and then second to 9th graders in 2023 so um that was uh that was good news now we're going to look at um a math achievement by student group again you see that median National percentile is a little higher for math um we didn't grow quite as much but still really good growth two points um from Fall 2022 to fall 2023 and most of our student groups did in fact um maintain or improve their median National percentile that being said um I'm not going to go through every one of them but we are aware that there are gaps and are working on those gaps um uh but I want before I turn it over
025to Dr Williams I do want to point out that what these data are showing all four of the slides I just showed you are are showing us that compared to the cohort of 2 to 9th graders last year that cohort of second to nth graders this year is sted the year a little bit higher than than last year's group um thinking about our value added gains last year um this means that you know most likely our students maintained that growth right so we are starting our students at a higher level of course we have new second graders in this cohort and some of our ninth graders last year dropped out but by and large these are are the same students that we had last year um so with that I'm going to talk uh turn
026it over to Dr David Williams to talk about our benchmark assessments thank you Dr stensson good evening I do want to take a few minutes to provide some reminders about our benchmark assessments we are in our second year of administering those in our district the overarching goal with these assessments is to provide information to our Educators about student learning with respect to the content that's taught each quarter they're administered in all tested grades that you can see here on the screen they're designed to take approximately 45 minutes and that way they can fit inside a class period regardless of uh grade or subject area I'm often asking the question are these assessments aligned I usually take that opportunity to engage into a deeper conversation by asking tell me what you mean by aligned there are
027several ways that our team thinks about aligning our benchmark assessments to our state Expectations first and foremost the assessments must be aligned to our grade level standards uh found in our state standards grade level content found in our state standards next they must cover a range of cognitive levels and ways of thinking next when you look at a particular grade level standards you'll start to see some Contours and some things stand out and you'll notice that the standards F standards focus in some areas more than others that is to say not all standards are necessarily of equal weight some are richer and more critical to learn than others next our teams look at the state blueprint to see how condent will be prioritized in our state assessment next when while multiple choice is still the
028most common item type we do see multi- select items or multi-part problems in grades three through five where there's more than one correct answer that needs to be selected in grades six and up this was new last year um our kids experienced for their first time in middle school we see what are called Tei or technology enhanced items these items take advantage of Technology when tests are taken online they may ask students to do things like drag and drop their answers type in the correct answer instead of selecting one um as in a text Box Etc it's important that we provide students this opportunity to learn how to answer their various these various item types that they will see on the state assessments and finally as benchmark assessments are given each quarter they are aligned
029to the content that's taught and uh as outlined in our scope and sequence for each quarter a little bit about Ela and math I'm going to talk primarily about those two contaras this evening our Ela T teams take great care to align the experience that students are are having with instruction provided and what's being learned in class to reflect things like the topics they're learning the types of text whether it's a play or a poem or biography um essential questions that are also found in our curriculum and as mentioned they also mirror the rigor and depth of our standards and the various item types that students will encounter in mathematics similarly The Benchmark focus on the content that's learned each quarter where standards in bro are Broad and may include multiple arithmetic operations or function
030types students are assessed specifically on what's being uh learned and taught that quarter for example maybe it's only addition and subtraction or maybe it's only linear and exponential functions uh that are being taught according to the scope and sequence and that's what students will experience on The Benchmark the state department also provides evidence of learning statements for each standard so we ensure that students have the opportunity to demonstrate the highest levels of Mastery math benchmarks also include two parts or two sections one is for calculator active items and one is for non-calculator or calculator inactive items and again again we include a variety of item types where it makes sense so this evening I'll be providing some high level updates and some Trends from our first quarter Benchmark and Ela and math in grades 3
031through 7 English 2 and integrated math 1 this was administered September 27th through October 5th so in grades uh three start with Ela our students were most successful responding to depth of knowledge web step the knowledge is a way of classifying the types of thinking that's required um they were most successful in responding to type two or level two questions skills and Concepts they also were most successful when they answered questions about a passage called fish frog internal and I also just did a screenshot over the side so you can see again that our Ela team takes care to align the types of passages they encounter on our benchmarks with what they're experiencing in class uh in third grade module one the module was called the c um and so the passage at least one
032we try to align to the types of things they're learning in class so that it feels seamless to the students uh content wise students were most successful determine the meaning of words and phrases as they're used in a text particularly distinguishing from both literal literal from non-literal language and also using sentence level context as a clue so that they could understand uh an unknown meaning uh or phrase the meaning of an unknown word or phrase some challenges we saw in ela was was similar uh as we expect and you'll see later in the presentation struggling with non-traditional item types and again these can be multi- select or even multi-part or two-point problems they did struggle content wise um using information that's gained from illustrations and words in the text to demonstrate that understanding and then
033also producing simple compound and complex sentences and what the way that looks is you'll see a word or excuse me a sentence in a passage that's not very clearly clearly worded and students are supposed to select from among the answer choices uh that sentence Rewritten in a more grammatically correct and clear form moving on to math in third grade some suggestions we saw were answering recall questions again webs depth of knowledge level one uh we saw some success from students interpreting factors factors and product and whole number multiplication equations and also demonstrating an understanding of division as an unknown factor problem and that really gets to understanding the relationship inverse relationship between multiplication and division in grade three again challenges we saw were selecting uh correct answer choices when there are more more than one
034correct answer interpreting the dividend divisor and quotient and whole number division equation so while they were successful doing that with the factors and products and multiple multiplication equations they struggled when it was flipped to division equations finally the last challenge that I saw again highle Trends wise in third grade math was understanding that shapes in different categories may share similar attributes and those attributes can define a larger category so for example if I have um a four-sided shape and all four of the sides are equal that could be a square it could be a rhombus but then I also see other four-sided shapes like trapezoids or parallelograms or rectangles and those could be broadly classified as quadrilaterals moving on to seventh grade ELA um some successes that we saw were answering non-traditional atom typ and
035this was a departure from what we've seen uh in the past and and this break from the pattern that students were actually successful in seventh grade answering multi- select items where more than one answer is correct they also we also saw some success analyzing what it Tex says explicitly and drawing some inferences and then also citing evidence to support those inferences we also saw success determining a central or main idea uh from a text and then analyzing its development over the course of a text some challenges that we saw um this is a different item type called ebsr or evidence-based selected response these items can be can earn zero one or two points part A always ask you to uh respond to a question and then Part B always ask you to justify that with
036textual evidence from the passage you must get uh part a correct in order to get Part B correct you cannot get Part B correct without part A so they're tied together that way they're worth up to two points and that was a challenge for our seventh grade students in ela we also had some challenge responding to uh again step of knowledge level two challenged analyzing relationships and interactions among individuals events or ideas in the text and also had some challenge analyzing how an author establishes U conveys and contrast points of view of different characters or narrators within a text moving to seventh grade math we saw some success responding to non-calculator items so as I mentioned there are two parts calculator and non-calculator um and this is important because we we want to make sure
037that the students are doing the mathematical thinking and not lying on a tool so in this case students responded to non-calculator items means that they are certainly doing the thinking and answering those items well um also some of my favorite standards here personally uh looking at proportional relationships which a key emphasis in seventh grade math they're able to identify the unit rate uh through proportion of relationships that can be represented in a variety of ways whether that's a table a graph a diagram equation or ver verbal descriptions and then also successful explaining on what a point XY within the coordinate plane in the first quadrant um that represents the proportional relationship with special attention to the point one R where R is defined as that unit rate some challenges that we saw again as I
038mentioned the Tei items uh those can those are a little bit tricky there's another layer of cognitive complexity that's layered on top of the student demonstrating the knowledge so I may have the knowledge but now I have to answer the question the way it's the way it's presented on the test and that can be a challenge um responding to level three questions were also challenged according to web step of knowledge and then representing proportional relationship of equation so graph ically numerically uh students were successful equations uh is going to be continue to be a challenge uh that's the most difficult of the way when you represent proportion of relationships and then this standard is entering um knowing the formulas for area and circumference of a circle and using them to solve problems so it's one
039thing to be able to apply but the standard also says it's not G you have to know the formula and apply it um and so that's that's what's key about that particular content so moving into high school English to some successes we saw and this was a again a positive responding to the most difficult categorization according to depth of knowledge is level three strategic thinking we also saw some success analyzing points of view and an author's purpose how that shapes the content and style of different texts which I'll just add the name of our secondary curriculum is my perspectives so being able to hold different perspectives at the same time and analyze them is great also saw some success demonstrating understanding of figurative language word relationships and the Nuance that can come in word meetings
040some challenges we saw again where the EBS are and then select drop down where it might be within a text and I have to drop down just like we do when we're filling out online forms uh question types of that nature challeng is also responding to type two questions and then finally analyzing what a text says explicitly and then drawing those inferences and also finding the most compelling textual evidence to support those conclusions and that fits with the ebsr uh that I mentioned earlier getting out of breath so let me pause for just a second thank you but last but not least moving on to integrated math one um again near and dear to my heart successive we're responding to recall uh depth of knowledge one questions success not surprisingly answering traditional multiple choice and
041I do again want to point out that traditional multiple choice questions are by far the majority of question types that are on our benchmarks and also what uh they'll experience in the state assessment interpreting parameters um within a linear exponential function in terms of a context or word problem students also perform well on those questions and then also understanding that the graph of an equation in two variables does represent all solutions to that equation plotted in the coordinate plane um some challenges uh were graphing students had two graphing questions on this particular Benchmark in integrated math one where they had to plot points according to a depreciating exponential function and then also plot a line given some constraints um and that was challenging again um the the item type is in and of itself challenging
042you have to know how to operate the your mouse and the keyboard to make sure that's done but that again is something that they need to do be able to do successfully on the state assessment um some other challenges content wise were graphing equations with two variables in the coordinate plane and then again comparing two different functions uh and their properties when they're represented in in a variety of ways all right so in summary there is some variability in Student Success as we saw with the different item types and the different types of thinking that's required but generally we do see students performing better on multiple choice it than on the other item types and I think that's just um generally the way it is again those multi um more complex types of questions do
043present an additional challenge to our students to all students um students also need to be expected to think and reasoning at varying levels of cognitive complexity we talked about recall um analysis synthesis application and while knowledge and recall is important we've got to push past that and get into deeper levels of analysis but that's not to say you only say at the analysis all types of thinking are valuable and important and then finally we do see some evidence that students are showing strong command of some critical content that's support for them to learn but as we move forward in the year again second quarter now going into the third quarter uh after the holiday break there's still a great opportunity for students to learn M moving forward so in conclusion for our next steps schools
044are equipped and empowered with a variety of data um through different portals that they can use to monitor student progress and personalized learning EXP experience for students as they move forward parents are also equipped with this data so as Dr sson mentioned in grades 2 through n the aath and the a reading is presented as the national percentile and then as we've done some analysis to make uh predictive claims about uh TCAP Performance Based on statistical correlations those uh reporting categories the four levels are in data warehouse for the benchmarks and are tested grades and subject areas and we'll continue that further analysis to strengthen those claims between uh last year's CCAP this year's benchmarks and then the upcoming coming TCAP and then finally professional development from a variety of uh support Hub staff from
045the research assessment evaluation Department the academics team and of course our executive directors and in leading their schools uh to make sure we're interpreting the results and using them appropriately so with that Dr battle I'll turn it back over to you all right thank you teame um for the fall assessment um update and I will turn it back over to you Vice um chair player thank you Dr Stinson and Dr Williams and Dr battle um there any questions or comments uh School Board member Tyler yeah um I had a couple of questions get back to it okay so it seems that in our younger grades we're seeing that the struggle of answering non-traditional type items um is a skill that they get better at as they move along do we have anything in place right
046now where maybe in grade two our students get practice with working with these types of questions so that by the time they hit third grade they've already had some practice with it yeah that's a that's a good point um all of our second grade students can actually log in and access uh the items that we have so for example an elementary school could could log in and access these items and provide them to the younger students um that that could help that's a good point um is that something that we're coaching some of our teachers to do or is that not I I know there's so much limited time yes and it's also just that Balancing Act of uh providing some of that opportunity to to to see the types of items so they can
047develop that skill without going down the road of test prep yeah um so that is something that that schools could consider but I would just encourage very limited use of that okay um and then I also had a question about so um in moments where we see we're able to get very granular with what our challenges and successes are um when we especially in math we see a lot of you have to understand this concept to build off of it and and to learn the next concept and then you have to understand that to learn the next concept and and if you have a missing step it can create larger problems the farther down the road you go um so when we have clear data on what our challenges are how are our teachers spiraling
048back to ensure that our students are not not missing that moving forward um I know again that we have very limited time and it's hard to go back and retach something when you're supposed to be moving forward um but I also understand that if we don't ensure that our students have that basic Foundation they can't move forward and it's delicate yes no it's a great great question and it certainly is delicate there's so there's a couple of things um PLT time uh for students who getting the math intervention they can get that extra personalized support whether it's through skills based intervention or remediation so that there is a time and place for students to receive some of that additional support I think when you're talking about Community Building or um warmup type questions bell ringer
049type questions there's always an opportunity to spiral some of those important things back the other thing that's important is that I have read research that even if a student may lack their multiplication facts they can still access conceptual understanding of proportional relationships for example so um so we just have to be careful saying I can't move forward until Master point a I can't get to point B that's not always true okay A lot of times as concepts are introduced in lower grades they become skills for later grades and students can still move conceptually through the grade level content because what we don't want to have is students just get stuck and then teachers get stuck with them so it's important to move forward and and introduce the concepts that they need and try to find
050ways to spiral back to those important foundational skills okay um I know some of our PLT programs um allow for the students to um meet them where they are whether it's at a higher level or a lower level wherever they are um do we do we have any ability to to look more deeply at which students are using like for example um some of our students who are working at a higher level and would benefit from moving ahead moving forward and having access to newer material um but the program doesn't necessarily give them an information give them information about why they might have missed something that's a little bit harder um and I can see how that I've talked to several parents who've had some concerns about well if she understood why she had missed
051it she could figure it out and move on then she'd get it um and I think that I Exel does that a little bit trying to remember which one does and which one doesn't um there's a little one one of them gives you reasons for why you missed it one of them does not and so it's you can't learn if you don't know why you missed it um so how are we making sure that we're meeting our our kids not just during PLT but that what we're giving them during that PLT time is also helping them move forward yeah and the I ready is the one that we use commonly across the district other schools may have ISL as an you know additional program um but certainly when those programs are implemented during PLT just
052as they are literacy it's not just on the computer there's always going to be a hybrid approach so there should always be a blended model where um the student may be working independently on the platform but they're always going to be reinforced and supported by uh inperson Educators that's always so they can diagnose and then also help them understand why they miss something to move forward okay that should absolutely be the case yeah no I agree with you that should be the case I also know the reality of being in a classroom with a bunch of kids who have so many different needs and not physically being able to get to literally everyone in the 30 minutes that we have or 45 minutes for PLT um so again I don't want to I mean obviously
053we want to have best practices and what we expect from our teachers but we also have to be realistic about what can you actually do during this time and how can we provide the best support um so so I was just going to add I actually observed in a classroom today right um during PLT where this was exactly happening the teacher didn't even know I was coming um and you know what you typically will see are students working independently at their own pace um inside the platform the teacher had three or four students grouped around her working on a specific skill based upon the information um from the program that they're working in and so while we are all having to be smart and efficient about our time um I just today I observed a
054teacher doing this extremely well um and in a space where every student's um needs essentially were being met because of what they were doing either individually on their computer or in small um group time um with their teachers so I just wanted to acknowledge that um we have teachers who are doing this extremely um well given the kind of student teacher ratio we have given the training that they have and understanding um the hybrid model that that truly does exist and so um that is something that um is expected and we continue to support around um to make sure that we are being responsive um to where there may be some skills gaps with our students and for for our teachers who might be struggling with that do they have the opportunity to go watch
055a teacher who is very skilled at that so that they can figure out how to do it better absolutely and I I know of several examples where either instructional leadership teams or principles are recommend ing um observations for models and and having this modeled in professional learning experiences I know we've talked about it and our p and we brought our coaches together so absolutely okay great the other point I would just add quickly briefly if you'll allow is um if I have 18 students in a classroom whether it's a PLT or gen General classroom um the misconceptions that students have are fairly predictable and so it's often times not that there's 18 misconceptions there are probably only three that are happening among the students and I just need to find again those groups of kids
056and address those misconceptions there's generally not 18 misconceptions for the same thank you all right um who were member Herold block so um I think I'm understanding correctly that the the a reading and a maath data those are the assessments we administer right just at the beginning of the year yes ma' um as as uh screeners in some way but they're part of our larger screening suite and so the the the fact that we saw the improvements over last year at this time is in a lot of ways just a reflection of having made some gains last year but also potentially having not really lost much over the summer am I interpreting that more or less correctly yeah that's fair okay that's a fair fair interpretation okay no yeah yeah um I I think I
057asked that in part because I'm curious about promising Scholars and just if there's anything we could know about promising Scholars from this I I would the answer that question might be no but I I just I find myself wondering that so I believe Dr Stinson's Department in conjunction with Chief Chin's Department have some internal studies on that that's just been released at very high levels right now so I don't want to reveal too much before we're ready except to say that I think we have some some results that show promise in our promising Scholars Program and more significant in some ways I mean that's most important right but that also that you guys are looking at it and schools are looking at it and so we know where things in promising Scholars may have worked
058and may not have worked as well so that we could make improvements as we're going forward absolutely yes ma'am um great that was question uh sort of question number two I I'm this this is my I don't know how to how you all might be able to answer this one or not but so the gaps we see are just even looking at the uh initial a reading a math scores are are pretty big um and I'm I'm wondering if you have any sense of how those gaps the gaps that we see in our district compare with other districts compare nationally so I'll let Dr senson talk about how if she has any comparison points for nationally we obviously um with the division of schools we concern ourselves with closing the gaps internally right and so
059we look at the promising data in particular those quintiles and moving children out of quintile one into the higher they can't cross proficiency if they don't move out of those ranges first um and so then when we look at benchmarks obviously we're talking about acquisition of Standards versus those skills and so um I'll let Dr Stenson answer your basic question of do we have data as to how we compare nationally um I just wanted to start by saying that's obviously the first thing we look at and the power of the assessment Suite is that every school can drill into every data point for every kid and answer the question where is this child compared to where they were this time last year or this time last week and um they do a very good job
060of that so I'll let Dr Stinson answer the national question yeah I by the way just cheated and while we were sitting here I didn't realize we're out went in the parent dashboard and looked at my own students scor so I do know that this is also possible for parents that are out there can go in and find the information right now if you'd like yes and uh the short answer is that as I mentioned the the Norms were created in 2019 they were pretty careful um to have a wide range of students and student abilities but two things one is we do not at this time have data on how students are performing this year nationally on um fast Bridge um however I would be amenable to like asking fast if they have any
061you know illuminate who's the parent company if they have anything they can share with us so that we can gather that information and talk about it you know either at a further board meeting or in a work session or just individually um and uh to reiterate uh Dr Bellamy's point you know uh the the data are most powerful at that student level and in the hands of the teacher looking at their progress and we have all kinds of tools in use to see that students are not slipping percentile wise wherever they start um from so that's yeah a non-answer that no it's helpful I mean I I think the idea is just to have a sense as we are looking to make progress on closing gaps you know where are we in that not just
062on our own progress but sort of generally speaking how are we doing and National might not be a good comparison I'm just trying to get a I'm trying to get a sense of gaps exist in a lot of places we all would like for them not to we all want to be making progress on that but I I don't I don't know that I have a good sort of mental image in my mind of how to compare that um as we're trying to move forward on it um and then um so on the on the benchmarks or sorry on the a reading a math um and benchmarks on on those I know Dr battle one of the things within sort of the Strategic goals for the distruct and the focus outcomes is to is to
063see where more than 50% of students are making progress on their benchmarks meeting or meeting or on on Benchmark right fast day that one is a reading and a math sorry I'm getting my things confused and so we would the first time we would expect to see any like that would be in the winter is that correct it would be in the winter screening which we would be able to report on usually in February okay great just just to set expectations correctly for myself and anyone else who's paying attention to those numbers and and that data um and then the the last question I have is just um one of the things that we had just talked about in evaluation uh at our last meeting was Fifth and eth grade last year which I'm not
064sure if that means that you know we sort of are trying to pay attention to Fifth and eighth grade this year or if it's Sixth and nth or um but I would just if there's anything that you all learned from this round of Assessments on that and and what we what things if there's other stuff that we're pivoting toward with those I'd be interested in hearing um so we are able to look at Benchmark data at school level at the grade level across the district at grade levels you have to be very careful in making interpretations broadly that way because the the tests are rather short and they do cover sometimes different content as our scope and sequence has changed so even looking at the group of the cohort of students that went from fifth
065to sixth grade and saying last year they were let's say arbitrarily 30% and now they're 32 is not necessarily accurate to say they're 2% better right depending on how many questions were on that test and where the cut score Falls the difference between getting seven questions rer eight can wildly sling swing a district percentage especially when you're looking at at a grade level across so it's difficult to look year to year with our Benchmark system that particular way because of a lot of of nuances in the data so that's why we encourage all of our schools to drill down um my EDS drill down by their Network they put their principles in groups within their Network to look at where were you this time last year both where were third graders last year to where
066were third graders this year and then where were third graders last year to those kids that are now fourth graders so we do exactly what you're asking for in particular at the school level where it's the most powerful across the district level and again even at our schools I would caution them and say Don't just assume that 30 last year and 30 this year for the same grade level of students means that everything's fine like that that those test are wildly different that's why you need to look at the cut scores and determine um based off off the the work that illuminate that Ree and all those folks are doing um and looking at each of these benchmarks almost as the individual data point that they are so we really hesitate and and urge folks
067to if you're going to go into a comparison route that way to really know what you're doing understand the two different test and be careful what kind of judgments you make about that the more powerful thing to do is to look at this point in time and say as of October 6 this group of students mastered this level of content in this way then you just formulate your teaching for November and December the same way right yes yeah I guess it's just like I would assume then so what what things do we use to try and track some of those items from last year that we we had as concern so in particular the grade band you're talking we can make some statements and I do have some data that points to we should feel
068pretty good about where we're at right now as a whole compared to where we were this time last year right and again that's an obviously a generalized statement right um when we look at problem areas that we had last year it's the reason that I IM data was presented to you tonight or the I am Trends right because we recognize that's a place where we struggled last year it's why English to was presented to you this evening third grade because the retention law so we absolutely dig in there we know what the the item types our kids tend to struggle with um and so we layer those things into the scope and sequence into our professional development for our principles for our coaches proactively and then when we get the data coming from this year's
069assessment we can react accordingly to how they did there thank you yes ma'am yeah appreciate it thank you any other board member board member trans excuse me yeah I was wondering if there were any accommodations for non-native English speakers because that could possibly explain the large gap in the reading benchmark um thank you for that question it's very insightful question um so on a reading and a math the graphs that you saw that were uh horizontal right yeah where we showed the gaps thank you um those tests actually do not allow for accommodations because they are part of our screening suite and they are looking to determine exactly what skills might be lacking so when you see a very large gap for example between e students and the the average uh G the average um
070National percentile for a student that is not accommodating for a child that may have have a reading disability benchmarks do allow for those accommodations and so the Benchmark that Dr Williams presented to you um any child that has an accommodation be it an English learning accommodation or an e accommodation or a 504 accommodation they would have received that so the information we get uh about their standards acquisition on benchmarks we can really take out of the take out whether or not they were struggling to access the content and we can we can understand their standards acquisition for the a reading and the a math those accommodations are not occurring because the nature of that test is that we need to identify the gaps and what what's existing there thank you any other board member um
071I have one question request so if we would had maybe like a 30 or 60 second sound bite to relate this to the lay person how will we kind of sum up this ass this this assessment is that a fair question yeah my sound bites coming those highlights that we H that we had for you that overall right now this group of students um are by and large doing better at this point in the year than our group of students were last year and those students last year were by and large doing better than the ones before and so we have a long history of making solid growth here in Metro Nashville we're going for a three repat um and it it it's going to happen we're going to three repeat and the trends right
072now to me the sound bite is that the trends are showing we're well on our way to a three repeat okay thank you I'm sure Dr battle probably has a better way of saying it works for me I I know sometimes you know we who do this um for a while we get immersed and there a jargon that we get into and then sometimes we like what how schools are doing so be able we can um repeat uh for people to digest exactly how well we're doing the growth that we're doing that there's steady progress and that's steady and solid um that hopefully we can reinforce this as Leaders um from the district and as elected leaders into the communities and just one thing I want to add it does um give an indication that
073a lot of the key strategies and initiatives we have in place are working um for our students and so again I want to charge this board this community um to come alongside us to help us um deepen our practices and to be laser focus and to um decrease any distractions to our Educators in being able to Double Down um on the strategies and the practices that we are seeing over time are working um for our young people and you know if we can grow every student every year that is extremely positive for us and we'll see the impact of that in both growth scores and um success rates and so uh come alongside us help us um maintain a laser focus on the right things um that work um for students and please please please
074help us to decrease any distractions from that work so that we can pour into our young people and into our Educators um both certificate and support staff thank you thank you Dr my apologies we neglected to go to our last and perhaps one of the most important slides of how can our board support so it's in your packet and it's on the screen we just continue to ask for your support in the use of a comprehensive assessment system um Be A Champion for our teachers which you always are teachers principles and school communities and continue to advocate for transparency and our accountability systems utilized by the state thank you for the opportunity to speak to you tonight thank you uh we have can I just add one thing on that last Point continue to advocate
075for transparency and measurements that include student growth all the time in every aspect of our accountability systems thank you Schoolboard member uh nbal K sure okay thank you very much uh we appreciate your presentation thank you for informing us uh and you can take your seats thank you Dr battle um now we'll move on to public participation um I believe we have three um people who are um to speak um we ask that you speak on a topic um that is gerain or that's on the agenda and you will have um three minutes to speak so we will start with Mr Caleb Taylor Mr Caleb Taylor going once going twice okay Miss Sophia pain good evening Dr Adrien battle chair player and members of the board my name is Sophia Payne and I am a
076senior at Hillsboro High School I here on behalf of Sunrise Hillsboro which is a part of the larger National Sunrise movement first I wanted to address the contract with jjca then I will explain why I'm here on behalf of the sunrise movement later I will wrap up my comments I wanted to First acknowledge the work that the mmps school board is doing to improve the classrooms and overall facility at Percy priesta Elementary School I'm so thankful for the work the mmps school board and other stakeholders have put in during the last couple of years to establish a targeted plan for creating additional space for the predicted growing number of students at Percy Priest I understand how important it is for the school board to focus on the needs of students like myself to improve unique
077learning experiences and support character development specifically I was excited about the future of mmps schools when I realized that current School renovation projects like the one at Percy Priest are strategically implementing lead certification and improved Energy Efficiency I think it is crucial that we continue to take action to address many of the local and Global environmental problems we are seeing like an increase in flash flooding in Nashville with this in mind there's a need for further environmental initiatives in our school district which brings me to why I'm here today our group of students at Hillsboro form a part of the national Sunrise movement which is currently advocating for passing the green New Deal for schools at the Congressional level locally however we are hoping to collaborate with the mmps school board and increasing sustainability across
078the school district at Percy Priest for example this could include using the new school construction to address aspects of the Nashville waste issue or to implement outdoor educational opportunities through pollinator Garden creation you may may be asking why the school board what role do we have in this the school board is in a unique position in that it has the connections and resources to make a more meaningful impact than we could ever make on our own especially through existing initiatives like the rebuilding of Percy Priest Elementary thank you for the opportunity to speak to you tonight thank you Miss pay uh Hayden Mr Hayden lens good evening Dr Adrien battle chair and members of the board my name is Hayden Legends and I'm a sophomore at Hillsboro High School I'm here on behalf of Sunrise
079Hillsboro which is part of the larger National Sunrise movement our goal is to make school safer and environmentally friendly and we can only do that with your help in early September I imagine you are familiar with this a natural gas Lake happened at Old Center Elementary School and the students had to be temporarily relocated to Goodletsville Elementary School which is about 2.5 mil away I imagine I say this for everyone involved we'd like to thank you for handling situation as well as you did being able to relocate that many students at such a short notice was an extremely hard job and we thankfully pulled it off a good school board is very important for a community in all schools and we're very glad to see we have one that cares despite hailing it well it
080is easy to imagine learning was affected for the students and because of climate change situations like this are happening more because of bad or harsh weather but on a more personal and smaller scale climate change makes natural disasters more common this increase storms and tornadoes causes power outages and maybe even the destruction of houses this can vent students from staying home having fresh shoed having clean clothes and even being able to do the school work my own friend lost his power for 29 days straight after a blackout we know that you value equity and education and this is a step towards it because our neighborhoods are affected by these natural disasters and we want to make sure these students have the same opportunities as everyone else I mention this because Sunrise Hillsboro would love to
081work with you on future projects and current projects like the old Center Renovations in our cluster and District we're part of a national initiative to ask schools and school boards to raise a bar on environmentally sustain aable practices and provide a safe ecofriendly eco-friendly place for students to thrive this could look like locally resourced Foods disaster housing for students and bling new schools to leave certification Sunrise is about uniting for the good of our community and the health of our planet we see that you're already taking major steps in this direction and we'd like to commend you yet challenge you all to do more we hope that there can be a space for student input or involvement in future projects our goal is to make school safer and more eco-friendly uh thank you for your
082time thank you Mr L that is the end of public participation we will move on to the consent agenda um I will entertain a motion to approve the consent agenda so move move by chair um Schoolboard member Nal Ken is there a second second second by uh member Hayes Mae Mae thank you oh got that I picked that up um okay all in favor we still have to call the roll even though okay okay um M Dr seir we do roll call please I hi I hi five eyes okay we have five eyes it passes um we'll move on to board reports we do not have any board reports because we had no committee meetings prior to this Schoolboard meeting we will move on to announcements um we will go with District three no oh
083yeah cuz she's is gone too uh District 4 good afternoon um I just have a couple of announcements uh first of all I want to uh thank Dr Stinson and Dr Williams for your presentation on data as well as board members for the questions uh that you raised today um thank you Dr battle and your leadership and the work that you are doing um with your team to support our district truly appreciate it um I do want to highlight um a week ago two weeks ago um we attended the Council of great s City Schools conference in San Diego California um was where I was able to witness um the great leadership within this District um do presentations um about uh a lot of the wonderful things and great things that we are doing in
084the district and leading the conversation Across the Nation if you're not familiar with the Council of great cter schools it's a convening of large um Urban Public Schools across the country um and so uh uh to be in the company of of uh of large Public Schools or school districts across the country um and to lead some of this work with um mnps is is just a great um opportunity I was also able to present with um Mr Ashford Hughes um at that conference as well as um chair Errol rod was able to present with Dr battle um in some of this work so it was a great conversation and and as I always Echo um it's really great to see that mnps um is leading the nation um in a lot of the work
085that we are doing and and really being recognized at that level um secondly I do want to announce mavic high school has a play coming up uh starting this week on Friday the 17th um the Raider theater presents 12 Angry jurors um from the original Tel Drama by Reginald Rose uh it will be hosted at mcgavic high school starting on Friday November 17th um at 7 pm Saturday November 18th uh there will be two shows at 2 and 7 um and then on Sunday November 19th at 2 pm also uh lastly there will be uh uh the Tennessee School Board association annual conference will convene um this week um and several of us board members will be attending uh that conference so we look forward to convening with school board members across our state um
086learning more about what's going on in our state um a as well as opportunities to Advocate on behalf of mnps um and some of the issues that we are experiencing in our state two things I want us to keep in mind is one if you're are not familiar with it please make sure that you are researching and looking at um our state relinquishing Federal funding uh for Education this is an important topic um that they are currently convening And discussing um I don't know how plain I can put it um as it being a really bad idea but it is something that they are considering and um as community members and as taxpayers we really really need to look at that and look at the implications it will have on schools and school districts as
087well as your children and what that impact looks like um and the second thing that um that is very important as well is the States move to a a a through F grading system um that will be impacted in our district as well and what that means for children within our schools so those are two important policy decisions that are happening in our state please look up that information please research it I ask all of our community to be involved in this and Advocate with your state and local officials um related to this and if you have family outside of Davidson County I encourage you to talk to them to talk to their legislators as well um this is this is not only going to impact mnps but this is a Statewide um issue that
088will impact communities across our state and children across our state so thank you um and you guys have a wonderful will we see you before Thanksgiving we won't see you until after Thanksgiving so have a wonderful Thanksgiving with your family um and Community thank you District Six sorry I thought we were going to go in order but five is not here yeah five yes thank you so much um okay I just have a few announcements first I want to give a big shout out and congratulations to several of our cheer squads from across mnps they competed in the state Dance and Cheer championships at MTSU on November 4th uh third Good Marshall Middle School can Ridge High School Antioch high school and Overton High School are the ones that I know of there may have
089been others Hillsboro was oh look and Hillsboro High School and a big shout out to coach Davis at Antioch High School this was the first time ever that Antioch High School competed and let me tell you something I was so proud of all of these young ladies they did such an amazing job I saw that face she's just making sure you're right about the an you got to watch them I'm telling you got to watch them all right and uh a big shout out thank you so much to the students and Educators at Stratford STEM Magnet High School for the invitation to participate in the womenin law panel disc discussion this morning I participated with two additional colleagues it was extremely uh fun for me and it was especially fun because I was able to
090make the connection between law policy and education so I think that we are going to be in good hands with these future lawmakers um and it was a great group of young ladies so thank you for that uh and this past week we held the Antioch and canbridge Joint cluster pack meetings we had several parents that were present and they were excited about reforming the pack in southeast Nashville and thank you to my colleagues Dr nabal mckenny and Miss O'Hara BL for attending and sharing information about the pack meetings that are happening in their clusters right now I think that was a big selling point for the parents that attended that meeting we will have future meetings and those will be announced uh via my socials and Via newsletters so be on the lookout for
091that and um wanted to put a reminder out that the Nashville MLK Day youth committee is still looking for students to join the planning committee the youth committee will begin meeting weekly each Wednesday at 4:30 after Thanksgiving via Zoom so it's a a virtual meeting time uh and the meetings will be held leading up to the MLK Day youth Symposium event on January 13th this year the youth Symposium will be held at um K academic magnet school from 9:00 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. and students who participate in the youth committee planning committee will earn community service hours so any of those seniors out there who are in still in need of community service hours this is a great opportunity for you to get your your service hours um you can reach out to um the
092to join if you are interested in joining send us an email at Nashville MLK Day events gmail.com and we will get you signed up for the meetings and the future planning and you will also have an opportunity to participate in all of the MLK day week of events activities Additionally the MLK day week of events will kick off with the annual MLK Day Gala on January 11th at the Cal Turner Center on the campus of mahary Medical College tickets for this event are on sale and can be obtained via event bright information on all of the MLK Day events can be found on the MLK website it's MLK nashville.com events will begin on January 11th and with the annual Gaya and wrap up on January 15th with the annual convocation program that will be held
093on the campus of Tennessee State University where we will have our featured keynote speaker Miss Nikki Giovani go ahead say it FIS guite F guite yes thank you very much all the events with exception of the Gaya are free and open to the public and uh in the spirit of the season I want want to wish everyone a Happy Thanksgiving but let's just be mindful that not everybody can make mac and cheese this is not the time to start testing your Mac and Cheese skills if you are not that person who can make it stay away from the mac and cheese and turn it over to somebody who can but Happy Thanksgiving everybody enjoy your holiday thank you very much uh District Seven I don't have any announcements District 8 can the same go for
094mashed potatoes yes I feel very strongly about mashed potatoes yes um uh March 27th at Hillsboro High School at 6 p.m. I'm going to be hosting a meeting to talk about the proposed um changes to magnet school policy um I have put that out on social media sent it to pto's in the area um anyone who I have received an email from about this particular issue um and any other way I can think of to let folks know but March 27th 6 p.m. at Hillsboro High School right now in the community room but um we might be we might have to change location given um interest that um in the meeting um said March 27th did I say March I keep saying that I did that it's November November 27th I'm really well prepared extraordinarily
095well prepared I have done this multiple times and you know the reason why and this is actually it's not because March 27th is in my head because that was the day of the Covenant shooting and so it has stuck in my head and I've done this unfortunately several times so sincere apologies November 27th um I wanted to just quickly thank um Hayden and Sophie Rose for coming to talk about the sunrise movement and and also for supporting um work that's already happening at a couple of our schools and and being concerned about the work that we'll do going on um going forward to make sure that our uh our buildings are uh keeping track of of the environment so that they have an En environment um to enjoyy as they are older um thanks to
096um councilman preti for his involvement in the books Brothers initiative that was um super cool I'm very excited about that um and I lastly I just want to say thank you to Dr battle and her team because regularly in my head when I see presentations about data all I can think is know where you are but don't stay there so um thank you for the constant reinforcement of that as a mantra know where we are but don't stay there so that's it thanks so again November this month the 27th Monday after Thanksgiving 6 PM Hillsboro High School in the community room did I say it correctly that time you did okay I'm proud of you thank you you're welcome District nine yes um so ga Elementary is having their book fair this week and it
097started yesterday it'll go through the rest of this week and they need more grocery bags for students to bring home their purchases so if you are a Gower family and you have some pox or kroer bags laying around please send those in with your child tomorrow so that um other students will be able to bring their their purchases home um West me is having their family literacy night on November 28th from 5: to 7: they'll have their book fair at that time that'll be going on there'll be other fun opportunities that evening um if you are a West me family I highly recommend you come out on that date and then um finally just a moment to celebrate our Orchestra students um Orchestra students from Lawson NSA mavic MLK and hum fog joined together to
098form the mnps honor Orchestra earlier this week at Lawson high school and I'm really proud that our best Orchestra Orchestra student members were able to use our state-of-the-art facilities at Lawson and the sound was superb as well well as the playing so um just wanted to take a minute and celebrate them I know how hard they have to work to get to that point and they deserve some recognition for that that hard work thank you uh student member TR hi I just wanted to reiterate that me mental health is very important taking care of yourself is very important both physically and mentally so you can be okay emotionally I'm still working on that too but everyone else here should work on that as well and I hope everyone has a good Thanksgiving break even though
099the origins of that holiday are questionable everyone has a happy holiday enjoys their time off thank you Schoolboard member Mitchell it's been a minute y'all I'm so glad to be back um so I want to firstly you know apologize for my uh my tardiness basketball season is coming y'all and Hillsboro cheers is real so I made it um and so yes you know I'm always going to say support uh mmps Athletics um these students work very these student athletes work very very hard to manage their time to balance and they put a lot of effort and so we need Community Support always um with that um I was invited to National School of the Arts to see their play um bright their musical excuse me bright star um which they did a phenomenal job so
100of course the Athletics would also support the Arts it is play season as Dr nabama McKinny said so go support go look at your school your local schools nine times out of 10 they have some production going on right now so go support them in Nashville's NSA National School the Arts they did such a phenomenal fantastic but both they did such an amazing job um and I really really would love to see uh investment in them because I feel like National School of the Arts our arts school should be the Pinnacle of Arts in Metro I'm be they don't have a set of the art LW in theater they don't they don't y y'all got a nice theater you know what saying so you know I know we're working to get everybody on lawon level
101I feel like everything we're comparing lawon but you know it's a nice school but you know I would love to see some investment into NSA because they did such a phenomenal job and the Arts are so important and such an integral part of be creating well-rounded students and well-rounded people um and then I know board member ma is always going to talk about her Antioch school so you know I do have to say I always know you know you're G to go hard but I'm ready to go Megs Megs Hillsboro and Overton we all at the cheer competition too just saying I know you know saying an and C they did good but we were there too um um and then of course I want to acknowledge U my Sunrise Hillsboro lovely you guys did
102an amazing job and over the last month just going to different Summits and different events I've been meeting so so many amazing students and it is always so awesome to see students using their voice and advocating for what they care about and what's important to them so kudos to you all and kudos to all of the mmps students out there who are doing great things so I hope everyone has a great week a great Thanksgiving holiday and I will see you guys next time yes Jeremy iiz I meant to say this earlier um going off of what uh board member nbat mckenny said tomorrow um is the last meeting this week of the joint working group on federal education funding there will be two meetings tomorrow one at 9:00 a and 1 at 100 p.m
103both meetings will be held in the Senate hearing room so if you interested in uh listening in on those meetings they will be they will be streamed live but you can also go down to Capitol Hill and sit in that chamber and listen to the foolishness yourself if you so choose to but uh again those meetings will be at 9:00 am and at 1 p.m and for anyone who cares to join and I would suggest that anybody who is interested which should be all of us please please pay attention to what's going on on Capitol Hill thank you thank you I hope everyone have a wonderful Thanksgiving break with your chosen family or your real family and uh Happy Thanksgiving and this meeting is adjourned this has been a service of the Metro Nashville network
104if you would like to see this presentation again or for more information on this and other programs visit nashville.gov